Too little time for love? That holds no relationship

This is the story of the end of a love. From my, so from a male point of view. But do not worry. This is no lament. I just want to talk about the impossibility of having a relationship with a working single mother.

It all started almost cinematic. On a warm summer evening, on the birthday of a mutual friend. She: "Hello, I'm? S, still know me?" Counter question, thought: Hello !? Is the pope catholic? Of course, I still knew them: there are girls who stay in the collective memory for a lifetime. "Yes, you are ... Annika, from the 11th c!"

"Ah!" like Annika. Two classes above me. I a year younger? so that one light-year away from her, far below her threshold of perception. Little comfort, I was not alone. At that time I did not know a boy who does not have a crush on her, and only one lucky person who was with her. "I even remember who your friend was," I said. "Tommy, with the red Mercedes-Benz." The best looking hippie of the school. After an hour we exchanged numbers. At your request, mind you, very important. That was like birthday and Christmas together. To ask for her number, would I have? little boy, big great girl? never dared. There are complexes that you can not get rid of. Since the existence remains an endless teen comedy or better: tragedy.

The first date I had imagined differently

First brisk sms traffic. Good thing, if you are a) writer and b) a bit shy. All the time against attractive women. And Annika looked fantastic even 30 years later. Simsen was like flirting from cover. The best: your answers were never long in coming. The mere "pling" of my cell phone every time a promise, plus correspondingly great feelings of happiness. In addition a pulse, which, I believe, in time with "Love Is In The Air" knocked.

Accordingly, the urge, "Ah!" to see Annika again: actions instead of words. Ignite the next stage. Go up to ... love? Only: "Let's meet!" That's so easy to simulate. The attempt to make letters an encounter? unfortunately much more difficult.

Annika was hard at work, often participated in free artistic productions in various cities and was on top of that? until the holidays? single parent, mother of a pubescent daughter. Since I am a father myself and not only sympathize with emancipation, but practice it? Half of my child lives with me ?, I know well what that means in the case of working and single mothers: double burden de luxe. A lot at the same time self-abandonment.

What I do not remember: how many weeks and text messages were between the birthday party and our second meeting. Feel another 30 years. Similarly stupid: The reunion was limited or not private. We met at the dress rehearsal of a play she had worked on. Annika steered me through the stage entrance. But not only me. No. A whole entourage was waiting for her. Almost a fan club. Almost ten people. I had imagined that differently. Somehow more intimate.

We just walked slowly towards each other

It's my own fault, I thought, that's what I expect. If you do not have it, you will usually be disappointed. Had better listen to the Buddhists: All suffering comes from wanting. How naive to think Annika could sit next to me during the play and spice up the staging with theater internals. Of course she was backstage. Most of the time. Besides, she feels most comfortable there, she once said. Where ever tried and improvised. In retrospect, it seems like a metaphor to me. As if she was also emotionally in the backstage area. Say for the friend largely invisible. So a miracle, that it came anyway, next eternity later, to the private premiere and we lay one evening in the arms.

However, I'll say the same, Amour fou is different. After Annika confessed to me that she had fallen in love (my answer, memoir: "What? Wow! Really? Did not know that you have room and time for such great feelings!"), I am immediately to her. Surrend the front door opened. Three stairs up. No one there. The apartment door ajar. I could hear her talking on the phone in the kitchen. With the tax consultant. Maybe I should have expressed surprise for the first time. Instead of always just to be amazed. And to train for the Understanding World Cup. Such a kind of love limbo: How low can you go? But accusations and demands bring nothing in my opinion: love and attention are gifts, not a fundamental right.

We were gentle with each other, almost shy: two wounds wounded in love with cotton-wool.After all, we were no longer 17, a bit perforated by Armor's arrows, emotionally scarred. A learning in slow motion. Good against wear, can be. Bad for real closeness. Take one step forward and two back. That's how it felt to me. There was always this residual uncertainty. This feeling of getting to know each other, which did not stop. And yet it worked well enough to want to see each other again and again.

On average, we met every two to three weeks. Decided too little, as I found. Maybe Annika also found. It could be. But, but, but. The many work, the child, the colleagues, the annoying ex-husband. Numinous reasons. Supposedly always desire versus reality, reality wins. It just misses her time. Her life was a single incident, she said. And I only one, I thought.

It has always been me who had to ask if we see each other, who tried to dock as an easy-care module in their lives. To squeeze me between them. Not only in her diary, but also between mother and daughter.

It gave me little to understand that she did not need a second father. And did not want to. Anyway, I had the feeling that she was acting behind the scenes against me. And the mother's undivided attention demanded in the rare moments when the work did not do that. Why else did she suddenly want to sleep in bed with Mama again? While I had to wiggle home after a visit to the cinema? After I last saw Annika I-don't-know. You had to be the Dalai Lama yourself to find that funny. My personal enlightenment: Children who want to prevent Mama's new boyfriend can be much more counter-productive than, say, mothers-in-law. Not least because children with their mothers? naturally? always be in first place. Then comes the job, the livelihood. And then, luckily, far behind in third place of the priority ranking, the friend. As a kind of luxury, maybe. Or nice gimmick.

The most reliable, apart from the great sex, if it took place, was the SMS traffic. Always went. And everywhere. Instead of a good night kiss, a good night greeting. Same in the morning. That also linked, somehow, virtually: district heating. That worked. A while. What never worked: planning weekends. Let alone a holiday together. In less than two years, we have no joke, made at most three trips. Twice a movie, and only once did Annika visit me in the country cottage in my weekend cottage for two days.

A kind of preview of what could have been

She came by train. No work, no child. Just a summer dress, a book, a bathing suit, a big smile. She was like a substitute. Your own doppelganger. Hard to recognize. And therefore a bit strange. Strange, I thought, what happens to single mothers when the children are with the father. No more and no less than a metamorphosis. All the attention that was suddenly released for the partner. As if she did not know where to go. Worse: as if you did not mean it. As if somehow you replace the child. And yet it was, so to speak, the great moment, the zenith of our relationship. A kind of preview of what could have been.

Had, would have, men's room. Then again the daily appointment tsunami. The job. The child. The missing time. I thought, what is there now because I still rumstressen? In my understanding, I had to behave well behind. I really wanted to go everywhere, just not on their stress agenda. Especially since one ends up with a single mother quickly on the ejection seat. Inevitably. Of daughter and work she can not separate well.

At some point, it was all too thin for me

When, nevertheless, much later, I gently raised my finger, "Hello, and me? We?? said, made homeopathic claims, Annika blamed her failed marriage. She was not that far yet. Or, generalizing: It's probably not for men. So very generally, previous relationship taken into account. Sorry. Occupationally too tight. And anyway, she already had a bad conscience towards me. That was, as I said, the last thing I wanted from her.

At some point, it was all too thin for me. And stupid. Where does selflessness stop, where does self-denial begin? Where does a relationship end, where does arbitrariness begin? When does the latte hang so low in the love limbo that you can not get through it any more? When should, should, as a friend on the plaster hit? And: what's in it? Except extrastress.

My forbearance was used up

After less than two years, my contingent of indulgence and indifference was used up. I fell in love with another, much younger woman. She was not 30. I did not talk about her age to Annika. Maybe for self-protection. The end: a shrug of the shoulders, a relieved sigh (maybe it's better that way !?) and, on my part, the realization that Annika's passionate busyness was just a pretext to keep me at bay. If it is true that love breaks all chains, then what she felt for me was probably not love.

Before now collective groaning, finding me all stupid and typically male and berating as Sugardaddy, because I fell in love with a much younger woman: The outer melt of youth was only part of the attraction. The other was the inner lightness that went with it. This feeling of weightlessness, of here and now instead of ifs and buts. That was so sexy. Unfortunately not very long: again no happy ending. But this is another story.