As I am sitting in the tent, eating my supper, Yours Truly is considering the current situation. We had to set up an emergency camp on a mountain plateau, far from any suitable location. The plan was quite different but due to the deep and intractable snow and darkness we have been left with no choice but to sleep here and backtrack the entire trajectory thus far.
At times like these, one cannot but contemplate the vagaries of life. We had a plan; it was a good plan. But it completely desintegrated. (As the military folks are apt to point out, no plan survives contact with the enemy.)
Yours Truly also has some plans. If you have read my previous posts, you know that I am working on being a better me. It is not easy but – not unlike a shark – if I stop moving, that will be the end of the line. Eventually, the aim is to be the kind of person that would be successful in interpersonal relationships, and especially the romantic kind. So as I am biding my time in a cold tent in the middle of a mountain plateau, with high winds battering the sides of the tent, on the eve of the Ex’s birthday, I am striving to figure out how is it possible that an exceptionally bright and beautiful young woman, 13 years my junior, would show romantic interest in Yours Truly. To date, we have only gone out on a few dates (though snogging was involved) and she is amazing. She loves a lot of the same things I love and same goes for things we hate. We have a tremendous amount of things in common. And I don’t know how to react and what to do with myself. Am I still in love with the Ex? Am I ready for a relationship with someone new? Does she even want one? How do I not screw this up? This new girl – let us refer to her as T. – is  by far more pleasant, far smarter, better writer, and more beautiful than the Ex. And yet I do still think about the Ex. To my credit, this does not happen as often as before and, since meeting T., the intensity of emotions has greatly declined. Will she be the one to help me out of my ennui and perhaps more? Or am investing too much, too early and am simply setting things up for a disappointment? The latter is most likely true. But I yearn for someone to hold me close and see me for who I truly am and what I can become. For now, though, I am stuck in a tent with two other guys, hundreds of miles/kilometres from home and T.