Even In Absence I was sitting at home one Friday evening around 9 o’clock, chatting online as I have too much tendency to do, when Elizabeth and I struck up our first conversation. We hadn’t been talking for very long when she mentioned that she lived near the Boston Pizza on Whyte Ave. I asked if it was busy there around 9:30 on a Friday night or if it would be easy enough for two people to get a table and some drinks.

“I think it would be,” she said, after a pause.

“I’ll meet you there at 9:30 then?” I asked.

“That sounds good,” she said, no pause.

On the drive there, I called up a friend and asked him to call me shortly after ten in case I needed bailing out of a bad date. When he called, though, I didn’t need the lifesaver; our conversation was as good as you could have expected from two nervous strangers. Afterwards, we went for a walk through the Legislature Grounds, embracing the unusually warm summer air and continuing a pleasant conversation that meandered around doubts and desires and dilemmas.

But pleasant conversation wasn’t enough. The spark between us was just that, a spark. Relationships don’t need sparks, they need enormous bonfires that illuminate faces so well that you can see your love even in absence.  ¶ 8:18 AM