Miracle

A week ago, a new friend (or friend in the making, since I've still only met her once) assessed my relationship with my guy to be a "miracle", both because of the way we've sustained it across an uber-long distance and because, as far as she can see, we have nothing in common.  I smiled, because I can see what she means - our interests and temperaments are quite different.  He's laid back, generally quiet, leisurely-paced, and doesn't worry about much (except when it comes to sports), while my desire to control my circumstances and enact change pushes me toward anxious rambling and occasional jarring decisions.  I am much more intense in my beliefs and in my moods than he is - he's not at all ideological.  But as I told my friend in an intentional understatement, I'm quite fond of him, even though we are different - even because of the ways we are different, because for the most part, so far we have been able to use our differences balance and complement each other rather than clashing.

And it isn't actually true that we have nothing in common - we are both some sort of math nerds, and a lot of our preferred style of living is the same - straightforward, avoiding pretense and striving to be true to ourselves.  Neither of us easily accepts anything as not possible or too difficult to try - we crave new experiences in new places, and in this I can see some of the passion beneath his calm surface.  A key theme for us is a shared sense of "why not?"  As in, why not try to be in this improbable relationship?  Why not pursue this surprising but wonderful connection that we have, as far as we can take it in this life?  We know it's uncommon in some ways, and that's part of what we value about it -- that it's not socially automatic or instinctive, but at the same time there's something really universal about us as humans that enables us to connect across traditional boundaries.

I guess all this is to say, I'm quite fond of him, and I'm excited about what we've started together.