On top of every mountain

There was a great longing

For another even higher mountain

In each city longing for a bigger city

After all that we've been through

I know that I will always love you

From now until forever baby

I can't imagine anything better

- Dirty Projectors, "Stillness is the Move"

Narcissism: I'm happy with how my last post turned out, but those intense days don't happen very often (though it's been an eventful few weeks). This post is going to be my usual self-centered mope. Thanks for reading, anyway.

Since dating Collin, the only person with whom I've been "Facebook official," I've never been asked to be someone's girlfriend. I've had flings, some that went on for months, but I hear always the same phrases: "I'm not looking for anything serious right now." "I'd like to keep this casual." "I just don't see us having a long-term relationship." It's the same with the guy I'm seeing currently, who on our second date, as he leaned me up against his car to kiss me, decided to make it clear that he doesn't want a commitment. Later he clarified that while he doesn't plan to hook up with anyone else while dating me, "stuff happens."

That attitude has been weighing on my mind these past few weeks, both despite and because of the fact that in every other way, our time together has been wonderful. I feel supremely comfortable around him; he's considerate, intelligent, reliable, and easy to talk to. But I feel as if at any moment it could all break apart. He could meet some other girl, or simply grow tired of me and decide to call it quits. At times I've felt annoyed that he can't exercise enough self-control to try a real relationship, or that he doesn't seem to think I'm worth the effort. I feel so natural and open around him in every other way that this area of tension (which I've kept to myself) registers as a particular blemish on our relationship. I've considered telling him I'd like us to be exclusive to each other, weighing the importance of letting him know how I feel against the danger of driving him away by being clingy.

But last night I spent the night with him, this morning he cooked me breakfast, and then I went to work and met someone else. Though I've been at this mind-numbing minimum-wage job for a couple of weeks now, I hadn't met this coworker before. We hit it off immediately, exchanging easy smiles and conversation, and he kept inviting me to sneak off for smoke breaks during which he asked me interested questions about my life. I half-expected him and his roommate, who also works there, to invite me out for drinks after work; I ended up getting sent home early and abruptly, so it remains a mystery whether that would have happened.

I don't know if my coworker's interest is anything other than a natural curiosity about and enthusiasm for the new girl (I have to think of Mad Men, in which queen-of-the-secretaries Joan tells plain, quiet Peggy to enjoy being the office novelty while she can). And I don't know whether I'd like him quite as much outside of the work setting, where any connection is a welcome distraction and a bright spot in a long, boring day. Or if anything will happen between us whether or not we genuinely like each other. But suddenly I understood what my "boyfriend" of the past few weeks meant when he said that stuff happens. And why monogamy is so hard, because of course you can't stop that sudden, random attraction. I wonder whether I would have felt guilty about my workplace interactions today if I were in an official relationship.

As much as I crave the comfort and stability of a real boyfriend, I think I ultimately dread being trapped almost as much as guys do. Or maybe I'm just destined to never be happy with what I have. The relaxed domesticity of breakfasting with someone I really like was sweet and lovely, but it may have played a role in my sudden interest in someone else. When I went to Rome, it was nice to be able to talk about my boyfriend back home, and to spend dozens of euros calling him up from across the Atlantic. But here's a confession I don't think I've ever made: one night in the Campo di Fiori, in almost the exact place where I'd had a long and happy phone conversation with Collin a few hours before, I briefly and very drunkenly made out with an Italian man. It was stupid and meaningless and anonymous (I don't think I ever learned his name), but it's there to make me feel guilty. So are all the times I flirted with Collin's friends in front of him, sort of jokingly but sort of seriously. And then of course the joke was on me when Collin broke up with me and suddenly I wanted no one else.

I know I've covered this ground before, but Sylvia Plath speaks the truth about my dissatisfaction whether I'm torn between commitment and freedom, Minneapolis and Rockford, journalism and filmmaking, winter and summer, the city and the country: "If neurotic is wanting two mutually exclusive things at one and the same time, then I'm neurotic as hell. I'll be flying back and forth between one mutually exclusive thing and another for the rest of my days."