I worked with an older man who I just really really really liked. I was early 20's, he was late 40's. I wasn't some naive kid, I was totally embarrassed how much I was digging him. I would have been so embarrassing had people known my feelings for him. I'm a straight woman, but sometimes I struggle to like men. I think I just grew up with too many bullying older brothers. But this guy was just awesome sauce. Mr. Zen, easygoing, inner calm, gentle, extremely kind. He was divorced, no kids. We had wonderful talks that would go on for hours. Just really introspective conservations that I haven't had replicated since. At some point I made up my mind that if he wanted sex, I'd be down for it. SECRETLY, of course. In no way would I want a relationship. Tres embarrassing. He wasn't physically attractive, there were times he would step into the sunlight and I could see all his loose flesh and wrinkles, and you know how with older men their ears keep getting bigger and it looks like it was glued onto the side of their skull, well it ain't hot. But there was still this massive chemistry between us. An older female friend of mine called it the 999 lb gorilla, in that no matter how much two people try to resist it, it feels like a 999lb gorilla is swinging the two together. I went over it in my mind for MONTHS, because I've judged friends before who've dated much older men, and I was surprised how it finally came to pass over me. I really evaluated my own naivety, his own ick-factor by his flirting with a much younger woman, and I think I decided that I liked him enough as a person to forgive him that and overlook it.

I could tell he was into me but would NEVER have made a move, so one weekend I decided to join my company's picnic/baseball shindig. (Which I usually avoid because they always place out in another county and no buses go there). But I snagged a ride over and sat the game out, and halfway through he chose to sit the game out too to sit with me on the bleachers and we just talked for ages. (Something about summer, baseball bleachers, bbq, just always puts people in a good mood). I just turned up the flirt factor 100%, which was extremely hard as I'm not a flirtatious person. I asked him to give me a ride home, I asked him to pull over to take a picture of a flax field, (but really I wanted to pull over and get the goddamn thing over with) and I think I pretty well bluntly asked him to kiss me. And he did. Much of it. And he drove me to his house and we had sex.

And I regret it. The sex was really really nice. But he NEVER initiated things, it was always me, and after I got hired at a different place, I think I lost interest. We had a really nice friendship that went awkward because I insisted on it, because I didn't know how to separate admiration from desire. I think casual sex works for some people, but I can't do it without feeling awkward. I'm in my late 20's now, and when I meet people at 21/22, it feels like a massive age gap when really it isn't. But people go through a tremendous maturing period in their early 20's, and I'm recognizing now how young I was (and in many way still am) even if I was in so many ways otherwise mature. I can't ever look back on my time with him as anything but awkward, which sucks, because I do feel we had a really lovely time as friends. (And that handful of time we were.... oh god I can't say the word 'lovers' with a straight face).