These are texts from December 16, and to recap, I met this man on an online dating site.  We started chatting through their messenger, and then through text, but he had to leave his home in Beverly Hills to work in Brazil for a couple of months.  We now talk through Google Hangouts but these men also like Kik, Viber and any other sites where they are using an app.  They've never used an iPhone and their calls are brief if they even call. They usually can't call and I'm slightly amazed at the difficulty in getting a call from international business people who would in theory call people as part of their work flow. It's a 9 hour flight to the obscure city he's in, but as a point of reference, it's not too far from Rio de Janeiro.  I know how to look up a map which is fun when they start talking about places they live. Since there's no way he could possibly see me right now, he's making sure I'm emotionally connected to him and only him.  He promises to come see me for Christmas though.  I will spare you the many times I'm asked about work, or what I'm eating or the ways he expands on the details of my life I have shared.  There's a definite schedule to our communications.  It's early morning until about noon, typically. Then it drops off until much later (almost like a whole 9 hours because he talks to me like he is working all day, but then drops off like he has a shift he really can't text through).

He's my good morning texter and I'm grateful that he's learning I don't need that to be at 5 in the morning.  He's established himself as the earliest texter because normal men try to keep it much more casual.  Like annoyingly casual.  Like I know that phone is in your hand, and you saw what I had to say, and yet your brief reply needs a day and a half to marinate and form.  Your disinterest is calculated or you really suck at multiple conversations at once.  They also freak out if you say more than you like them and want to hang out in the first month and a half.

Being punctual helps with his schedule for me, and his language still gets me.  I mean, he grew up in New York but hasn't once said it was "a mad boring flight." He has lived in LA for years and his "resume work daily" is the sound of a foreigner applying natural language rules to the unnatural craziness of English.

The hustle is what he knows and that is how he connects to me.  He asks a lot about what I do, when my breaks are, will I get in trouble for texting him.  He notices the spaces when I ignore him because I'm in a meeting or training someone else.  The distance means a 20 minute car ride but I steal the hour to clear my thoughts.  If he were really someone I could see growing a relationship with, I would insist on a call during my car ride because my car has an awesome hands free system for calls.

Babe.  Miss you.  How's work.  I could never get lost in his depth.  That makes me sad.

Food.  And watching a picture of me while he eats.  This doesn't say creepy at all.  Again he's connecting through things that hardly matter because he's really trying to matter.  If I feel like he's interested in my minutiae, then maybe he's the only one that cares for me and I'd better keep him close to me.

Maya Angelou once wrote that jealousy is like salt.  A little can enhance the savor.  Too much spoils a meal.  I see it as insecurity.  The lack of confidence is not sexy.  It's clingy and vile. Don't do this.  Real or fake, clingy insecurity, jealousy and possession are a major turn off.  Besides, would you want a prisoner, or a person that doesn't need you but chooses you? I'd always prefer to be a choice.

Love sick puppy willing to country hop can sound fun.  But I've never met him.  That's a lot of pressure and a whole lot of creeptastic going on right there.

The amazing thing about smartphones is they come with world phones.  It's two taps for me to see his time and it looked like 4 in the morning.  I shouldn't have a better idea of your time zone than you do.

He might not do this for any other person but he follows a scripted pattern that others have already done.

I was bored, so I thought I'd have him remind me of his story before seeing if I could pick it apart.

If you ask any other American that lived through the 9/11 terror attacks, they could tell you exactly what they were doing.  I was on bedrest with Kid1.  I was asleep when my ex called to see if I could tell him what was on the news.  I was confused about him telling me what had just happened because I was watching the second plane live.  I couldn't imagine the same accident happening twice and I couldn't understand that it was done on purpose.

He claims to be American. He would have lived through it. I felt rage at this point.

Earlier this week he said he was close to marriage and she died.

Forever seems so long.  I give this one another week or two at the most.

I'm really great at lying through text.  See what I did there?

He wants to marry me, and can't tell that I used song lyrics on him.  *Epic Facepalm, just short of bruising*

This tells me he'll pop the question in less than 7 days.  Will he ask for a gift card, money, a phone, cash a check he'll have mailed to me, use a credit card . . . They possibilities are endless but these are the usual.

Yes, he thinks I would want to go through diapers and sleepless nights and the cost of a child with someone I have just met and started talking to for 5 days.

I offer many opportunities for them to slow down a bit.  They never do.

Isolation looks like a hunger for love and acceptance.  He's hoping by Christmas I will see him as family and worth every hard earned penny I would otherwise use on my kids.