I’m writing from a cab and the night air hitting my face through the open windows feels just about perfect.

I don’t normally take cabs, but see, it’s late. I’m tired. Like, I got-three-or-so-hours-of-sleep-last-night-tired. And the A train didn’t seem to be trying to come anytime soon. I found the two men in orange vests dusting off the subway rails–or whatever the heck it was they were doing down there–to be particularly disheartening, as one could only determine by watching them literally standing on the tracks that, no, the train was not anywhere close.

So now I’m speeding on some kind of big road in the general direction of my apartment. Well, my friends’ apartment. It’s not really mine at all.

But anyway.

I already mentioned the air, with good reason, for it really did feel noteworthy tonight. Past tense now, because I am inside, no longer writing from the back of a yellow cab.

But I didn’t mention this yet. A new friend confided in me tonight. We don’t know each other well, having really only talked once or twice, but we walked out of class together this evening, and, since I am generally starving after taking ballet and then capoeira, we stopped for some pizza. Barbecue chicken pizza. Because that’s all I ever want. But, I was saying–we talked for a while, and finally the the conversation looked like this:

Me: “I’m not trying to be in a serious relationship with anyone right now. Things have been real hard for me lately, and so I am being single. On purpose.”

We talked about that, and so I asked him what his thoughts are on the whole subject of wanting to be single or wanting to not be single.

Him: “Yeah, I am not looking for a relationship now, either…I mean, I had told myself four years and it’s only been three now…”

He drifted off, obviously having not quite given me the full context. So I waited. He took a deep breath and looked at me as he quietly continued with, “I used to be married.”

So many things happened inside as I heard him say these words.
Me too.
I get it.
You have no idea who you’re talking to.

But I listened a little more, letting him talk. And then I knew I could tell him. See, being a part of the capoeira group here in NYC has been wonderful for many different reasons, but one of them is that, here? I’m just Cisne. The dancer who can kick her face. The girl who catches on quick and has vowed to do handstands or else. She’s single. She has dreams, else why would she have moved here? Her past is only what she’s told people, and she’s told 98% of the people she trains with hardly anything at all.

And that’s been really kind of nice for me.

But I decided to tell this guy a little about Jess.

Deep breath.

“I used to be married, too,” I said.

Too.

What a word. So tiny, yet can make all the difference in the world for those of us who would feel alone, had somebody not told us something and followed it with too.

“Nobody else in the group knows,” he told me.

“Yeah,” I said. “Hardly anyone else know that about me, either.”

And then we talked about our respective relationships. Why they ended. How we are now. And well, it was a good time to be honest, I guess. Not that I am not honest other times–but I am not quite as transparent, I guess.

But it was good this evening.

It felt like a significant connection.

That usually happens when someone throws the word too in your direction; it’s kind of an anchor like that, I guess.