Chapter Six: Lost in Translation - True Story

Sunday Funday 23AUG26

Sunday morning started on a great note, Porsches and Pilates! What a workout, LOL! These beauties (and more) were just chillin about for our viewing pleasure. After such an amazing time, I thought I would stop by the other car show in the afternoon... 

There are some interactions in life that I will probably never completely understand. I'm learning that maybe I don't need to.

I met someone through Instagram. We exchanged numbers, talked on the phone, video-called and eventually crossed paths several times in person through the exotic-car community. He told me he was divorced, so naturally I understood him to be single.

Nothing serious ever happened between us. There was some harmless flirting and joking. At one event, he jokingly referred to me as his “wife.” I joked back about needing a prenup. He laughed and told me that a girl like me wouldn't need one. Another time, after I showed him pictures I had taken of his car, he encouraged me to post them.

To me, these were ordinary, playful interactions between two adults who knew of each other's existence.

Apparently, somewhere along the way, something became lost in translation.

The next time I encountered him with his daughter, the energy felt different. I didn't approach them. I stayed with the people I had met and enjoyed myself at the church car show. I noticed the difference, but I dismissed the feeling because I have learned that not every strange feeling deserves an investigation.

Then came another encounter.

During a quick exchange where I approached him, I jokingly made a comment about him finding a good woman. His daughter quickly corrected me: he already had one.

I brushed off what I perceived as a hostile tone and kept the interaction moving.

But yea...

That was information I certainly wasn't expecting.

I had previously been told he was divorced, but I also realized that I did not know enough about his current life to decide what any of this meant. People reconcile. Relationships change. Families are complicated. Words get misunderstood. Circumstances evolve.

And most importantly, I don't know.

That sentence has historically been difficult for me.

I like truth. I like explanations. When something doesn't make sense, my instinct is to keep pulling at the thread until it does. And after recently discovering that someone else I knew through the same car community had misrepresented his marital status to me, anything involving ambiguity around wives, girlfriends and availability was probably going to hit an already-bruised nerve.

But two confusing situations do not automatically make two identical men.

Later, I sent him a video that included him walking away from his car with his daughter quickly following behind. From my perspective, it was a sweet, ordinary moment. I assumed he loved his kids, and since I had always seen him greeting people, shaking hands and enjoying these events, I thought it might be nice for him to have a candid video of himself with his family.

Boy, was I wrong! LOL.

I had already said I wasn't going to post it, but he nevertheless made it clear that he didn't want pictures or videos of himself and his children shared.

That part required no interpretation.

It was a boundary.

And boundaries don't require my agreement or understanding to deserve respect.

So I respected it.

I also decided to remove myself from the situation entirely. Not because I needed to punish him, expose him or determine who was right, but because sometimes the healthiest response to confusing energy is simply:

This is no longer somewhere I need to be.

And perhaps that is the larger lesson.

I don't regret being expressive. I don't regret being friendly. I don't regret assuming that people mean what they tell me. And I don't want one person's deception to transform me into someone suspicious, cold or afraid of people.

Most importantly, I don't want somebody else's misunderstanding of me to make me spend hours trying to prove that my heart was in the right place.

I know my intentions.

Other people are allowed to interpret me differently.

They are allowed to have boundaries I don't understand.

And I am allowed to quietly leave situations that no longer feel comfortable without assigning anyone the role of villain.

Maybe that's the change I need in my life, not becoming quieter, less emotional or less authentic.

Just learning that not every misunderstanding needs to be corrected, not every contradiction needs to be investigated, and not every uncomfortable ending needs someone to blame.

Sometimes I can simply respect the boundary, take the lesson and keep moving.

Whatever was lost in translation can stay there.