Old flame sparks

Last night's dream: Monday Night 9/3/2007
I ran into R-, a guy that I used to have a huge crush on in community college, 11 years ago. I'm not sure if he started working where I work, or I just ran into him nearby, but somehow we ended up arranging a lunch date. In the dream world, there was a very fancy restaurant on some high-up floor across the street from my work. We met there, I was very nervous and he very polite and basically just as I remembered him. We examined our menus for a long time and about the only thing I wanted to order that was available was lamb. There was a 2 or 3 page brochure-like spread explaining how their lambs were selected, with little cartoon pictures, the effect of which would presumably be making someone feel guilty for eating the lamb. I did not feel guilty, but I wondered what he would think if I ordered that, having the same menu and all. We made chit chat and he ordered silently by pointing to something on the menu. I ordered the lamb after all, and from something the waiter said I realized that he, too, had ordered the lamb, and we smiled, sharing the joke about the menu.

Then, my aunt N- showed up out of nowhere! She was being very annoying and nosy and wanting to know who he was (without saying so) and would not go away. Finally I was almost rude and she could no longer pretend not to know that she wasn't wanted there, as I wanted to have a private date, and she moved away (later I found she had only moved to a table around the corner). Then I discovered that her sister (no kin of mine) was there too, at a table near to us! I was extremely annoyed by these intrusions, but we continued on, talking quietly. I think the restaurant was French, because French songs from my youth (Allouette, etc) were playing and we talked about them, or else they just came up in conversation. I was very fluttery and smitten all over again and nervous, and he very gracious. Our elaborate lunch arrived and went on for quite some time (probably longer than my lunch hour allowed) before I woke up. The whole dream was very intense, but I don't remember feeling I was cheating or thinking about my husband, if he even existed in the dream world at that time.

In the waking world, nothing ever came of the crush except angst for me and discovering my obsessive personality, jealousy, stalking tendencies, etc. I also never indicated my feelings to him as I was excruciatingly shy at the time and also petrified of him finding out the age difference between us. It seems likely that his apparent attempts to avoid me may have been a result of eventually figuring this out on his own, in retrospect. I never saw him outside of school, and haven't seen him at all since he graduated from there, a year before I did.