“you just know”

I’ve always hated that reply. You know, when you ask how they knew you were with the (or a) right person.

“You just know.”

Like really? How can you just know?? Like it’s some irrefutable solid-as-a-rock-thing. Unshifting. Unquestionable. Undeniable. Not an ounce of doubt.

Simple as that. ?

I’ve been dating a little bit recently. Cautiously. Very cautiously. I constantly think of worst case scenarios. Not just with dating. With anything. I’m much better at thinking about all the millions of things that could go catastrophically wrong in any given scenario. I don’t really know why but it’s almost like some sort of subconscious pathological impulse (ergo, no control over this one). I suspect it might be to do with protecting myself. Like, if you’ve thought about all the things which could go terribly awry, at least then you’re prepared for any eventuality. As if you can future-proof your heart.

More than a few times I’ve been in relationships and wondered, how could someone “just know”? (okay, now I sound like Carrie Bradshaw. Sorry. But really,) I mean, how can you know? For ever and ever amen? I mean knowing suggests something solid, all-encompassing, ubiquitous, ever-reaching.

And then I think, c’mon Dawn, even Yoda didn’t know everything (if in doubt, always refer back to ‘Star Wars’….or the cavemen).

I mean, half of knowing, must be not-knowing. Or knowing that you can’t possibly know everything there is to know. Did Yoda say that at some point? Did he also say something about revisiting the past to reveal your future? Wise guy.

I’ve dug a little. Back to the time (truly, I think, only the one time) when I was in love. Properly. Honestly. And I remember how I knew. Because in that moment with that person, nothing else mattered*.  It didn’t matter about the future.  Or what anyone else was doing right now. Or what might happen in some imagined disastaurausarus ©**  scenario in an hour, a week, a year, a decade. What mattered was that I was just there, in that moment, with that person. Without a care for what the future might have in store.

I guess that’s when you just know. When you can say “When I’m with him/her, I don’t want to be anywhere else”. Geographically. Metaphorically. Future scenario-ly.

Maybe that’s when “you just know”. For now.

* (Confession: I have been known to suggest to dates, that if either party knows within 5 minutes of meeting each other that it’s a “no”, we go our separate ways at the end of said 5 minutes. After all “there’s nothing worse than being on a date thinking I’d rather be with my friends right now”. Cringe.)

**Copyright © 2013 by Jon, my sister Ruth’s boyfriend, all rights reserved (it’s slightly a family thing)