We met her at Christmastime. She blew in late, flushed and lovely after five hours on the dark December roads, and stole our hearts. She arrived alone, bearing gifts, and effortlessly, elegantly folded into the raucous celebration of a large, loud and borderline obnoxious crowd. My son scooped her up and made the rounds, introducing her to siblings, parents, and friends — a merry, bright-eyed crowd hopped up on sugar and nog. Everyone was charmed. Tall, smiling, impeccably dressed, she was polite, smart, funny, kind — better than most of us. We were smitten.

Thus began the three-year march of this very modern, practical love affair. He was wrapping up a stellar university career, she had recently graduated and both were searching for “the” job — they seemed close to perfect. She visited many times and courted me with small handmade gifts and treats, notes and e-mails, recipes and books. She fed everyone and took tender care of the boy. We bonded over art and history, books and film. She was bright and talented, unfailingly gracious and generous — a great cook, an artist, a runner. Cooler than me but nice enough that it didn’t matter.

They hunted apartments in various cities, hoping to land jobs together. Both designers by trade, they meticulously planned kitchens and living areas, outfits and parties. Designing life, they were. Together. I was living vicariously, happily, through my fabulous first-born and his winning soul mate.

But then, as it inevitably does, real life crept in. They each found jobs in their chosen fields in a very tough market — hundreds of miles apart. With loans to pay and resumés to build, they did the practical thing and settled in separate cities. Gradually, the calls and the texts became shorter, the Skyping less satisfying. Visits were expensive and difficult to shoehorn into their tight, real-world schedules. I’m not sure when, or how, it happened, but the distance grew, the silence deepened until there was — nothing.

I don’t think a decision to break-up was ever made — she just stopped messaging, stopped responding, a black hole in the center of the country. My son, befuddled and lonely, was left wondering how he lost the girl of his dreams. She, for her part, remains silent. In the age of Facebook and Skype, texting and permanent wireless appendages, this is no small thing. She is working at her silence.

Well, it’s hard to explain what this silent, wholesale rejection has done to me. I am the forgotten person in this equation. I was wooed, charmed, and dumped, too. Nothing has ever been explained to me. My birthday greeting to her sits in the ether, unacknowledged (unreceived?!). I am not usually the meddlesome type (really) and I’m not unnaturally attached to my adult children (honestly). I adore them, of course, but have been happy to see them go and build lives.

Please go — make me proud and yourself happy.

This, however, has thrown me. She was, perhaps, the one for him and, potentially, the one for me. I find myself thinking about it entirely too much, questioning my son too often and engaging in odd, highly uncharacteristic little rituals to magic her back to us. I light the handmade pumpkin candles she sent one Halloween, thinking they may somehow tickle her memory. I read horoscopes, hunting for clues. Perhaps the Mayan calendar will figure in somehow.

What’s next, voodoo?

This is not the first girlfriend to fall away — three sons will make sure of that. But this one has crept into a corner of my brain and is refusing to vacate, like a sort of minor madness. Even my son is moving on, telling me to “stop.” This is his repeated request. “Mom, stop.”

I recognize that I may not have the full story. I’m like an historian working with a dearth of primary sources, stitching together a reality from bits and pieces of his side. I also recognize that for me, the mother of one of the principals, there may have been a bit of fairy dust sprinkled over the proceedings. I suppose it’s likely that he hasn’t divulged everything. Was there a fight, or a misunderstanding? Something darker? Is she, for some mysterious technical reason, not getting his texts/calls/messages? Is she in the clutches of some frightening Svengali character, like in a movie?

Could it be that it’s really none of my business?

He told me recently that he wrote her a letter — a real pen and paper throwback. Five pages of romance, in my imagination — his last ditch effort to get some attention, some closure. It’s been many months and he’s heard nothing.

This is my new obsession — was it well written? Did she receive it? How can we know?! The mystery gnaws at me. Why the silence? Is she angry, lonely, distracted? Is she a crazy, cold woman and we missed it somehow? Or is she, like most of us, an emotional child who changed her emotional mind? Was her head turned by someone with straighter teeth, more money, better shoes (hard to find, that last bit)? Someone with a cooler mother, perhaps? Why won’t she say something — anything? Even “Get lost” would enable us to get lost.

Honestly, I’m not liking this new me. Thoughts of her insinuate themselves into my routine. I find recipes to share, books to discuss, design questions to ask. I wonder about her job, her family — is she still trying the gluten-free thing? I need closure — where’s my closure?!

Recently, photos have surfaced in my daughter’s Facebook newsfeed (yes, I spy — she’s a teenager, don’t judge). The ex is lovely still, smiling and often with the same clean-cut, crazy-eyed hunk. It seems she has moved on, after her protracted silence.

My son has moved on, as well, mired in a new tragic and passionate mess. I, however, am finding it very difficult to leave this behind. There was love, I’m sure of it. She helped me build a grand graduation party for him, surprised him with treats and gifts, delivered home-baked meals to his studio and wept when they parted. They glowed when they were together and were attentive and tender with one another. What of that?

Does big love just dissipate, like smoke on a cold December night?

She must still feel something, somewhere — my son still talks about her, even in the midst of his current passion tragedy. His heart is broken, he is bruised by the rejection and, as the old saying goes, a mother is only as happy as her least happy child.

And that, perhaps, is what this is really about. Maybe my angst is not about her at all but more about my wishes for him, my child. When he was in love and was so obviously loved, much was right in my world. She cared, she fed him and watched over him. She was his cheerleader, his lover and his friend. If he fell, she would scoop him up and fix it. It helps in this big bad world to have a partner, someone who will celebrate the good and endure the bad.

When he was five years old, he played tee-ball. Sitting at a game with the coach’s wife, a kind, demure mother of two boys on the team, I commented that her sons were so sweet, so adorable. Her out-of-character response was a shock. “Yes,” she said. “I know. And they’re going to grow up and some bitch is going to take them away.”

This had never occurred to me, as the mother of small children. They will grow up and meet any number of unworthy people, and then what? They’ll face rejection, they’ll be buffeted by the winds of something like love and how can I possibly protect them from that?

I don’t get to pick the partners, it turns out, but I do have to welcome them.

She couldn’t have been perfect, of course. One of my sons says she was “boring.” She spent her weekends at estate sales, wore vintage hats and pins. They joked about her old lady ways — more fun for me perhaps, the old lady in the piece, than the boisterous boys.

I think the bottom line might be the simple fact that she was kind — until she disappeared, anyway. She was unfailingly kind to my son. And what more can a mother ask than that her children find kind partners? It has, I’m afraid, become an underrated trait in this big, loud, brassy world we’ve built. So, perhaps rather than looking back and pining for the one who got away, I should be open to the future and hope for more kindness to come along.

Oh, but wouldn’t it be delicious if she came out of the shadows and explained it all? A mystery, after all, is only fun for a while — then you need answers. Perhaps I should reach out, send her an e-mail or a letter, with recipes and fabric swatches.

Or perhaps I need a hobby, or a new friend, or something.