Reluctant wedding bells; Day 12 of Writing 101

You know the most important thing to do if you want to be a writer? Practice. And yet, you get home from a long day at work and you know the last thing you want to do is sit down and write. Me too. Until I signed up for Writing 101 – WordPress will sent a prompt every weekday for the month of April.

Day 12: “Write a post inspired by a real-world conversation.”

“I’m waiting for him to ask me to marry him,” said someone behind me.”I tell him that all the time.”

I nearly got whiplash turning around to catch a glimpse of the speaker. She had a dark bob and was dressed to look older, with a low cut dress, and big, black leather heels, but the fullness of her face and the innocence in her eyes revealed that she was still young.

“Well he better get on that, if he knows what’s good for him,” said her dinner companion. Her back was towards me, so I couldn’t see her face. I could see her gesturing to her own ring.

“I know, right,” said the first girl again. “We have been living together for two-years, and we just bought a house, so I can already take him for half.”

I nearly choked on my diet coke. This is why I have promised to stop eavesdropping on the people around me. I mean I am completely failing at that, but that’s an issue for another time.

Today’s issue is, apparently, marriage is based entirely on material gain. Whether she is trying to take her boyfriend for half of what he’s worth, or that’s his fear, I am not sure, but it all seems kind of sad.

First of all the girl couldn’t be more than 21. If she and her boyfriend have been together for at least two years, she hasn’t had the opportunity to grow on her own, stand on her own two feet and decide what she wants in a partner. When I was 21, I like guys with motorcycles and tongue rings. I realize in my 30s that it is far, less important – tongue rings are not as sexy as I initially thought, and I could just ride my own motorcycle.

Secondly, while I am about as feminist (the good kind, who wants equal rights for all, and I like my bra, looking pretty and men) and independent as I can get, I have some romantic notions about marriage. Context: I hope never to be married. However, if everything was right, then maybe I would reconsider, but I would want it to be about being head-over-heels in love, with my best friend so we could show others how important our relationship is to us. Not about financial gains. Not about trying to hit some kind of societal set timeline.

Nothing says love like, “he better if he knows what is good for him.”

Sigh.

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Avoiding loss; Day 4 of Writing 101

You know the most important thing to do if you want to be a writer? Practice. And yet, you get home from a long day at work and you know the last thing you want to do is sit down and write. Me too. Until I signed up for Writing 101 – WordPress will sent a prompt every weekday for the next month.

Day Four: “Write about a loss: something (or someone) that was part of your life, and isn’t any more.”

I am going to cheat a little bit today.

It’s not about not wanting to write I do – but loss is nothing something I like to think about. I am sure a therapist would have a field day with that one, but goodbyes are my biggest fear. Now, when I need to write out it I will.

In fact, this blog was started because of a breakup, and the story behind it, which I have termed the international incident.

I will leave it there, hide beneath my desk and see you for real tomorrow.

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Adventures in Online Dating: Too Nice to Say Goodbye

So the guy I met online got around to texting me again.

We went for a walk, again I talked a lot as he doesn’t say much. I still don’t really care, which I’m taking as not a great sign.

The problem is now I am fighting my I-need-a-project side – the side that tries to find the potential in a man and help them grow to realize it. The, “I could make him a really great guy for some other girl side.”

I’m not that interested and I don’t really know what to do about it. I could keep hanging out with him, but at some point I wonder if I should tell him that he is so far in the friend zone that he can’t see his way out, unless it’s to simply walk away.

On the other hand, I’d love to have a long-term running, cycling buddy and wonder if were not dating if we could still be that.

This whole thing is complicated. I’m too nice to say, “I’m just not that interested.”

It’s funny how busy I’ve become recently, I’m struggling to find time, maybe he’ll take it as a hint.

 

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The End of Sex: A book review

The end of sex – fortunately I’m doing something a little different here and writing a book review, not commenting on the state of my love life.

Where I work gets a lot of books sent from publishers – they get used, then packed onto a window ledge, largely forgotten.

People pick through them now and again – and I am among those people.

Imagine my interest in a book called The End of Sex, which promised to be about how hookup culture was destroying people’s ability to have decent relationships. Of course it made me pick it up, I’m largely a byproduct of that and I want to know why.

I took the book home.

Turns out the author has no idea why, or what is going on with hookup culture. She seems to be under the impression it’s because girls want to be classified as the good girl, not a slut or a prude, but it’s a tough line to walk and once you are a slut no big deal, have at her… or something like that. I read a few pages of a couple of the chapters, but between not agreeing with a word she says and the dull, academic language, I put it down and took it back to the shelf.

It’s rare I write about a book with out finishing it, but for some reason this book irked me. I know a number of bloggers who can more adequately (and interestingly) say why they get stuck in shitty “relationships,” why they pretend it doesn’t hurt when the guy they like sleeps with someone else and why they refuse to say how much they like him.

Since we are little girls, we are largely told (either directly or subconsciously) that you shouldn’t pursue a guy, they like the chase and will work for you. Let’s compound that by every romantic comedy out there, which shows the girl who swears she’ll never love, or the one who is random and quirky (and clearly not girlfriend material) or that crazy manic-pixie-dream girl who is totally unattainable. All of these women push the love interest away (and of course the love interest is a major player until he meets her). Give it time (well approximately 1:30 to 1:55) and they fall in love and live happily ever after – I mean even in movies called No Strings Attached (there are now), or He’s just not that into you (he was) hookup culture leads to long-term boyfriends.

So now legions of women sleep with men and pretend they don’t care when he doesn’t call. But they do. This also leads to men lying, saying they will call (or that they will be in touch after they move), so that women want them to. If they didn’t lie and say, “sure I’ll text you,” then we could at least be prepared.

Hookup culture thrives because while women like the occasional one night stand, when it becomes a two or three or more night thing, they start to get attached. They allow terrible behavior from their partners because they want to pretend they are cool. It’s all good.

Now, before I get any hate mail, I know there are exceptions to this – sometimes I am even the exception where the thing was what it was and it’s all good, but sometimes even I get caught up and forget that actually he’s ACTUALLY not that into me, because if he was, he wouldn’t hurt me.

If you are looking for an excellent book about what it means to find the one, I highly recommend, Screw Everyone: I’m Sleeping My Way To Monogamy, by Ophira Eisenberg.

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Postcards from the edge: an email after six months

Well speak of the devil.

Why is it that when I bring someone up, it’s like they are reading my mind from a world away.  The man who sent flowers, emailed me. It’s the first time in more than six months.

I was kind of hoping that when I never heard from him again, I would never hear from him again, but, like always, just when I think it’s all good, they write.

Along with the news, he sent this “it seems like all my friends are getting married. What am I doing wrong? Am I doing something wrong?”

Gut instinct is to write back, “well convincing a girl that she is largely in love with you, getting her to travel halfway around the world to meet you for New Years Eve in a beautiful (and neutral) location and then when she steps off the plane, acting like you are nearly strangers and having that continue for the next three weeks, might be part of what you’re doing wrong.”

However, common sense is outweighing gut instinct. Instead I am writing that response here, giving myself time to comprehend the entire email and will write back when it’s not such an emotional response.

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Just a little slip

Like what can happen to so many people trying to kick any habit, I had a little slip.

I had been drinking at a big, fancy night out for work, and I got home, all dressed up with nowhere to go, so I texted the Professional.

It was a fun text. I teased him about being bad at keeping in touch, and telling him I hoped his new live was even better than he hoped.

The problem was, he texted back. And he texted back, then I texted back etc. etc.

And finally this,

“It’s my birthday today, we are out having a cake and a drink.”

I didn’t know it was his birthday and I hadn’t thought of texting him before that day.

Now I’m wondering what cosmic power seems to think I need to be attentive to him, be with him, without telling him the reverse is true. They must be having a great laugh at my expense.

Eventually I wished him well on an upcoming trip and went to sleep feeling very unsatisfied and angry. Why doesn’t he want to be with me. Idiot.

Happy Birthday.

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Seven stages of dealing with a breakup

There are seven stages of dealing with loss – on the list is negotiating, denial, anger.

And the rest include things variations of sad before the recovery stages that end with acceptance and moving on.

I’ve had company for the past few days, so I’ve been able to ignore how I’ve been feeling, it’s been just too busy, but now the company is gone and I’m on my own.

I believe this stage is called, depression, reflection and loneliness … not that I’m particularly sad, but I’m rather at a loss of what to do with myself.

I definitely prefer the anger stage.

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50 ways to leave your lover

There are 50 ways to leave your lover, some are far more musical than others.

1. Just slip out the back, Jack
2. Make a new plan, Stan
3. No need to be coy, Roy
4. Hop on the bus, Gus
5. Move across the country, while making false promises…

Of the five examples, one has little rhyme (or reason) to it. Apparently I’m a little bitter today. All the professional needed to do was be honest to get himself free.

What am I on about? Watch the Muppets own, Janice, Floyd and Animal.

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Open letter to another man to break my heart

When I gave you the choice to go, I meant it. It wasn’t a trick or a trap. You could have left and slept at your own house.

When I said if you stay, you had better mean it, not for five more minutes or five hours, but for five days, weeks, month or years. Stay until there is a reason to go. When I said if you stay, I’ll start to become attached, I wasn’t lying.

If it is the sex you were after, that’s okay; you don’t have to lie to me to get into my pants.

I said, “don’t stay because you feel you should, stay because you want to.” In fact, if some weird sense of moral guy obligations is what is keeping you in my bed, then I prefer you go – it doesn’t mean you can’t come back – it just gives me a fighting chance to protect my heart.

When you ask, “are you kicking me out,” and look horrified at the thought. When you realize I want you to stay and mean it. When you wrap your arms around me, tuck me in a close and go to sleep that way, you work your way into my heart.

This means you’ll hurt me when you leave. It’ll hurt me the next morning. It will hurt me all week when I wait to hear from you, and it will hurt me when you text me two weeks after you move away to say, “I can’t promise regular visits in person.”

Because of the choices you made and because of the things you said, I let you into my heart for the first time since I had my heart broken years ago, I believed I could have a real relationship. It wasn’t like you didn’t know you were moving … yet you said you wanted to stay just five more hours each time anyway. Of course I thought that meant you would want to continue to see me – texts, Skype, phone calls, airplanes, all of it.

However now you are gone and all I have left is a text freeing me to see other people, who I don’t want to see.

And now I write an open and anonymous letter on a blog, because it is all things I could never tell you in person, because we’ll likely never talk again.

Was I naïve to believe that you understood what I was saying, when I told you what would happen if you stayed? Or are you just kind of a jerk? If it’s the latter, which I truly believe it isn’t, I wish that next girl you meet a whole lot of luck and more of a chance than you gave me.

Sincerely,

The Girl

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The morning after; waking up after it’s over

Waking up this morning went exactly how I knew it would.

Eyes open sleepily, big streeeettttccchhh, yawn, enjoy the sun streaming in through the partially closed blinds and feel good for about three seconds and then that horrible, exhausted, crushing feeling.

It’s been a while since I felt this way – two-and-a-half-years ago really.

The good news is I have been though this once before, which means, unlike last time, I am prepared for the stages of losing someone you love. Strange, thinking a previous breakup as something good, but I think I can handle it better when I know what to expect.

The bad news is that it still hurts, when I stop to think that, again, someone I care about isn’t willing to wait or try to make a relationship work with me.

The good news is I know from previous experience that if someone isn’t willing to put the effort to make a relationship work now, it won’t work under the same conditions later. This protects me from all those not-so-helpful demi friends that will try to convince you that if I just keep in touch he’ll change.

The bad news is a little part of me thinks that maybe if I keep emailing him that he will realize that I’m awesome and worth waiting for.

The good news is a breakup is fantastic motivation for me. I will become a skinnier, prettier, tougher, more skilled, bad ass version of myself.

The whole experience also teaches me that I need to not have expectations. I had it in my head, I’d fly to see him, he’d fly to see me … er, or not. Those without expectations of others are not disappointed. I guess that  is another rule for living, if you just live and experience things as they come versus expecting them to happen in a certain way, you will be happier.

Too pragmatic? Well it’s this or curl up in a ball and cry.

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