Relationships: they are both the bane and joy of our existence. The baneful ones are complicated and messy and give you a severe case of eye rolling (or eye twitching) and The Sighs. The joyful ones give you warm fuzzies, butterflies, unicorns and rainbows…or something like that. Having a plethora of bad relationships in our respective lives doesn’t necessarily mean we don’t have very good relationship skills, although I’d be hard-pressed to believe otherwise. Corrolation and causation and all that scientific stuff can put up an awfully good argument. However, I wouldn’t necessarily maintain that “Relationship Experts” have all joyful relationships in their lives–maybe they are just lucky. Or lying. How does one become a “Relationship Expert” anyway? Do you take a bunch of classes on interpersonal communication? Study groups of people? Chug through reams of data on how individuals deal with each other? That all sounds like a lot of work. Although I think I can safely state that in order to become an expert on any given subject, one must have a lot of experience in that subject.
A few weeks ago I devoured Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, and he states (among other, awesome things) that to become an expert you must put in at least 10,000 hours of practice time. Whether you are talking about playing the violin, winning cases in court, or writing software programs; 10,000 hours is the magic number you must strive towards in order to maintain Expert Status. (I should probably mention here that while I absolutely LOVED Outliers and gave it 5 stars out of 5 stars, Mr. Gladwell is not paying me for a review, nor is he sending me free stuff–although he should probably consider it because I own all of his books in hardback and half I own an additional second copy in paperback. I’m a good customer, yo! Where’s the swag?)
Ten thousand hours. In terms of playing the violin that sounds like an inordinate amount of time; three hours a day for a decade. But how do you calculate hours actively spent on/in relationships? Allow me to do a little math. (Don’t worry, you will not need a calculator to continue with this post, take a sip of your Diet Coke and just give me a moment here.)
[Insert somewhat rusty sounds of brain gears warming up, slowly cranking through equations and algorithms, quickly exhausting any functionality, giving up and laying down for a nap.]
…Ok, let me try that again, easy math this time. I have been pursuing and being persecuted pursued by citizens of Planet Man for approximately 14.5 years. In that time I think it is safe to say that I have gone on approximately 2,200 dates; 1,750 of which I would guesstimate have taken place in the last five years. I have been on dozens of first dates, probably 25 blind dates, kissed [redacted] guys, and had a double handful of real relationships–some good, some horrible–that lasted anywhere from 6 months to three years. In this particular realm of measurement, longer doesn’t necessarily mean better. Without constant growing, nurturing and improving a relationship from both sides, there comes a point where longer is just longer. (Yes, I’m talking about duration of relationships, get your mind out of the gutter.)
From this set of Super Scientific Data I can draw the following conclusion: In the last five years I have achieved “expert” status when it comes to dating. This does not mean I am a Relationship Expert. This means I know how to have and be a really great date. I will try almost anything once (whether that is ethnic food, curling, or mountain biking), I can have a conversation–a meaningful, humorous, pleasant conversation–with anyone of moderate intelligence and I can defuse a lot of that dating awkwardness without embarrassment or resorting to cheap shenanigans (ok, at times I have perhaps employed a few shenanigans). Alright, so I’m a great date. Now what? Until TLC comes up with a new reality show where I am paid thirty-seven-bazillion dollars (my standing rate to appear on any reality television show) to flounce around in fabulous outfits with amazing shoes, teaching handsome, debonair, charming-but-perhaps-slightly-shy men how to plan and execute a fabulous date–basically, the female equivalent of Hitch–without all that, I’ve got bupkiss. So what if I’m a great date–that means nothing unless it can somehow translate into decent relationship skills.
I communicate on an above-average level for an intelligent human being, I listen well, I am willing to admit mistakes and apologize when necessary (and sometimes unnecessarily just to keep the damn peace), however I am also one to stand my ground when I firmly believe I am right. In fact, being pushed, manipulated or bullied while under such a circumstance will never end well for the other party, the one doing the pushing/manipulating/bullying. When I dig my heels in I dig them deep; I wear stiletto’s for a reason, people. I understand that men and women are different, and while I wouldn’t necessary simplify it into “Men are from Mars and need Cave Time; Women are from Venus and need Mani/Pedi’s”, I do think there is a bit of truth to that comparison. But I think that expectations and the differences that whirl around expectations, the achieving, failing and lack of, are a huge part of why men and women have a difficult and frustrating time understanding each other.
Can someone become an Expert on Expectations? Hrm, allow me a moment to ponder this, [indiscernible pause] No. No you cannot. Expectations are a bitch and there is no real way around that except to have no expectations of any sort, eliminating the unfortunate situation of being disappointed. This is not a recommended skill, however. It’s too depressing.
Back to relationships. A Relationship Expert is typically someone with a grundle of degrees, the author of a self-help book or–even better–a series of self-help books, who wears too much eye makeup and resorts to gender cliche’s like they are Brand New Scientifically Proven Facts. We all know most boys would rather watch a sweaty, testosteroney sporting event than go to the ballet (despite the fact that ballet dancers have remarkable athletic abilities, especially the male ones). But does any of that generic advice really help? I mean, sure, if you’ve never had a real relationship, sure. I can see how that would be useful. Or, if you’ve never had a healthy and/or successful relationship, I can understand your interest. I refuse to listen to someone lecture me about relationships, or even worse, pay someone to lecture me about relationships when they do not know me personally. A personal therapist I can get behind. A trusted friend will have my undivided attention. A self-help seminar leaves me feeling itchy.
I am not a Relationship Expert, but I am fairly good at relationships. In fact, I think I’d say I’m above average. I am on good terms with most of my x-boyfriends, rarely have fights with friends, and while my siblings are delightfully quirky, we get along quite well. Sure, I have some baggage and a few hangups when it comes to relationships, but no more than the next person.
…What am I getting at? I’m not sure, really. This whole 10,000-Hours-To-Become-An-Expert thing has just been rolling around in my brain for a few weeks and I needed to get it out. Have I spent 10,000 hours on relationships? Probably. Am I an expert? No. Does that discredit Mr. Gladwell or his book? No. It just means that relationships are trickier than playing the violin, or arguing before a jury, or writing the code that created That Glorious Invention: The Interwebs. Relationships have ten-thousand variables and, as a single person, my relationships are constantly changing. I am constantly breaking up with one boy and/or starting all over again with someone else and another set of ten-thousand variables. That doesn’t mean I suck at it, it just means it’s tricky. Or that I’m incredibly unlucky. Or both.
Thoughts? Advice? Nuggets of wisdom? A good vent, perhaps? Does anyone need a good relationship vent? …Bueller?
You may have some x-boyfriends who you will think of fondly; they are kind and funny and wonderful–it just didn’t work out.
You may have some x-boyfriends who you will think of and dry-heave; they are vile and disgusting and generally horrible people–thank heavens it didn’t work out.
You may have some x-boyfriends who you will think you are rid of, only to discover that through no fault of your own they are now your cousin. True story.
You may have some x-boyfriends who you will think of occasionally with little to no emotion attached to them either way. You dated. You broke up. The end. Sure you were probably sad for a little while, but it was better to break up and, in retrospect, there wasn’t enough of a relationship there to justify trying to be friends later.
Regardless of the nature of their memory, I have recently discovered that when it comes to x-boyfriends, the world can be incredibly, disturbingly small.
Over the weekend I had a friend in town from San Francisco. I met Erica years ago when I was dating Berkley/Adam and visiting San Fran every other weekend. Adam and I broke up, but I have kept and cherished the girlfriends I made in San Francisco. Here we are, several years later Erica and I are still friends who meet up for lunch or something whenever we happen to be in the same city. Saturday night a group of girls met up for some dinner and general girl-chat. I caught up with several of Erica’s Salt Lake friends who I have come to know a bit, and then started talking to the girl to my right; a lovely blue-eyed E.R. nurse with a fantastic smile. She was funny and charming and admittedly I had started to develop a bit of a girl-crush on her immediately.
Erica saw us chatting and without warning said the one thing I would have never expected.
“Oh! You two have something in common! You both dated _______.”
Woah. Wait. What?
It’s true, my friends. Unknowingly I had befriended my x-boyfriend’s x-girlfriend. (Note: this particular x-boyfriend is not Berkley/Adam. Erica is friends with half the planet, including another one of my x-boyfriends.) Now, this could have been monumentally awkward, luckily it went the absolute other way. After the initial shock wore off, we started tentatively chatting about our mutual X. We talked about his humor, his smile, his quirks and peculiarities. Yes, we talked about his kissing expertise (and even managed to survive the very bizarre moment when another girl at the table chimed in with her opinion–the boy gets around! Goodness!) and after a little while it came time to make a choice. Do we dare talk about The Hard Stuff? Or is it best to just skip that part all together.
Hard Stuff. Every relationship has it. Many relationships won’t survive it. Ours clearly didn’t.
We talked a good long time about relationships in general, relationship specifics, pitfalls, communication, quirks and red flags. Our respective relationships ended for similar reasons–we both wanted different things than our X. One relationship lasted for over a year, the other for just a few months. We had some very similar experiences, and some vastly different ones. We both loved some of the same things and hated some of the same things.
As we continued to chat, to dissect, to compare I couldn’t help but wonder if this is what the wives from Big Love do on their “off nights.”
I am clearly not giving out many specifics here, partly because I have no real ill-will towards this particular x-boyfriend and while I have no problem discussing his faults with his other x-girlfriend, I don’t think that discussing his faults with the Internet is really appropriate. Those details will be left to she and I–oh hell, I really do sound like a sister-wife! Someone please send a plain-jane dress and a YouTube tutorial to achieve the perfect, coiffed, high-rise bangs.
In the last six months I have gone on approximately umpteen thousand dates. Okay, that is a bit of an exaggeration, but prior to The Boy Who I Promise Will Be Named Later In This Post, I was a bit crazy. After breaking off an 18-month relationship I went on kind of a dating rampage, which will not be discussed in much detail here. Notable mentions are The Butcher, who has the notorious distinction of being the only boy who has ever broken up with me; The Baker, whose cookies and pastries were distracting from the unnerving, contentious and (eventually) yelling-and-crying-in-a-restaurant type of relationship; and The Candlestick Maker, who was so tall that even in my tallest heels (which put me at six feet) I hardly grazed his shoulder. These “relationships” ranged from a few dates, to a few weeks, to a few months. I also feel that it should be noted that The Butcher, The Baker, The Candlestick Maker, and The Boy not only all know each other, but are routinely invited to the same parties, functions and events. Yeah, being in the same (suddenly much too small) room with all four of them was perhaps one of the more awkward moments of the last month.
Which brings me to The Boy Who Is About To Get A Name. While we met in October and started dating soon after that, I have been hesitant to properly introduce him on ye olde blog. Inexplicably, I’m all nervous about it, which is bizarre because I have sent novel-length emails to a half-dozen friends around the world about The Boy and how amazing he is and how fantastic everything is going, ad nauseum. But I’m still nervous, however, nerves aside, here it goes.
The Boy is kind of a Jack Bauer type, the SuperHero guy who can save the world at a moment’s notice. (Unlike Jack Bauer he does not routinely break dozens of federal laws or have the President’s cell phone number. And unlike Kiefer Sutherland he does not have a television series or criminal rap sheet.) If they were in a fight, I think The Boy would totally beat Jack Bauer. He runs a business where he actually trains other people to be Jack Bauer types. And by “people” I mean SWAT teams and military teams are previous clients; seriously, he’s hardcore. If something bad is happening, The Boy is the type you want to have around. I was surprised (and relieved) to discover a balance to all that testosterone, The Boy writes his own music, plays the guitar and sings. And I know of no easier way to get me into full swoon mode than to have a big, strong, handsome man hang out in my living room playing his guitar and crooning. Seriously swoony.
You want some more examples, don’t you. Oh good, I thought you’d never ask. (If you are the type to get squeamish or annoyed when hearing about someone gush over a new relationship, I advise you to skip to the end. Seriously, gushing is about to happen, don’t say I didn’t warn you.)
“For Cute” Number A: The Boy and I had only gone on two dates before I went to Phoenix for Thanksgiving. When I asked him if he’d mind picking me up at the airport and then maybe go out to lunch he agreed (squee!). I was fully prepared to be blasted with Utah Winter Coldness as I waited at the pick-up point outside the airport, typical for arrivees at Salt Lake International. You can imagine my shock when I saw him waiting there by the baggage claim. Shock. I don’t think I’ve had anyone meet me inside the airport since…um….the beginning of time. Seriously, he parked, came in and waited. I am still swooning over this. (Also–this began what may go down in history as the best date ever.)
“For Cute” Number B: After a particularly long (90-hours plus) and exhausting week of work, The Boy sneakily made plans for a little surprise. He arranged for a friend of his, a massage therapist, to come over to my apartment and give me an hour-long full-body massage while he did the dishes and cleaned up my kitchen. For. Reals. Who does that?! Swoon!
“For Cute” Number C: While I was working during the Christmas holiday (and was pouting that so many of you had weeks of time off) he came to visit and brought a giant bouquet of red and yellow Gerbera daisies. Daisies are my favorite flower and these were absolutely gorgeous. Swoon!
“For Cute” Number D: On Christmas morning he arranged for Santa to visit and I opened my first Christmas-morning-present in a decade. I laughed, I may have actually cried a bit, and I have loved seeing the way a pair of sparkly green sapphires look in my ears (not pictured below, heidikins fail.) Swoon!
“For Cute” Number E: Last week while I was in Disneyland “for work” he drove down to meet Vladd & I for a couple of days in The Happiest Place on Earth. Turns out, Disneyland is a really great place to go on a date. Noted. And Swoon!
The Boy clearly needs an Internet name. Potential options include the following:
- Mr. Scrufftastic
- Lover Boy
- The Bulldog
- Gunsmoke
This list has been seriously edited, my initial list was something like 13 nick-names long. I like Scrufftastic and Lover Boy, but somehow they seem a bit derogatory in connotation–is that just me? Yes, The Boy is scruffy, but it’s not his defining characteristic. Yes, he’s swoony, but I can hardly think about calling him Lover Boy without conjuring up images from Dirty Dancing, and as much as I love Patrick Swayze–may he rest in peace–I don’t want him haunting my relationship. That leaves Bulldog and Gunsmoke. Wait…I can just call him Bulldog McGunsmoke and leave it at that, right?
Ladies and Gentlemen (the 2 who still read this blog with any regularity), The Boy Who Has Been Nameless for Months has finally been given a moniker: Bulldog A. McGunsmoke*. BAM!
*Just to be clear, “A” is for AwesomeSauce. Also, BAM! makes a much nicer acronym than BMG, which sounds like a sketchy multi-level-marketing company.
One of my goals for this year is to read twenty-five books, at the moment I just finished book twenty-four (The Omnivore’s Dilemma) and have no worries that I will hit my goal by Dec. 31. I haven’t been great about posting book reviews here, perhaps next year I’ll add that goal to The List.
A little while ago Nilsa posted a book review of Julie & Julia and mentioned, in passing, her distaste for Eat, Pray, Love. I was relieved to find another individual who was not gushing about Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir/documentary and was shocked to discover in the comments that most people did not particularly like Eat, Pray, Love.
In my next life I will have some kind of corporate sponsorship and/or independent financing to allow me to travel to exotic places and lounge about eating pasta, relaxing, and meeting handsome men. Someone will purchase, in advance, the artistic rights to my recovery from a major life crisis and I will have the opportunity to spend a solid year wallowing and wading in said recovery because, hey, someone has already ponied up the cash for me to do so.
Wait. Hold on. Seriously?
The premise for Liz Gilbert’s best seller, Eat, Pray, Love, is just that. She and her husband get divorced under emotionally tumultuous (but undefinable) circumstances, her publisher agrees that Liz should spend a year traipsing around Italy, India and Indonesia on the company’s dime and write a book about her experiences. Now, before I get too much farther into this–allow me to explain a few things. Am I jealous that Liz Gilbert managed to swing an all-expenses paid trip around the world? Yes. Do I wish someone would give me a similar opportunity? Yes. Do I think that her experiences helped her to “find herself”? Ummm…not necessarily. In a lot of ways I think it actually hindered her psychological recovery.
I agree that I am not Liz and I don’t know what she was really going through and there is no possibly way to really judge her situation. But here’s the catch, in many ways I do know what she was going through. She wrote it all down, page by self-depreciating, impossible-to-get-through page. Elizabeth Gilbert is a fantastic writer, she can paint metaphors like nobody’s business and I do envy her talent as a writer. But as a memoirist (is that even a word?), she is severely lacking. I was shocked at the lack of honest self critique or even self-reflection. Bad things happened to her, sure. She somehow doesn’t seem to realize that there may have been something in her behavior that contributed to her problems. Similarly, she is completely unaware that by changing her behavior she can change her perspective, and vice versa. Spending a year lounging about the world, eating pasta and putting on strange meditational/self-centered religious ideals is not going to heal you. I really don’t know how many times I can say this; I am loathing the film-version of this book because I will have to hate the whole concept all over again.
Admittedly, I may have had too high of expectations regarding this book. I was married once, I left my husband, I had my own year of recovery with small milestones along the way. I guess I thought I would identify with Liz Gilbert on some level.
Um….FAIL. I didn’t find a single thing in Liz Gilbert’s experience, or the way she describes herself or her life, that I could identify with.
Actually, I take that back. That’s not true, at the very beginning of the book when she has locked herself in the bathroom, and is sitting on the floor sobbing about her life being in shambles…I remember doing that. Vividly. More than once. Okay, so I could identify with a half page of her 331 page memoir. This is not a very convincing statistic.
Alright, I’m done ranting about the emotional crap that is scribbled all over Eat, Pray, Love. Elizabeth Gilbert has a talent as a writer, and I would probably read a completely fictional novel of hers, but I won’t even give away her memoir because I hated it that much. It will be recycled.
And now I’m curious, did you read Eat, Pray, Love? Did you like it? Did you like her writing skill? Or her sentiment? I’m genuinely curious. (Also, I feel it important to mention that if you did like her book I will not judge you and we can still be friends. We can be friends, right? Even if I hated Eat, Pray, Love? Right?)
Let’s talk about dating for a minute, shall we? Specifically, let’s talk about dating-to-get-engaged-and-then-subsequently-married. Now, before you get all excited, let me be perfectly clear. Yes, I have recently tried the dating-to-get-engaged-and-then-subsequently-married thing. If you recall, it didn’t work out that way. I have also done the dating-just-to-be-dating thing with various levels of success. However, currently I am single. For the most part, I like dating. I like getting to know people, I like going and doing things with people, I like the butterflies that can come from someone new and I like moving on if/when it is over. No harm, no foul.
Now, in my neck of the woods, ridiculously short courtships and engagements are par for the course. I have known people to meet, start dating, and then get engaged in a few weeks and have a lovely wedding three months later. Actually, this happens all the time. (Out of staters, I know, this is crazy to you, but it’s “normal” and sometimes even “expected” here. Don’t blow a gasket, yet.) Many of these couples (several of my siblings included) are still happily married years later and starting families. I couldn’t be more happy for them.
Immediately after I became single again (and after an appropriate mourning period) I went on a bit of a dating rampage. A couple of weeks of multi-dates not only cured me of the habit but got me over the idea of kissing someone just to kiss them. Confession: I have kissed boys simply to kiss them without any real feelings involved. It happens. Don’t judge. Somewhere around the beginning of August one-such, um, episode, took place. I met “Office Ink” about five years ago–at work, shockingly–and we dated a bit then, then a bit more a few months later, then a bit more a year or two after that, and then a bit more over the summer–somewhere between “I’m single…now what?” and “This is lame.” Ink has some very nice qualities (which I will not discuss here because it makes me a bit nauseous to think about right now) and I suppose in the back of my mind he would always be there for good times.
Office Ink is engaged. Facebook announced his relationship approximately 5 weeks ago with a mass of cutesy couple pictures (she is actually quite beautiful, I’ll give him that) and fun day trips. Yesterday, Facebook announced his engagement. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!
Now, lest you think I am jealous or something–it’s not really that. I know things could never have really worked out between Mr. Ink and I, he was fun to hang out with and we had a good time together, but it would never have gone farther than that. I am actually happy for him. Mostly. (There is the whole coming-to-terms with the fact that I just wasn’t good enough for him what he was looking for. And yes, this is probably compounded with the as-yet-unexpressed feelings of I just wasn’t what Handsome was looking for either. My clinical-shrink-trained brain is telling me that there is a wonderful guy out there who is looking for someone like me, and it’s better to wait for Mr. Right than to get wrapped up with Mr. Not Quite Right But You’ll Do In A Pinch/Moment Of Desperation And Weakness Where I Have Convinced Myself That Unless I Settle For You I’ll End Up Alone With 37 Cats And A Whole Lot Of Crazy. Really? When I think about it, I don’t want to be with that guy. Firstly, can you imagine fitting that last name on wedding invitations? No thank you.)
Back to Office Ink. He’s engaged. He’s getting married in six weeks. Six! He started dating this girl at the beginning of August either a) right after he and I had our last fling-thing, or b) before he and I had our last fling-thing…at this point I’m not sure which is better, both are kind of gross to me, actually. At any rate, by the end of August he was “officially” dating Miss Blue Eyes (because you know it isn’t official until Facebook or Google confirm it), engaged in September, wedding date set for the beginning of November.
Four months. I’ve had blocks of parmesan for longer than that!
I am trying to be excited for him, but I can’t help but feel this impending cloud of doom. Not necessarily for them, in the words of OPH, “I’m sure they’ll have a long and happy marriage”. I just have this heart-sinking, stomach-wrenching fear that I’m doing it wrong. Not the “being excited for an x-whatever who is getting married to someone he’s known for four months”, that doesn’t really matter in the long run and they are both adults (bona-fide adults, in their 30′s), they probably know what they are getting themselves in to. I just have this nagging little voice in the back of my brain telling me that I’m doing it wrong.
“heidikins, most of your girlfriends from high school are married and on their second or third kid.”
“heidi-ho…the ones who don’t fit the description above are done with masters degrees and/or working on Ph.D.’s”
“heidster, everyone else is doing it, what’s wrong with you?”
“oh heidi-girl, what is it about you that makes men think you just aren’t good enough?”
…you can see where this ends up, right? Yours truly will be ordering a male underwear model from Norway, convince him he will be the next Daniel Craig if he simply stars in my “reality TV” show (aptly named “heidikins and the Norwegian”), then dragging the poor scallywag down the aisle and forcing him to marry me. For real, no fakesies. Then I’ll fit in, right? I’ll have it all! I can announce my nuptials on Facebook and everyone will see how hunky and Viking-like Mr. Norway looks in our overly-posed, overly-styled photos. We could honeymoon in the Greek Isles and I’m sure no one will notice the little “stock photo” watermarks on our souvenir snapshots. In a year or so I could probably rent a kid or two to bulk up the “family” album and no one would be the wiser! It’s brilliant!
Ahem.
Or, I could just write incredulous real-time twitter updates and a subsequent blog post to cleanse these WTF feelings, go shopping for new outfits to become more appealing to men, go for a run, bake and consume another batch of cookies, ignore the masses and look forward to going out on a regular date, no strings attached. Just because [insert copious numbers of "couples" here], or Office Ink and Miss Blue Eyes go and jump off the marriage cliff doesn’t mean I need to follow them. I’m quite content where I am, thank you. The view from the cliff-top is lovely.
Americans are a funny people, and American culture is even more comical. It is considered bad form to admit personal failure, but television commercials would lead you to believe that the entire country is populated with fat, stupid slobs who can’t use a paper towel without some overly styled soccer mom judging your technique. If TV is to be believed, Americans homes are so rank and smelly that they need a timer-released automatic freshener in each room, as well as a life supply of Lysol. We all have bad skin, yellow teeth and sweat profusely. Wow. We’re a bunch of WINNERS! (Please bless you can actually wipe the sarcasm off your screen.) I don’t get it, we believe admitting failure is the ultimate self-shame, but we are bombarded with High Definition messages that we, as a collective, are the ultimate FAIL. And here’s the kicker, hundreds of thousands of people buy into this advertising! It baffles me.
I don’t really want to rant on commercial advertising leading to massive consumerism of product that are, in many ways, redundant and could be eliminated completely with some basic hygiene, physically, domestically and mentally. Moving on…
Experts agree that regular check-ups with a physician are beneficial; wear sunscreen, keep tabs your moles, do monthly self-examinations to detect irregular lumps in your breasts, floss, get a tooth cleaning every six months (and get it from Dr. Mac, he’s fab). Most Americans will agree with these “experts” without putting up too much of a fuss.
Now, in my personal opinion a semi-annual mental health check-up is also necessary. It’s exactly like a tooth cleaning, or a colon cleanse…only without the Novocaine or messy side effects. Therapy is like perpetual spring cleaning on your brain, get rid of all the dusty corners, hidden skeletons and nasty gunk that messes with your emotions and slows you down. I really wonder why more people don’t believe in this; it’s not admitting failure, even the most careful brushing and flossing can still leave you with a cavity, or a soft spot on the way-in-the-back molar. Messy life stuff can sometimes leave you with some ugly bits lurking in the corners and the way-in-the-back places.
With the several dozen Major Life Changes I’ve had in the last few months I thought it would be beneficial to let my shrink, Dr. Nancy, give me the once over, you know, check me out for gunk and dust. She says I’m okay; great, even. I believe the term she used was “serene,” in fact. I don’t think I’ve ever been described as “serene”, nor has my life ever had the overarching feeling of serenity. The uncanny likeness to a soap opera, sure, but not serenity. Here’s the kicker, I actually agree with her, and I like it. I feel it; and it kind of feels like I have somehow arrived as a Real Life Adult or something. I’ve got all my little pink ducks in a row.
Sure, I’ve still got issues and things to deal with and am in no way perfect–my apartment is cluttered, my bedroom is dusty, the tub hasn’t been scrubbed in more weeks than I will publicly admit and I don’t even own paper towels to clean up the toughest messes, I generally use a rag and generic-issue 409. I don’t bleach my teeth or dye my hair and yesterday I had brownies for breakfast. But I am feeling very zen! I do yoga, I meditate, I have been running again and have been spending some quality time doing things that make me happy. I have arrived. And that, folks, is all there is to it. Serenity is my sparkly little key to happiness.
Boredom is the feeling that everything is a waste of time; serenity, that nothing is.
–Thomas S. Szasz
Once upon a time, not so long ago or far away, there was a little girl with bright green eyes, a feisty personality and a whole lotta issues. She didn’t have a fairy godmother, she didn’t have three magic wishes, and if there was a secret, hidden rich Prince somewhere he did a hell of a job staying hidden. This little green-eyed girl had to go through her issues on her own.
As she grew up, Miss Green Eyes figured out how to deal with most of her issues, all by herself. As she got older she came to a point where she almost believed that most of her issues were gone, resolved, or buried so deep they would never surface again.
It is probably no surprise that Miss Green Eyes was wrong.
Buried issues have a tendency to vomit themselves up at the most inopportune times. Without the proper foresight and medication, that Issue Vomit can end up all over your shoes, and your dress, and your preppy little handbag. And there’s another kicker, when you really “grow up” and become all responsible and adult-like and everything, you get to deal with other people’s issues as well. So now in addition to your own Issue Vomit you’ve got Brown Eyes’ Issue Vomit all over your strappy sandals as well. It’s a real mess.
As Miss Green Eyes looked down at her shoes, she couldn’t tell the difference between her own issues and his issues. Standing there in a puddle of tears and issues, it occurred to Green Eyes that the only way to unbury and resolve these issues was to get them out in the open, even if it meant ruining a pair of shoes. And, if you knew Miss Green Eyes at all, you’d know that ruined shoes is a REALLY big deal.
There is no fairy godmother and no magic genie. All that mess and the only people there to clean it up were Green and Brown Eyes. In the middle of a discussion on whether or not to bring in the pressure hose and blast all that mess–and any remaining compatibility–into the next block, or into Never Neverland. Amidst ruined shoes and slippery surfaces, these two people had to make the decision to pick up the pieces, clean up the crap, and make it work.
Here’s the thing about all those buried issues, regardless of how strong or healthy or amazing you think you are, issues that are left buried will start to ferment. And eventually, there will be Issue Vomit. And it stinks, in every possible sense of the word.
Back to the story about Little Miss Green Eyes, she is still picking Issues up and either putting them away or letting them go. It’s a long, hard, slow, laborious process, but she’s working on it. And as for Brown Eyes, he’s doing the same thing. And I’m sure it’s long and hard and slow and laborious. And sometimes it hurts. Correction, it hurts a lot. Having your heart ripped from your chest and then stuffed back in haphazardly, in the attempting to rearrange that haphazardly placed heart, and in trying to deal with all those Issues all at the same time..it hurts. Even for a little girl with bright green eyes and a feisty personality.
Filed under: All about me, Handsome V, Life 101, Love 101, Relationships, Things That Suck
Sometimes, life sucks.
And then sometimes it sucks a little bit more.
I have this friend, see, and right now? Her life sucks. And because she’s my friend, and because of the nature of the sucktitude, it cannot be discussed with The Internets. When this happens, some people, like my friend, feel like pulling their hair out. Or their fingernails. Or something.
So, what cannot be discussed on The Internets? Well, some people feel that issues that are uber-personal, uber-private, or of a somewhat delicate nature shouldn’t be blabbed about willy-nilly like. Not that my friend is willy-nilly. She’s actually pretty normal, above-average even. But even above-average people sometimes agree that there are certain subjects involving certain other parties that should be kept off-line. Or at least kept off-line until they have been discussed/resolved with previously mentioned other parties.
Ok, so in RealSpeak, my friend is having Issues. A Crisis even. And do you know what the best thing is for a crisis? Chocolate. And Ice-Cream. And Road Trips. And lots and lots of couch-time with a therapist–whether that is a friend or the lovely invention that is wireless Internet and a laptop. Unfortunately for my friend, options three and four are impossible at this particular juncture, and options one and two will only last as long as the current stockpile of chocolate and ice-cream can withstand the Crisis Management Task Force–That’d be my friend, lover of all things chocolate and/or ice-cream.
Gaaaaah! My friend is cranky. Without any REAL way to solve said current Crisis, the only thing to do is to rehash this Crisis 18 times per day to 7 different friends and hope that Crisis Management can get with the program and solve the problem before all her friends start screening her calls, ignoring her desperate texts and emails and forcing her to make a Costco run for more chocolate, more ice-cream, and yoga pants in two sizes larger.
How about you give my friend a little love, tell her your favorite “Bad Day Remedies”. Your favorite movie, your favorite activity, your favorite something! Be specific, this is a Crisis we’re talking about people!
Oh, and Happy Friggin’ St. Patrick’s Day. Take Luck!
It is so easy to become stagnant, to become lazy and to take things or people for granted. Day after day, week after week, exactly the same. Stagnating almost seems like the natural response. It’s easy for relationships to become stagnant; dinner, hang-out, movies, whatever, repeat. Unless someone changes the stakes, things will remain stagnant, cracks and divisions will form and eventually two separate and opposing sides will form. Unfortunately sometimes you don’t see the cracks, you don’t realize what is happening.
In many ways, I cracked. My cracks were noticeable and starting to show in my daily interactions. I don’t know how I missed them. Last week while I was wandering around San Francisco they suddenly were blatantly obvious to me. A weekend away from my daily grind was exactly what I needed to see how my stagnant, lazy behavior had started to affect my relationships, particularly one relationship.
Ya know, it really is a good thing that Handsome knows how to sweep a girl off her feet, I’m not so great at sweeping. (See “stagnating”, above. Also, see dictionary to see if “stagnating” is actually a proper word.)
Last week Handsome told me that he wanted to take me on a date–ok, interest piqued–and that it was a surprise, and that I needed to wear a dress and heels. Wow, in less than 4.7 seconds I was completely obsessed with figuring out what kind of surprise Handsome had in mind. I generally hate surprises. Alright, “hate” may be a bit of a stretch, but not by much. The suspense and anticipation is absolute torture for me.
Over the next couple of days I pestered Handsome with approximately 862 questions trying to unravel this surprise-date business. For the record, Handsome is really good at keeping secrets. The only thing I could get out of him was that besides the surprise date factor, I was apparently receiving something larger than a candybar and smaller than a book. (Frankly, I would have been perfectly content with either the candy bar or the book, but I digress.)
Friday night I rushed home from work to primp and make the final decision on my outfit–creamy chiffon polka-dot skirt, black sweater and red satin slingbacks. When Handsome walked in with a bunch of my favorite flowers, daisies, I knew it was going to be an amazing night. When he let me choose his shirt, and even shaved off his 5-o-clock shadow, I was smitten all over again.
And my surprise? Swoon! It was a fantastic surprise. Handsome made me a CD of all of his favorite romantical love songs, my very own mix-tape. I don’t think I’ve ever had a boy give me a mix-tape of love songs. Checking mental inventory, nope. This is my first mix-tape! I have listened to this CD several times over and I must admit, I fall in-love with that boy a little more every time I think about the time he spent choosing the songs, narrowing it down to a short-list of favorites, and then picking the 18 “best” ones from the longish short-list.
The rest of my surprise was a mythical dinner & dancing date. Me, Handsome, slightly cheesey DJ, and a room full of strangers. Let me repeat that last part, a room full of strangers. Now, the vast majority of you do not know me in real life, and those of you who do know me in real life may not know that I do not dance in public. Ever. And I define “public” as anywhere outside of my shower. I have been known to get my groove on in the tub, but that’s about it. So me dancing in public is a BIG deal. I was so nervous! The fact that Handsome is an amazing dancer (think waltz, fox-trot, cha-cha and swing more than “shake your booty” kind of dancing) only made me more nervous. I already felt like a fool and when he and everyone else in the room saw me looking all fooly while trying to remember one-two-three, one-two-three, slow-slow-quick-quick, one-two-three…just thinking about it now gives me anxiety.
After a couple of hours my one-two-three’s were getting better and my swing was actually passable. Granted, I still felt like I had three left feet. I am also convinced that my posture–while fantastic in heels–is transformed into a that of a hunchback when dancing because I can’t stop looking at my Handsome’s feet. Shrug. I’ll get better at this, right? Besides, spending the night twirling and spinning and being held by a Handsome man is something I could definitely get used to, despite the “dancing in public” thing.
What does this have to do with relationship cracks? Well, there are bandaids for cracks and there are genuine fixes. For me, spending the night dancing with Handsome is a fix. Listening to a romantical CD he compiled is a fix. Realizing just how much I miss him is a fix. Going on a road-trip is a fix. I don’t know if I could actually define the bandaid solutions, but I do know that I don’t want any more bandaids. I don’t want any more cracks. I am well aware that I am at fault and have a myriad of things I need to work on, I am so very far from perfect. But I also know that as I work on things that will make us better I want nothing more than to have Handsome holding my hand and leading me through the tricky bits.
That saying “Dance like no one is watching, love like you’ve never been hurt” always seemed like a nice saying to me, something to be cross stitched on throw pillows or doodled on your chemistry homework, or even taped to the bathroom mirror. It never occurred to me that it could actually be true.
I love you Handsome, Happy Valentine’s Day.*
*Yes, I know it’s not Valentine’s Day, but due to The Booksale this weekend, we’re celebrating early.
So, once upon a time I dated this guy, let’s call him The Always Selfish Sam, and then we broke up. End of story, deleted from phone, forgotten.
A few years later, I am single again, going on a second or third date with someone I kind of liked and was talking to my dad about his second or third date with someone he kind of liked. For the record, it’s a little strange to be swapping dating stories with your dad. However, it was a good weekend for us both, although his date stuck around a little longer than mine. Two and a half years longer, actually. Lurch–that would be my dad, Lurch–and his fantastic girlfriend, Glinda, will be getting married this fall. They are a great match and I’ve never seen my dad happier or more content. I really couldn’t be more excited for them.
Except.
There’s just one, teensy little hiccup.
A hiccup that didn’t rear it’s teensy, but indescribably awkward head until a few months ago.
Lurch went with Glinda to a family event, and he saw this man he thought he recognized but wasn’t sure. And after a few minutes he realized that The Always Selfish Sam (ASS) had crashed the party.
Only he hadn’t really crashed the party, because he was invited.
Clearly, I have done something to piss off Fate. Fate has retaliated. Sadly, as Fate would have it, The ASS is Glinda’s nephew. HER NEPHEW! This alone is shocking to me as they are nothing alike! Glinda is good and beautiful and powerful and has done AMAZING things to my dad’s penny-loafer-and-polo wardrobe. The ASS well, he is neither good nor magical. In fact, he’s exactly what his name suggests. Always Selfish. And an ass.
The ASS called me the other day–of course I screened him and then promptly deleted his voice mail–to let me know he is in town and would love to see me. Um, thanks, but No Thanks (i.e. “Stay the hell away from me you psycho!”). I do not want to see him. Firstly, because he is The ASS. Secondly, because he is my x-boyfriend. Thirdly, because…well, no actually. Reasons one and two should be plenty sufficient.
A few minutes later I was sucker-punched in the stomach with a terrible, terrible idea; after Lurch and Glinda get married, The ASS will be my cousin. My bonafide cousin. My family-functions-and-holidays cousin. MY COUSIN, PEOPLE!! The ASS will be my COUSIN!
What is wrong with this statement: If your x-boyfriend is your cousin…
Why yes, that’s correct. EVERYTHING is wrong with that statement! Wrongity-wrong-wrong!!
Ladies and gentleman (or is it men? Do I have more than one male reader?), will someone PLEASE send me a Redneck Membership Card? I can name a half-dozen NASCAR drivers and my x-boyfriend is will be my cousin. Sick. Sick and Wrong. It’s time to throw in the Redneck towel, tease my hair into an unnatural pouf–called Utah Hair, for those of you who missed that post–and accept the fact that I have dated someone who is will be listed on my family tree.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must go throw up. Again.
Shudder. The ASS will be my cousin.
Sick.
