Now, I've been out of the scene for a hot second at this point, but I remember it well. For me, dating largely consisted of flirting with friends of friends and playing hard to get with men I'd flirted with in bars until one of them snared me into a casual hangout that led to emotions without me realizing it and the rest was
Never. Intentionally.
Yeah, that's a true story. Ask my first college boyfriend what I said when he finally got up the nerve to ask me to be his girlfriend after we'd seen practically nothing but each other for three months
It was something along the lines of, "Ummmm. Well. I mean, I'm a freshman. I don't really want a boyfriend, you know, a serious one. But, I guess we could give it a try. Let's just keep is casual, okay?"
Fast forward to our HORRENDOUS breakup a year and a half later. He's ugly crying on a park bench and I'm standing around like an asshole waiting for it to be over so I can go cry to my girlfriend over ice cream about him crying over me.
Rinse, repeat for six years.
One minute I'm perfectly happy running around like a crazy person on my own. But never really on my own, you know? Just surrounded by the best and happiest people I can find. I'm so busy and full of life and movement and the next thing I know, BOOM, I'm either dating a total asshole with bigger commitment issues than myself, or I'm shaking my knee like I've been holding in four big gulps for an eight hour bumpy ride with my father behind the wheel. Antsy. Shifty-eyed. Trapped with absolutely no idea how I got here.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not heartless or especially cold or incapable of emotion in any way. I cry during movie previews for christs sake. I ended up caring deeply about everyone I dated over the years, whether it was for three months or twenty. I formed friendships with their families, who they ALWAYS wanted me to meet. I grew to like many of their friends, and I liked almost all of them as people. But it took me a REALLY long time to realize that kind of compatibility doesn't necessarily mean ROMANTIC LOVE in capital letters, as least not the kind for which I was looking.
You see, my problem was never that guys were hard to find. In fact, my problem wasn't figuring out places to meet decent men, it wasn't weeding out men, it wasn't getting men interested in me. It wasn't even getting men interested in me for my personality instead of my looks. Although honestly, I'm kind of an asshole and don't really pay much mind to my appearance, so that part kind of escapes my logic.
(Please note that I'm not implying that men were flocking to me like Salmon during the spawn, nor am I a hussy by any means. I just got really good at figuring out how to screen out shady men and make the rest really like me.)
My problem wasn't in logistics or the pool.
And no issue of Cosmo or Glamour or even Carrie Bradshaw herself was telling me what the eff was going wrong here, despite my desperate perusal or any advice they had to offer.
It was me.
And tomorrow, I'll tell you why.....
Xo Sare
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