Here it comes, this early stage of obsessing over a complete stranger I may or may not even meet. First it’s the incessant checking of my email account to see if he’s responded to my last message. He hasn’t. Then it's the thought: “What if my last email got lost in cyberspace and he never got it? Quick! Must send another email or else this opportunity for a life-changing experience/ possible great sex/ true meeting of souls will be forever lost!” Still no response. Then comes the egomaniac’s tendency to personalise everything: “Oh my god, is it me? Is it something I said? Is it something I’ve done? It’s me, isn’t it?!”
Get a grip, Anna K. Whenever the rational part of my brain deserts me like this, I remember my friend Xerxes* teasing me mercilessly about a similar reaction on my part when someone very important to me was rather short with me on the phone: “That’s right, he hates you. Nothing in the world pisses him off apart from you. Rend your veil! Stagger weeping through the streets!” I calm down.
I’ve figured out why Gabriel* didn’t take very long to get over the girl he’s been pursuing. Okay, it was partly his own realisation that he was rebounding from his broken marriage and she happened to be the girl he’d fixated on, but - more seriously – the man was not in love with her. He has never been in love. During the course of his young life, he has had exactly two relationships: a teenage fling, and a serious long-term relationship which led to marriage and, ultimately, divorce. In both cases, the girls went after him and he didn’t have a clue that they were interested until they a) snogged him or b) were naked in his bed, which was a bit of a giveaway. True, he has loved, and he’s has experienced the ups and downs of a steady relationship, but the poor bugger has never experienced the I-want-to-rip-your-clothes-off-with-your-teeth-right-this-minute kind of passion, has never known what it’s like to live for someone, to be so captivated by some luminous, extraordinary being that in their presence you discover that you suddenly have too many feet, break out in a cold sweat, turn red and babble incoherently because you suddenly can’t form a sentence, when you feel your knees turn to liquid and your stomach to jelly as they pass by and have to lean against the wall for support – when a glimpse of them, a smile from them – heck! – any kind of attention from them makes your otherwise worthless existence temporarily worthwhile, when their absence is too painful to contemplate and their indifference sends you into a dark downward spiral from which you fear you will never emerge. Yep, he's missed all that.
I’ve been in love twice, once with a male and once with a female. The first time, I was twelve and it spared me the indignity of crushes on pimply teenage boys and members of Take That. It hit me with all the force of a lifelong passion and took years to transform into something less overpowering, more gentle and something I could live with.
Sometimes I can’t help but think that at that age, I saw more clearly what was truly important – his intelligence, his compassion, his passion and life experience – than for much of my adult life, when I went astray. I mistook ‘exotic’ for ‘interesting’, went for looks rather than substance, forgetting that it’s the important qualities that make a truly person attractive and subconsciously trying to find them in half-empty vessels. I also displayed a remarkable capacity for self-delusion by projecting those desired qualities onto unworthy men unable to reciprocate affection or to enrich my life in any meaningful way. It was not unlike schizophrenia, I imagine: a part of my brain would acknowledge the criticisms levelled at the men who passed through my life, and would tell me: “He really isn’t as interesting/intelligent as you think” while another part of my brain shouted shrilly: “Shutupshutupshutup! No, he’s really intelligent and really interesting!” That would carry on for a while until the first part of my brain won out or my patience wore out. It probably didn’t help that I mostly picked men whose cases would be of considerable interest to psychiatrists.
When I was at university, a gay friend and I compiled lists of people we’ve been involved with/gone out with/exchanged filthy letters with (his was somewhat longer than mine) and then put a tick or a cross next to their names, depending on whether or not we’d repeat the experience, given the opportunity to relive our lives. My results were: 30% ticks; 70% crosses. On top of that, I managed to forget a name. How terrible is that – someone making so little impression on me that they may as well never have existed! (I did remember him in the end: his name was Cliffe, he was tall and fat and lived in Milton Keynes – the armpit of the Midlands). In spite of my results, I’m not really complaining. My romantic adventures and misadventures have all shaped me and contributed to the person I am now, a person I rather like, actually, so in that light, I guess that none of them can ultimately be counted as negative experiences. Of course, one day my instincts may fail me and I may end up dead in a ditch, but so far, so good. And who else among my friends can count amongst their beaus a married Jehovah’s Witness, a plumber/electrician dial-a-shag (sounds like a premise for a dodgy 80s porn), a sex shop worker, a nudist, a bible-thumping Baptist, a Puerto Rican hustler called Pantera, a nymphomaniac on death row in San Quentin, a barber addicted to crack and a man on San Diego’s February 2003 Top Ten Most Wanted list (though that may be because they were having a bit of a slow month). Some of them were even the same person.
But I digress…The second time I fell in love, I was seventeen, she was Apollonia*, my supervisor at the menial job I did for a year to save money for college and travel - and it made my life a sweet misery.
"She moves like she don't care, smooth as silk, cool as air
Oh, it makes you wanna cry
She doesn't know your name, and your heart beats like a subway train..."
Blondie, "Maria"
She was stunningly handsome – tall and muscular with short cropped dark hair and piercing blue eyes. She didn’t walk: she sauntered. Coolness oozed out of her every pore. I had heart palpitations just from seeing her, from standing close to her, and would nearly pass out from excitement when she sometimes flung me over her shoulder like a sack of potatoes. I came out to my friends, thinking that I may never again love a man. They took it in their stride; Josephine* even informed me that she always knew I was gay. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me?!” was my response. My best friend asked me if I fancied her. “I love you, darling, but you’re not my type,” I reassured her. I had hot flushes whenever I heard Prince sing: "I got the butter for your muffin, just need the keys to your room." I took up rugby to be within sight of Apollonia’s* broad shoulders and sculpted abs before I realised that I value my life and limb, I conjured up a deity, whom I named “My Lady” and who had her perfect face, and wrote bad poetry about how glad I was that there was a piece of machinery between us at work:
“Blue metal separating us, I cannot see your face
I’m glad, for at the sight of it my heartbeat changes pace.”
I wondered if she batted for the other team. Of course she did, and the day I found out that she wasn’t straight, I penned the following lines:
“Relief immense; my torment ends, but only for a while.
For still you linger out of reach, too perfect to be mine.”
And she did, because she was. Or, more accurately, she was not even remotely interested in me in a romantic way, besides being in a long-term relationship. This didn’t stop her from flirting outrageously with my friend Sappho* who, incidentally, has recently married a woman after divorcing her wishy-washy husband, having gone through a pious Mormon stage before that. Sappho* flirted back, and it broke my heart, to the point where I found myself morosely drunk in the corner of Cambridge’s “Five Bells”, a now-closed gay pub run a prune-faced lesbian, soliciting hugs from miscellaneous women, including middle-aged Dobber who had a military haircut. I may never get over it. Women are just too wondrous and cruel.
Harun Al-Rashid* once told me, after I approached him with yet more tales of relationship woes, that he imagined that when I fell in love, it would be with someone amazing. He was absolutely right. The problem lay in the fact that who I fell in love with and who I actually went out with were completely different people. Perhaps I play it safe, or perhaps there’s a certain amount of self-preservation at work here, but I would never have approached the two amazing people with declarations of love because I don’t dare aim that high. Most people can tell whether or not they are in with a chance, or whether spilling your feelings will either get you viciously trampled, or gently rebutted. The nice thing about going out with mediocrities is that if it all goes tits up, it doesn’t matter – it’s no big loss. If you are lucky enough to be in love with an amazing person and if – even more luckily – they return your feelings, then there’s always the possibility that you might screw up and destroy the most precious thing that you’ve ever held in your grubby little hands.
Maybe Gabriel* got it right. Maybe it’s best to avoid the rapturous heights and the suicide-inspiring lows, the being tossed about in a maelstrom of tempestuous emotions, and to be content with a steady, if uninspiring, relationship that plods along, year after year, until you’re both retired and your entire day’s conversation consists of: “Pass the salt, please.”
Who am I kidding! That sounds like a fate worse than death. There is a happy medium to be found, and I've experienced it myself: it is possible to love a normal, well-balanced human being, who has all the ideal qualities a man can possess, to have a relationship based on friendship and mutual respect without screwing up. It’s possible to be completely comfortable, and – dare I say it – to even leave oneself vulnerable in another person’s presence without losing the desire to tear their clothes off. I fully realised then that those two glorious spectres that haunted my youth were never perfect, and by acknowledging their specific flaws I came to see that if by some miraculous chance they’d actually reciprocated my feelings, it never would have worked because they are not what I need, and no longer what I want. This, in turn, made me appreciate them as fallible mortals like myself, and while I may worship them less, I like them a lot more. As for the happy medium, it may have run its course, and while I am constantly reminded of what I don’t have, of what I may never have, of what I didn’t have for long enough, I’d put myself through it all over again without hesitation.
Monday, 18 January 2010
Saturday, 16 January 2010
My three beaus.
I've got mail! Lots of mail, in fact. I am a fisher of men and I've got a bit of a mixed catch. Anything from requests to chat from 18-year olds who think I'm hot to comments that my profile is too scary for most men due to my bluntness and a photo of me looking militant and aloof in my Che Guevara gear, to a message from a guy in the forces whose interests include 'long-distance wanking'. 'Walking', one presumes, or else the man is bragging.
Requests for 'chats' I simply ignore. I can't abide smalltalk in most situations and what's worse than regular smalltalk is smalltalk about inane subjects with complete strangers. I prefer big talk, or, even better - meeting up with complete strangers. If nothing else, the awkwardness of initial meetings entertains me. Not everyone shares my point of view, of course. Many people on the site don't see the point of casual social interaction if it doesn't directly lead to their desired goal, i.e. a long-term relationship or marriage, yet how can you find that elusive one if you're not prepared to engage in the initial stages. I've had an email from a nice-sounding fitness instructor (looking a bit like Dane Bowers from Another Level), who has a most gorgeous cat:
"You probably get thousands of emails, but I hope I stand out." I invited him out for coffee, but when I explained to him that I wasn't out to find my soulmate, that I was simply interested in meeting up with random people to see what transpires, he sent me a rather abrupt message to say that he thought it was a complete waste of time: "Predictably, I'll never measure up to your standards of an 'ideal partner' and we'll end up just being 'friends'. No thanks." I'm not actively looking for an 'ideal partner' and this chap clearly has a bit of an inferiority complex. As for not living up to my standards...well, all I can say is that in the past, my standards have been...unconventional. Best of luck to him, anyway.
Predictably, I've exchanged several long emails with an aspiring writer who's done time for small-scale drug trafficking, who was writing a book about his prison experiences and subsequent romance with a female prison warden when his laptop got stolen and year's worth of writing disappeared. We talked a bit about muses and Jack Kerouac but I wasn't too enthused about the drug trafficking bit, even though he'd explained that he only sold to friends to fund his own addiction. I used to have weakness for damaged, tortured men, and I'm not keen on revisiting that area.
One chap, David, a Londoner of Spanish descent wrote me an email that made me guffaw and spit out my coffee: "I saw your profile and was instantly mesmerised by your beauty."
I dare him to say that to me with a straight face.
He continued: "Then I read your profile and found that you are as intelligent as you are beautiful." What is he trying to say? Still, he was articulate and his spelling was good, which worked in his favour, as one thing I can't abide is txt spk and poor spelling and grammar. I foolishly gave him my mobile number and he spent a whole evening texting me the likes of: "OMG, I can't believe how beautiful you are. Why are you still single?" I told him of my tragic past and asked him why a charmer like him is still single. "Because I haven't met you yet." Smooth.
I take him with a pinch of salt. You see, on PlentyofFish you get two virtual 'be mine' roses to send to people every month. I noticed that he'd already sent someone a 'be mine' rose and since the recipient wasn't me, I can only conclude that he's courting more than one girl. Furthermore, he's a bus driver, and as I told Gabriel*, "I've done working class, darling." Terrible as it may sound, I have serious doubts about a bus driver being able to widen my intellectual horizons. Do I come across as a terrible snob? Finally, I checked out the charmer's Facebook profile and found that he a) only has female friends b) his profile is very recent and c) he only has one photo and that is deliberately distorted, which suggests to a cynic like me that he may well be attached and trying to score with other girls without his partner finding out.
Then we have an Aussie who works as an engineer in Saudi Arabia in between learning Muay Thai (Thai kickboxing), walking across South America for a year and a half, taking disabled folk for a spin in his boat during his spare time and dreaming of yachting across the world. Sounds okay on paper, though walking's a pretty slow way to get across South America and when he mentioned that his other dream is to walk across Russia, well, I think I'll take a train, personally. Then he had the audacity to suggest that women in Saudi Arabia are not really oppressed by men, that wearing a head-to-toe burka is no biggie and that the women themselves insist on wearing it and coerse other women into doing the same. The last bit may well be true; as all oppressors know, if you give the oppressed an illusory bit of power over their peers, they tend to focus on that rather than the big picture. I told him as much, as he hasn't responded yet. If he does, I may grant him a dinner with yours truly, but one dinner only.
Lastly, an interesting character. His photo appears alongside one of Mick Jagger at some photo gallery, he sets up the stage before rock gigs, he wants to motorbike across Europe and he manages to look like different rock stars at will, simply by changing his hair and facial hair. "An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory" is his motto, and I agree. Too many people of this site are all mouth and no trousers, and all too keen on online chat only, whereas this one seems to be happy to meet in person, loves travelling and photography and, I must admit, is rather good-looking. I think I shall meet him and assess him.
Requests for 'chats' I simply ignore. I can't abide smalltalk in most situations and what's worse than regular smalltalk is smalltalk about inane subjects with complete strangers. I prefer big talk, or, even better - meeting up with complete strangers. If nothing else, the awkwardness of initial meetings entertains me. Not everyone shares my point of view, of course. Many people on the site don't see the point of casual social interaction if it doesn't directly lead to their desired goal, i.e. a long-term relationship or marriage, yet how can you find that elusive one if you're not prepared to engage in the initial stages. I've had an email from a nice-sounding fitness instructor (looking a bit like Dane Bowers from Another Level), who has a most gorgeous cat:
"You probably get thousands of emails, but I hope I stand out." I invited him out for coffee, but when I explained to him that I wasn't out to find my soulmate, that I was simply interested in meeting up with random people to see what transpires, he sent me a rather abrupt message to say that he thought it was a complete waste of time: "Predictably, I'll never measure up to your standards of an 'ideal partner' and we'll end up just being 'friends'. No thanks." I'm not actively looking for an 'ideal partner' and this chap clearly has a bit of an inferiority complex. As for not living up to my standards...well, all I can say is that in the past, my standards have been...unconventional. Best of luck to him, anyway.
Predictably, I've exchanged several long emails with an aspiring writer who's done time for small-scale drug trafficking, who was writing a book about his prison experiences and subsequent romance with a female prison warden when his laptop got stolen and year's worth of writing disappeared. We talked a bit about muses and Jack Kerouac but I wasn't too enthused about the drug trafficking bit, even though he'd explained that he only sold to friends to fund his own addiction. I used to have weakness for damaged, tortured men, and I'm not keen on revisiting that area.
One chap, David, a Londoner of Spanish descent wrote me an email that made me guffaw and spit out my coffee: "I saw your profile and was instantly mesmerised by your beauty."
I dare him to say that to me with a straight face.
He continued: "Then I read your profile and found that you are as intelligent as you are beautiful." What is he trying to say? Still, he was articulate and his spelling was good, which worked in his favour, as one thing I can't abide is txt spk and poor spelling and grammar. I foolishly gave him my mobile number and he spent a whole evening texting me the likes of: "OMG, I can't believe how beautiful you are. Why are you still single?" I told him of my tragic past and asked him why a charmer like him is still single. "Because I haven't met you yet." Smooth.
I take him with a pinch of salt. You see, on PlentyofFish you get two virtual 'be mine' roses to send to people every month. I noticed that he'd already sent someone a 'be mine' rose and since the recipient wasn't me, I can only conclude that he's courting more than one girl. Furthermore, he's a bus driver, and as I told Gabriel*, "I've done working class, darling." Terrible as it may sound, I have serious doubts about a bus driver being able to widen my intellectual horizons. Do I come across as a terrible snob? Finally, I checked out the charmer's Facebook profile and found that he a) only has female friends b) his profile is very recent and c) he only has one photo and that is deliberately distorted, which suggests to a cynic like me that he may well be attached and trying to score with other girls without his partner finding out.
Then we have an Aussie who works as an engineer in Saudi Arabia in between learning Muay Thai (Thai kickboxing), walking across South America for a year and a half, taking disabled folk for a spin in his boat during his spare time and dreaming of yachting across the world. Sounds okay on paper, though walking's a pretty slow way to get across South America and when he mentioned that his other dream is to walk across Russia, well, I think I'll take a train, personally. Then he had the audacity to suggest that women in Saudi Arabia are not really oppressed by men, that wearing a head-to-toe burka is no biggie and that the women themselves insist on wearing it and coerse other women into doing the same. The last bit may well be true; as all oppressors know, if you give the oppressed an illusory bit of power over their peers, they tend to focus on that rather than the big picture. I told him as much, as he hasn't responded yet. If he does, I may grant him a dinner with yours truly, but one dinner only.
Lastly, an interesting character. His photo appears alongside one of Mick Jagger at some photo gallery, he sets up the stage before rock gigs, he wants to motorbike across Europe and he manages to look like different rock stars at will, simply by changing his hair and facial hair. "An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory" is his motto, and I agree. Too many people of this site are all mouth and no trousers, and all too keen on online chat only, whereas this one seems to be happy to meet in person, loves travelling and photography and, I must admit, is rather good-looking. I think I shall meet him and assess him.
Thursday, 14 January 2010
So what exactly is 'closure'?
I've been thinking about the concept of 'closure' lately - how it manifests iteself and what it means to different people. An older friend of mine was married twice: the first time she married a man against her gut instinct because she was too embarassed to call the wedding off. He turned out to be abusive; he beat her and caused her to have a nervous breakdown. Yet when the marriage was annulled, she kept his name, whereas I would have shed it like a filthy second skin. Her second husband left her because he was not completely happy, and she'd kept his name, too. Why leave it as a lingering reminder of failure? She seems content with the situation, but if you leave it open-ended, how is it possible to get over, to move on, to achieve this elusive 'closure'?
When Gabriel* took his date out for dinner, only for her to tell him that she was in love with her housemate, he was stunned. Understandably, really, since for the past three months he'd been reading into her behaviour whatever he wanted to. She seemed to enjoy his company, willingly spent time with him several times a week, went out to numerous dinners, came round to our house for dinner and even invited him to come up to Edinburgh with her for New Year's, though that fell through. To my mind, she'd never displayed any sign of sexual attraction, yet Gabriel* interpreted her willingness to spend time with him as a sign of something greater, so he was temporarily crushed.
I wasn't unsympathetic, but when the following day he told me that he was thinking of spilling his guts to her, of telling her exactly how he felt, I didn't hold back. "Why on earth would you want to do that when she's made it clear that she's into someone else?"
"Because it would help me achieve closure, to draw a line under the whole thing."
"She's just told you that she's in love with another guy. How much more of a line can you draw?"
It reminded me of the time when I set my sights on a local Big Issue seller with attractive blue eyes. He reminded me of my ex, Forrest, for all the wrong reasons - that same tall, thin, twitchy demeanour of a drug addict, the same sunken cheeks. Paul was just dreamy. After weeks of relentless pursuit, I managed to get a quick kiss on the lips, but there was no repeat performance. I was away for a couple of weeks, and he'd hooked up with an ex of his. I saw her at his spot, her arms draped around him. I'm a scab picker. "Was it me? Is it something I did?" The worst response to that, of course, is: "It's not you, it's me." At least if it is something you did, then it suggests that had you acted differently, you stood a chance. "It's not you, it's me" means that there's no hope.
Of course, I knew why Gabriel* wanted to tell her everything. It's a kneejerk reaction to rejection: "If only I said something, maybe things would be different." Willing the final outcome to be different doesn't bring it about, though, and if there's no attraction on the girl's part; then a sudden declaration of love is only likely to result in more rejection. So Gabriel's* answer as to what he hoped to achieve wasn't strictly true. Closure wasn't what he was looking for; he was looking for her to change her mind: "Oh, gosh, well, I didn't know that you felt that way about me, but now that I know, clearly I must go out with you and not my housemate."
"She can react in one of two ways," I told him. "Most likely, since she doesn't seem to be very bright, she'll be really surprised and taken aback. It'll damage the friendship that you've been cultivating with her and things will be awkward at the office for weeks.(Did I mention that Gabriel* sits opposite this girl at work? Office romances are only a good idea if the two of you simply can't keep your hands off each other, otherwise, "don't sh*t where you eat" applies). I mean, this is the girl who didn't have it in her to tell you in person that the Edinburgh trip was off: she sent you a text. How do you think she'll deal with something as major as this? Clearly she likes you enough to spend time with you and considers you a good friend. Do you want to risk that over some unlikely chance that she'll be talked into going out with you? What you'll be doing is making her directly responsible for your feelings, which she isn't, and making her feel guilty."
Gabriel* conceded that I had a point and decided to wait for a good interval before making a decision. A couple of days and a few email exchanges with a cute girl online later and he's decided to let sleeping dogs lie. Admirable. I myself used to have real trouble leaving well enough alone. After a short but potent relationship with an abusive man in Puerto Rico, for years I dreamt of coming back and confronting him, of telling him exactly how he'd made me feel. I'd wake up in the wee hours of the morning, unable to sleep, furious at myself for putting up with lousy, disrespectful behaviour. But since I couldn't go back, eventually the feelings abated, the anger dissipated, and now if I ever think of him at all, I feel nothing.
Perhaps closure is not something that's brought about by a grand gesture or a 'final' dramatic act, although many of us hate leaving the persistent itchy scab of a relationship unfinished, especially if that other person really got under our skin. In essence, ‘closure’ is getting the ending you want, turning a bad situation into one where you get the upper hand in the end, where you triumph and feel better about yourself. We forget that life is rarely tidy. Perhaps closure is just an uneasy truce you have to reach in your own head. Perhaps true 'closure' is coming to terms with the fact that most of us will never get the kind of 'closure' we want from individuals who wronged us.
When Gabriel* took his date out for dinner, only for her to tell him that she was in love with her housemate, he was stunned. Understandably, really, since for the past three months he'd been reading into her behaviour whatever he wanted to. She seemed to enjoy his company, willingly spent time with him several times a week, went out to numerous dinners, came round to our house for dinner and even invited him to come up to Edinburgh with her for New Year's, though that fell through. To my mind, she'd never displayed any sign of sexual attraction, yet Gabriel* interpreted her willingness to spend time with him as a sign of something greater, so he was temporarily crushed.
I wasn't unsympathetic, but when the following day he told me that he was thinking of spilling his guts to her, of telling her exactly how he felt, I didn't hold back. "Why on earth would you want to do that when she's made it clear that she's into someone else?"
"Because it would help me achieve closure, to draw a line under the whole thing."
"She's just told you that she's in love with another guy. How much more of a line can you draw?"
It reminded me of the time when I set my sights on a local Big Issue seller with attractive blue eyes. He reminded me of my ex, Forrest, for all the wrong reasons - that same tall, thin, twitchy demeanour of a drug addict, the same sunken cheeks. Paul was just dreamy. After weeks of relentless pursuit, I managed to get a quick kiss on the lips, but there was no repeat performance. I was away for a couple of weeks, and he'd hooked up with an ex of his. I saw her at his spot, her arms draped around him. I'm a scab picker. "Was it me? Is it something I did?" The worst response to that, of course, is: "It's not you, it's me." At least if it is something you did, then it suggests that had you acted differently, you stood a chance. "It's not you, it's me" means that there's no hope.
Of course, I knew why Gabriel* wanted to tell her everything. It's a kneejerk reaction to rejection: "If only I said something, maybe things would be different." Willing the final outcome to be different doesn't bring it about, though, and if there's no attraction on the girl's part; then a sudden declaration of love is only likely to result in more rejection. So Gabriel's* answer as to what he hoped to achieve wasn't strictly true. Closure wasn't what he was looking for; he was looking for her to change her mind: "Oh, gosh, well, I didn't know that you felt that way about me, but now that I know, clearly I must go out with you and not my housemate."
"She can react in one of two ways," I told him. "Most likely, since she doesn't seem to be very bright, she'll be really surprised and taken aback. It'll damage the friendship that you've been cultivating with her and things will be awkward at the office for weeks.(Did I mention that Gabriel* sits opposite this girl at work? Office romances are only a good idea if the two of you simply can't keep your hands off each other, otherwise, "don't sh*t where you eat" applies). I mean, this is the girl who didn't have it in her to tell you in person that the Edinburgh trip was off: she sent you a text. How do you think she'll deal with something as major as this? Clearly she likes you enough to spend time with you and considers you a good friend. Do you want to risk that over some unlikely chance that she'll be talked into going out with you? What you'll be doing is making her directly responsible for your feelings, which she isn't, and making her feel guilty."
Gabriel* conceded that I had a point and decided to wait for a good interval before making a decision. A couple of days and a few email exchanges with a cute girl online later and he's decided to let sleeping dogs lie. Admirable. I myself used to have real trouble leaving well enough alone. After a short but potent relationship with an abusive man in Puerto Rico, for years I dreamt of coming back and confronting him, of telling him exactly how he'd made me feel. I'd wake up in the wee hours of the morning, unable to sleep, furious at myself for putting up with lousy, disrespectful behaviour. But since I couldn't go back, eventually the feelings abated, the anger dissipated, and now if I ever think of him at all, I feel nothing.
Perhaps closure is not something that's brought about by a grand gesture or a 'final' dramatic act, although many of us hate leaving the persistent itchy scab of a relationship unfinished, especially if that other person really got under our skin. In essence, ‘closure’ is getting the ending you want, turning a bad situation into one where you get the upper hand in the end, where you triumph and feel better about yourself. We forget that life is rarely tidy. Perhaps closure is just an uneasy truce you have to reach in your own head. Perhaps true 'closure' is coming to terms with the fact that most of us will never get the kind of 'closure' we want from individuals who wronged us.
Wednesday, 13 January 2010
There are plenty more fish in the sea...and other platitudes.
The dating website that I've joined is called PlentyofFish.com. Unlike so many other dating websites, it's actually free, you can email whoever you want and you don't have to pay to view someone's profile or to be able to view any messages you've been sent.
I've joined it in a bid to inspire two close friends to follow suit. Gabriel* has recently come out of a nine-year relationship, having been with the same girl since the age of 18, and having married her two years ago only to find out last year that she'd been having an affair with another teacher from her school. He's only been in two relationships in his entire life, and on both occasions, the girls came after him. Striking out on his own and trying to pursue a girl at work has ended in a semi-disaster: after cultivating a friendship for three months and treating her to dinner at an expensive restaurant, he thought things were going really well, when over dinner she told him she was in love with her housemate. What do you say to that?
"Women are unfathomable", he complained. Not really, I thought. Either she was too dense to realise that she was being courted - and being treated to a romantic dinner for two is a bit of a giveaway - in which case he wouldn't want to go out with someone that thick anyway, or she guessed his intentions, and that was her way of warning him off gently.
Clarice*, aged 28, has never been in a relationship due to her running away screaming whenever a member of the male species expresses any interest in her. Yet she does want a family and children, and you can't make an omlette without breaking eggs and all that, so I encouraged her to start somewhere. "You don't have to jump in the deep end. In fact, this is more like just dipping your toe in the pool. You don't have to respond to any messages, or if you do, you're under no obligation to meet up with anyone. And even if you agree to meet up and then get cold feet, you can always cancel and never speak to that person again."
As for me, I like having access to a wider gene pool, having the opportunity to interact with people that I wouldn't otherwise meet. A bit of a cynic, I'm tickled by people who put down that they want to meet a soulmate or the love of their life. Dare to dream, cyber seekers!
I've been on dating sites before, with humorous and mixed results. One time, I went on a date with someone who vaguely looked like one of my exes in the photo - big mistake! - only for him to tell me on the phone before the date that he was jilted at the altar by his fiancee seven years ago and not dating since. That made him sound really desirable and a great catch. Still, I turned up in Birmingham, since I'd agreed to meet him. My train was late and when I asked him if he'd been waiting long, he responded without a trace of irony: "All my life."
The rest of the evening progressed in a similar vein. He presented me with a piece of soap as a present, saying that he was walking around the market, saw the soap stall and thought of me. To give him some credit, it was the kind of rough chunk you'd get at Lush rather than a plain ol' bar of soap. Some men give flowers, other men give soap. We walked around aimlessly before setting on a mediocre Chinese restaurant. Loquacious as I am, I couldn't get a word in as Delroy talked about himself, each sentence culminating in a nervous giggle. I began to shudder each time he giggled.
You know those trays of airplane food that you get on a decent airline? All neatly presented and all? I briefly wondered who put them together but didn't have to wonder for long, because Delroy informed me that that's what he did for five years and proceeded to enlighten me about various aspects of his job in excruciating detail. At the end of the meal, we split the bill. Don't get me wrong: I'm a modern woman, happy to pay her way, but I think that if a guy invites a girl out for the first time, he should at least offer to pay for the whole meal, if only to give her the opportunity to refuse and insist on going halves. I shook the hand of my Darwinian dead end date, wished him luck, and never saw him again.
I'm expecting all this and more from PlentyofFish.
I've joined it in a bid to inspire two close friends to follow suit. Gabriel* has recently come out of a nine-year relationship, having been with the same girl since the age of 18, and having married her two years ago only to find out last year that she'd been having an affair with another teacher from her school. He's only been in two relationships in his entire life, and on both occasions, the girls came after him. Striking out on his own and trying to pursue a girl at work has ended in a semi-disaster: after cultivating a friendship for three months and treating her to dinner at an expensive restaurant, he thought things were going really well, when over dinner she told him she was in love with her housemate. What do you say to that?
"Women are unfathomable", he complained. Not really, I thought. Either she was too dense to realise that she was being courted - and being treated to a romantic dinner for two is a bit of a giveaway - in which case he wouldn't want to go out with someone that thick anyway, or she guessed his intentions, and that was her way of warning him off gently.
Clarice*, aged 28, has never been in a relationship due to her running away screaming whenever a member of the male species expresses any interest in her. Yet she does want a family and children, and you can't make an omlette without breaking eggs and all that, so I encouraged her to start somewhere. "You don't have to jump in the deep end. In fact, this is more like just dipping your toe in the pool. You don't have to respond to any messages, or if you do, you're under no obligation to meet up with anyone. And even if you agree to meet up and then get cold feet, you can always cancel and never speak to that person again."
As for me, I like having access to a wider gene pool, having the opportunity to interact with people that I wouldn't otherwise meet. A bit of a cynic, I'm tickled by people who put down that they want to meet a soulmate or the love of their life. Dare to dream, cyber seekers!
I've been on dating sites before, with humorous and mixed results. One time, I went on a date with someone who vaguely looked like one of my exes in the photo - big mistake! - only for him to tell me on the phone before the date that he was jilted at the altar by his fiancee seven years ago and not dating since. That made him sound really desirable and a great catch. Still, I turned up in Birmingham, since I'd agreed to meet him. My train was late and when I asked him if he'd been waiting long, he responded without a trace of irony: "All my life."
The rest of the evening progressed in a similar vein. He presented me with a piece of soap as a present, saying that he was walking around the market, saw the soap stall and thought of me. To give him some credit, it was the kind of rough chunk you'd get at Lush rather than a plain ol' bar of soap. Some men give flowers, other men give soap. We walked around aimlessly before setting on a mediocre Chinese restaurant. Loquacious as I am, I couldn't get a word in as Delroy talked about himself, each sentence culminating in a nervous giggle. I began to shudder each time he giggled.
You know those trays of airplane food that you get on a decent airline? All neatly presented and all? I briefly wondered who put them together but didn't have to wonder for long, because Delroy informed me that that's what he did for five years and proceeded to enlighten me about various aspects of his job in excruciating detail. At the end of the meal, we split the bill. Don't get me wrong: I'm a modern woman, happy to pay her way, but I think that if a guy invites a girl out for the first time, he should at least offer to pay for the whole meal, if only to give her the opportunity to refuse and insist on going halves. I shook the hand of my Darwinian dead end date, wished him luck, and never saw him again.
I'm expecting all this and more from PlentyofFish.
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