16 December 2008

Uncharted territory

Dating, that is.  I don't want to go too much into individual dates with individual people-- although, I will say that there are two different men, if they are not so put off by infectious disease (terrible cold) or unexplained freakishness (the usual)-- but it is unlike anything I have ever experienced.  The expectations, the unknowing, the best-foot-forward, the unknowing, the coquettishness, the boredom, the intentions (the unknowing of), the etiquette, did I mention the unknowing?  What is appropriate, when?  How should I feel?  How much attention is too much, and when should I feel something, if I feel something?  If a guy seems perfect, does that mean that by extension he is a psychopath?  Will I always be terrified by such perfection, or this perfection someday seem less than daunting?  I have been telling myself that I want someone who thinks I am luminous and brilliant-- and then I meet people who think just that, right away, and I am terrified and repelled.  
Perfection scares me.  I feel the need to put my fallible nature out there so that my complexity, my quirkiness, will be known from the very beginning.  But if someone thinks these qualities that I have tried so hard to preserve despite a culture of conformity are "cute" or "amazing"...are those the correct adjectives to describe my rebellion?  It almost makes my personality seem diminutive, like I'm transformed into Thumbelina being cupped in some guy's superior, stabilizing hand, even though they may intend to convey respect.  
I don't want to send good things scattering with the breeze, but I am at a point in my life where I am different and I like that about myself.  I do not want to normalize to suit anybody's whims.   I am passionate, and passion is messy.  I want to eat cookie dough and drink kir royales and wear tutus and read Waugh out loud and watch foreign films for their beauty and travel off the beaten path and go thrifting and burn candles and teach with all my being and be the beautiful disaster that I have come to be.  And even though sometimes-- many times-- I miss Exbf, and sometimes I wish for snuggling and holding hands while walking the streets and drinking hot cider, I find myself wondering if maybe I do not want to be in a relationship right now.  Or at least, not when I am forced to look for it, online (just writing the word makes me want to vomit, even though I know that many people have found love that way!).  
In the end, maybe I just feel like-- as terrible as it sounds-- I'm above it all.  That I'm not the type of person who is supposed to find love, but that rather, it's supposed to find me, at the most inconvenient time possible.  The best relationships arrive by happenstance.  When you least expect them.  Like a butterfly in the subway.
"Once I read a story about a butterfly in the subway and today, I saw one!  It got on at 42nd and off at 59th where, I assume, it was going to Bloomingdale's to buy a hat that will turn out to be a mistake.  As almost all hats are."
But then again, didn't Joe and Kathleen meet online?  If it is good enough for Joe and Kathleen, shouldn't it be good enough for me?  Maybe it would be different if I had someone writing me about bouquets of sharpened pencils...
Something else beautiful: Zooey's Christmas list.  I want.  If this is luminous, then so be it.  I want a life of magic and sparkles and hot cocoa.    

2 comments:

Caroline Cakewise said...

Magic and sparkles and hot cocoa... this was a beautiful post. And I hope you don't mind all the quotes - you just so often manage to articulate beautifully and accurately what's been on my mind of late! As with your comment on my last post - thank you. I actually wrote something a while back on this whole *theme* of love and difficulty (I think I had just watched The Way We Were, and was seized by sudden inspiration, as you can probably tell from it!) and I quoted one of your posts at the time then, too!:- http://sparklesandcrumbs.blogspot.com/2008/09/people-you-and-me-are-more-important.html
Thank you for the inspiration! :)

Therapeutic Ramblings said...

Sadly, I know that quote was from You've Got Mail....which is probably the most well formed chick flick ever (perfect mix of mush, humor, and storyline).