THAT Girl

If you’ve ever read my blog before, you know that I hate romance. If you haven’t read my blog before, know one thing: I hate romance. I can’t stand when men are too gushy and sweet, when they bring girls roses and chocolates and all those other cliched items that every girl ends up tossing. I especially despise watching the reactions of girls who like this type of attention. Any girl who feeds into that type of love-dovey behavior in front of me isn’t someone I want to be around. Except myself.

Let me explain. Don’t worry, nothing has changed. I haven’t turned into a girl that expects (or even allows) her man to buy her things, and I’m certainly not one that makes out with her boyfriend in public. Unfortunately for him, I’ll barely even give him a kiss on the cheek when other people are around. As I’ve reiterated over and over, I’ve spent a huge chunk of my life being single. I’ve watched (in jealously) as other girls show affection for their boyfriends on the side of the road, only for the boys to reciprocate.

What happens though, if you’re a girl like me, one who hates watching other people all sickeningly in love, when you find yourself in love? What if you realize that you, too, love a man, and love him so much that you want to show your affection everywhere and anywhere? So much so that you want to shout it from the rooftops and show him off to every passerby?

If you’re aware of your surroundings, social rules or at all empathetic, you won’t act like those people you see on the street. You won’t be hanging on each other as if you’re physically attached at the lips to your partner, and you won’t be shrieking “I LOVE YOU” and “I MISS YOU!!!!” in front of other people. You just won’t.

But, that doesn’t mean you won’t be all ew and gross and pukey in private. In fact, the more you hold it in when you’re out in public the more likely you’re going to be disgusting with your boy-toy in private. If you won’t even, say, hold his hand when you’re walking to dinner, there’s a good chance that you barely let go of his hand when you’re in private. If for nothing more, it’s to make up for lost time with the one that you love.

Is that a problem if you’re really touchy-feely and romantic in private? I’d have to argue that it’s not at all. In fact, I’d even say that you’re more empathetic and socially aware of the people who don’t save their PDA and affection for private time. As a single girl at heart (simply in my beliefs towards affection in public, not in promiscuous behavior!) I’m always aware of other people. How might my friends react if I were “spending time with them” while simultaneously groping my boyfriend? Do you think they’d like it if my tongue were down his throat as they tried to share a meal or have a conversation? You know the answer. That answer is why I keep my hands to myself-- at least in public! The rules of nursery school, boys and girls.

Sure, sharing is caring. As my friend L. always says, sharing is caring unless it’s a venereal disease. I’m going to add to that and say it’s caring unless it’s affection in public. Don't share your affection in public and be THAT girl. No one wants to see it. Really.

Just remember, though, that affection still is important. It’s what makes or breaks our relationships with other people, what boosts or hinders our self-esteem. Without showing our love and gratitude toward those we care about, of course they’ll feel under-appreciated and not understand how imperative they are in our lives. Our emotional well-being relies on hugs, kisses and, yes, I’ll say it, sex. But there’s no reason to show the world all these expressions of love. Such public displays make other people want to slap you and your partner both across the face. I’d have to say that I wouldn’t argue with someone for (FINALLY!) doing that. It might do all of us disgusted onlookers some good.

Bitches in Stitches

A Little Housekeeping
So, as you may have noticed, I haven’t been signing my posts anymore. Actually, you probably haven’t realized this, or at least I hope you haven’t noticed this trivial little detail. I haven’t been signing because these posts have all been by me over the past couple of months. Because of a busy work schedule, S was unable to blog for a while. I’m happy to announce that she now can and does post her stories. Check out her blog, Sara For Sale, at www.saraforsale.blogspot.com. You can be sure that we’ll be writing some posts that go back and forth to each others’, mainly because on some things we think so similarly that it’s scary and, on others, you’d think we might as well have been born on different planets.

As for “Bitches in Stitches,” yes, we’re still both bitches and you better believe that we are still very much both in stitches quite a lot of the time! The blog name is too fun and way too accurate to give up. For that reason I’m keeping it even though I'm the only bitch writing. Or maybe because my readers are now the bitches in stitches. Either way, this blog is here to stay and I’ll now be linking you from time to time to bonus posts that S writes.

Now to the Point
Today is the first day that S. and I really decided that we should start linking our writing and, what a more perfect opportunity than the day after she had a little guy drama! Most of you can imagine-- if for no reason other than you do the same thing with your friends-- that S and I talk a lot of the day during work. All that talking sometimes leads to something productive like--oh hey-- this blog!

Apparently there’s some guy that S. has been on a number of dates with. He was supposed to cook her dinner tonight until he found out last minute that he has to take a client out tonight. Boss’s orders. It happens. So he was kind enough to call her in advance, reschedule for Sunday (good luck, S!) and, not only that, he apologized! He explained that he didn’t like that he had to do this, that he felt guilty about it, that he hates when work commitments come up unexpectedly.

Now, don’t get me wrong, S. was a little disappointed that she would’t have the chance to allow him to show off his culinary skills (and perhaps other skills...) tonight. But, was she mad like a lot of girls would be? No.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think a lot of girls (I’d even venture to say “a majority of girls”) would have been peeved, ticked off to the point that they’d be overtly angry. That, or it would be the girl stewing and not this boy’s dinner tonight. One or the other. I mean, it’s ok to be annoyed when we get blown off, right? (With the understanding that sometimes legitimate things do come up, like in this instance, of course!)

If this boy hadn’t rescheduled with her I’d argue that, duh, he’s just not that into her. But he did, so that’s something we don’t even have to consider here. What should be considered, though, is S’s reaction to the situation.

What did she do? She told him it was ok. She told him that really, he could stop apologizing. She understood what happened because, well, life happens.

And then she explained to him the most important part of all: she actually likes that he has commitments in his life that don’t involve her. It’s great that he has business plans and other social plans, she continued. I LIKE THAT HE HAS A LIFE, she remarked when telling me this morning.

This is one of those issues where S. and I are like a match made in heaven-- in terms of friendship, you wishful thinking boys! This is where I agree with her wholeheartedly that, yes, it’s great he has other elements of his life besides just pursuing his girl(s) of interest. He’s not focusing all of his energies on her (although you can bet he’s spending a great deal of time thinking about her!) and he’s allowing himself to continue his life pre-S. And that’s exactly how she wants it.

Of course I’m exaggerating a little. Sure it’s important that he fits her into his life if he wants her to be a part of it, and yes some things have to change in his routine in order to fit in a girl. Likewise, she also has to make an effort to fit HIM in. (Ew I don’t mean it like that! They haven’t had that many dates yet!!!) Every relationship takes some sort of time and effort, no matter if it’s brand new or decades old. But it shouldn’t take all of anyone’s time, or then it’s just what at least I personally would deem unhealthy.

It would honestly be very much peculiar if this boy were to drop everything and clear his calendar in order to spend every waking moment staring into her dreamy eyes and catering to her every need. It would even be weird if he cancelled poker night with his boys or dinner with his family just to spend time with her. She’d be freaked out, and rightly so.

Anyway, what I’m getting at here is the importance of each person in a relationship having their own life. Sure, two lives can merge here and there, but really, it’s important to maintain separate activities and friends to some degree. S’s worst fear is basically that some guy will spend too much time doting on her. Maybe that’s not what most girls fear, but really, I think I have to go with her on this one. It’s just creepy if a guy gives up courtside seats to basketball games all the time just to see you. But once and a while, if you don’t tell anyone (shh!) I might admit that it’s kind of a nice compliment.

Which brings me back to my ultimate point: if he spends ALL his time with you always, it just doesn’t feel as special anymore, does it?


XOXO,
R

The (Childish) View of Gay Marriage and Proposition 8

We all have memories from our childhood that we’ll never forget. For whatever reason, I have an absurd amount that I remember clearly, but I can’t remember the name of the new girl at work or that man I emailed with about a computer help question last week.

For me, some memories, like the one I’m about to share, really stand out years later. We were all four years old and a group of us were eating lunch around a rectangular table in our nursery school. I don’t know any of the context beyond that, but I can assume we were talking about how kids of the opposite sex have cooties. (Really, what else could we be talking about besides that, toys or birthday parties?)

Daniel, my best friend at the time, grabbed my juice box and made bumped it into mine.

“Boys marry boys, girls marry girls and juice boxes marry juice boxes!” he exclaimed with a matter of fact in his voice. Of course none of us stopped to think about how that’s not how the world works because, well, we didn’t know that. At the time, his idea seemed to make sense.

Little did I know, of course, that this four year old’s dream of how things in our society should operate paralleled the deep desires of countless homosexual and heterosexual people in our country. On a day to day basis, how many people wake up wishing they could be legally married to their partner? How many (straight) people are pained by the fact that their friend or family member can’t marry the person of their choosing? The numbers are of course beyond my wildest ideas and I have no way to quantify these wishes.

That said, we all know that gay marriage has been an exceptionally hot-button issue in this country for quite some time now, and only has become more of a heated topic in the past week over California’s decision to slam down Proposition 8, or the law that says that gays in the state can’t legally marry.

Now, I don’t know about you, but I had always considered the State of California to be a pretty liberal one-- much more than other areas of the country where minorities are still treated unfairly across the board and where legislation has only superficially outlawed their mistreatment. Even when I was in the third grade and figuratively married to my best friend, we’d tell everyone that we wanted to actually get married. Did we know the implications of this statement? No, of course not. But did we know where we should go if we really wanted to get married? Yes, to California. Disneyland, to be exact. Because who wouldn’t want to get married in Disneyland?

So now, over the past year and the vote for Proposition 8, many Americans have grown disappointed with California . We’re saddened by it’s lack of liberalism and acceptance that we had always admired as one of its impressive and positive qualities.

Fortunately for the gay population in both California and, I think we could argue, the rest of the country, California has overturned this law-- for now. Of course it’s going to be an ugly, uphill battle from here, one that will involve The Surpreme Court, thousands upon thousands of protesters and countless dinner table debates.

What’s interesting, though, is that it seems at least that the kids of my generation (or the ones that I was surrounded by) got it right from the beginning. It’s clear that none of us would have been phased by marrying a child of the same gender (in some sick world where kids could get married) and that it would, in fact, almost be considered “more normal” for girls to marry or for boys to marry each other in our culture of cooties and disgust for the opposite sex. We were kids and we considered close relations between girls or between boys acceptable. Now we’re adults and a huge percentage of our country, including the majority of voters in California, now oppose these social and romantic ties. What happened?

This is a time where I’m going to say that we have to take a lesson from the kids. Think back to your childhood, when it didn’t matter who married who, as long as they were happy. Maybe our country isn’t ready for juiceboxes to marry, and I’d honestly venture to aruge that there’s not a single protester fighting for this cause in front of the California statehouse right now. But shouldn’t we be at least ready to accept the loving and happy ideas of some innocent kids who held a very serious business meeting over peanut butter sandwiches?