The Disappearing Act

It happens all the time. Girl goes out with boy. Boy and girl both have fun. It seems like they share a “special” connection. Both go home smiling. Maybe they share another night out. Maybe not. Boy never calls girl again. Girl wonders what happened. Boy never tells girl. Girl never finds out answer. Story ends.

It's all too common yet I hear this recurring tale from girls' perspectives all the time. "We had everything minus our mothers in common!" they exclaim. "It went perfectly and I was never so comfortable in my life on a first date!" others tell. What they all wonder, no matter how they're phrasing it and regardless of how they proceed with their lives, is WHY. Why didn't he call? Why didn't we ever see each other again? Did I misjudge the situation? Am I really actually not so accurate when it comes to reading people and did he not actually have fun?

Well, ladies, it's a harsh reality out there: sometimes, you just won't know. You'll never know. Ever. Maybe it sucks, maybe it frustrates you, maybe you want to know what went wrong so that you can finally sleep again or know that it wasn't entirely your fault. But you can't. Sometimes there's no way of knowing. And that's just life.

I've been in this situation many times myself. Sometimes I've found out the honest answer, like when a close guy friend who I seemed to gel with perfectly told me flat out that he's "just not attracted" to me. At the time I was offended; in retrospect, not so much. It was honest. Blunt, hurtful (although out of my control) but honest. Had we not been such close friends as well, I think in that instance that statement would have explained why, even though we connected well, we didn't end up dating.

Likewise, I've also dealt with the Houdinis of dates-- the guys who pull the mysterious disappearing act for reasons that I've never know, only to magically pop back into my life weeks or months later. Maybe they've reappeared with the intentions of scoring more dates with me, or maybe they've just wanted a booty-call. I usually imagine that they've tried out some other girls (perhaps unsuccessfully) and are trying to revert back to me, their second, seemingly safer option. But, let's face it, I no longer want to see you again, no matter how much I felt like we connected in the past. You've already proven to me that you're not reliable or, really, all that serious in pursuing me.

A strong emotional spark means a lot and there's no arguing that, but it sure aint everything. Dependability, on the other hand, represents a greater part of the equation than we usually imagine. So you've got some amazing things in common, but does it ever really matter if he doesn't call when he says he will or never initiates plans with you?

Yes, we can sometimes learn from our mistakes but, quite honestly, when a guy just fades away, there isn't always something to gain from knowing why. I'm a believer in constructive criticism, even when it hurts, but sometimes, like in many of these situations, there's nothing really constructive to say. Maybe he's just not interested or perhaps he just has bullshit commitment issues and is scared to actually get into a serious relationship.

Knowing about any of his personal mischegas (the Yiddish word for BS) won't help YOU. You might even find yourself wondering if you can convince him otherwise or help him in some way. But don't. Just don't. Take it for what it is: it wasn't meant to be. If he wanted to date you he'd make it a point to call you and make plans and treat you well and impress your friends and family. Maybe in the future he will be ready, and he might come crawling back. It's then up for you to decide if you want to get involved or not. That's when you have to weigh the evidence and go with your gut.

It's comforting when we have answers. It really is. Especially when we know things happened because they were out of our control (even as frustrating as that can be) because we know that we didn't do anything wrong to precipitation the situation. The fact of life is that we don't always have answers. Just like we don't know how the world came to be or why Bill Clinton ever thought it would be a good idea to bang Monica Lewinsky (couldn't he have done better?!), we don't always stop dating someone with full knowledge as to why things went down the way they did. (Not him on you, sickos! And, if that is what I'm referring to, maybe your answer is that you just didn't smell that clean. If so, take care of that now, missy.)

Speculating isn't worth our time. Making an effort to find someone reliable and respectful is. And it's important to remember that.

Being grateful for what you have.

This weekend was supposed to be a good one. And it was. It just didn't start out that way. Let's just say I was supposed to spend Friday night to Sunday night celebrating my boyfriend's birthday in New Orleans. Due to a missed flight in Philly (thanks, US Airways, I love you!) I ended up spending the night there and not scoping out all of the trash (human and not) in the Who Dat Nation.

So I'm sitting on the plane to Philadelphia, watching the seconds tick by on my phone (using airplane mode, don't worry) and realizing that no way in hell am I ever going to make my connection to NOLA. The plane finally lands after having left the gate 15 minutes late, hanging out on the tarmac for 45 extra minutes and then circling around Philadelphia and-- yep-- my connection had already left. Not only had it left me, but it also left 11 other lucky souls-- so lucky, in fact, that they were able to witness my near hissy fit when I found out that we had just missed the final flight to Louisiana for the night. It became clear that I was going to be spending the next 12 hours in a dreary airport hotel room, when really I should have been down south taking jello shots and collecting Mardi Gras beads.

That was until I met my N, who I'll call my"new best friend." N had been sitting behind me on our delayed flight and happened to be heading to the same final destination as I was. We bonded as we battled the incompetent morons who sat picking their noses and rolling their eyes from behind the "CUSTOMER SERVICE" desk. When we both realized that no supervisor would actually be arriving after we requested one about nineteen times, we decided to make the best of the situation: have dinner, get rooms in the same hotel, make sure we both woke up for our early morning flight and have breakfast together. And so we did.

I'm not going to lie, but our dinner felt like a first date. A first date gone relatively well, mind you. Too bad we weren't looking to date each other; rather, we were both stuck in this miserable location when we were both really supposed to be in the south visiting our boyfriends who temporarily both have moved from our home city there to work. But, as far as girl dates go, this one was as good as it could have been. In fact, we had a lot in common, and if I had to choose someone to be stranded in an unfamiliar city with again, it might actually be her.

What I didn't expect, though, was that I'd actually learn something at dinner. My boyfriend, C, has been away training for business in Arkansas. N's boyfriend, a civil engineer, is temporarily in New Orleans, working on some sort of flood wall project. C is gone for 3 months. N's boyfriend, when he finishes up the project, will have been gone for two years. After I heard that, I began to recognize a lesson learned about long distance relationships:

It could be a lot worse. And I really mean A LOT worse. What if, god forbid, I were with someone off at war in Iraq? The worst thing I have to worry about is that my boyfriend is going to come home addicted to fried catfish, but not if he's going to come home at all. I'm so lucky, I realized, that this is temporary and, what's more, that he's in my life at all. So for all those moments when it feels lonely to have a partner away for business or something else equally as trivial, I've realized that we all need to be reminded how lucky we are. Some people aren't fortunate enough to ever know when that special person in their life will ever come home. And, more people than not aren't even lucky enough to have someone they even consider special in their life at all. Maybe I got a little of the south in me when I was there this weekend, but really, kids, [insert southern accent here] count your blessings. You've got more to be happy about than you think and, more often than not, you're not in the worst situation possible. Doesn't mean it's not a hard circumstance, but plenty of people have it so much worse-- and their version of worse might be forever.

My dinner date also made me recognize how great it is to learn about your own strength and independence when the one you love is so far away. N started telling me how she rarely complains about her boyfriend being absent, mainly because of the reason I listed above and because she knows she can handle being on her own and having her own routine. What drives her insane, she explained, is when her girlfriends will call her upset because their boyfriends are gone for a couple days on business or for a family function over a weekend. Funny how it's the same thing that makes me crazy. Together we decided something: if you can't handle your man being away for a couple of days then you've got a problem. A serious problem. It's called co-dependence. Be grateful you're in a loving relationship if you are and that your circumstances are only temporary. Then tough it out like a real woman.

They say "distance makes the heart grow fonder," but after my lengthy discussion with N I've come to the conclusion that distance makes the mind grow stronger. It's important to learn how to be independent, how to go out with friends and spend time apart from your significant other, no matter how much you love them or are in love with them. I've realized that I look down upon people who can't do that, people who complain about a couple of days apart from their relationship. And I've learned that some space can be the most special and magical thing of them all.

My boyfriend thinks that girl's sexy and I... AGREE!?

My disclosure: Some of you are going to be weirded out by this post. Not only that, some of you are going to think I’m crazy—which I may very well be. There’s a slight chance you might agree with what I’m about to say, but it’s unlikely. I encourage you to share your thoughts either way.

I’m going to throw this out there: I don’t get offended when a boy I’m dating comments on the level of attractiveness or sex appeal of some other girl. I don’t throw a girly fit, snap at him or threaten to break up with him. In fact, I do the very opposite: I’m willing to engage in thoughtful discussion with him about it. I mean I guess maybe thoughtful isn’t the appropriate word—is a conversation about judging someone’s appearance really that detailed, serious and important?

You might wonder if I get jealous when my boyfriend tells me he finds another girl attractive. The answer is no. I don’t get jealous whether he sees her on the street and makes that comment. Nor do I care when I show him a picture of a girl that I personally think is cute or pretty or sexy or hot and he responds with an affirmative opinion.

Likewise, I don’t find some secret pleasure if and when a guy that I’m with points out an unattractive girl on the street. Actually that evokes the very opposite reaction for me—why would I want to be dating someone who is evil enough to comment on the heinous nose of a girl he doesn’t know or on some stranger’s botched haircut!? Sure, like any girl, I can admit that I do experience a little pleasure when anyone close to me has an opinion aligned with mine, especially if it’s about a particularly unkind girl and her dreadful appearance.

I know that some people will argue that I’m objectifying women here. There are always a few people in every audience who claim that the person speaking is objectifying women or men or animals or SOMEONE. To clarify, I believe in starting a thoughtful (again, not MEAN but rather constructive) dialogue about a person’s aesthetics.

In my sick and twisted mind, I justify this viewpoint as being the same as looking at a piece of art. Just like a Monet or a Picasso, a woman can be beautiful, exotic, unappealing or simply hideous—with many other things in between. If I were in an art museum with a boyfriend, I’d value and seriously consider his opinions about the pieces hanging on the walls. Why, I wonder, should this differ from any human face or body, essentially works of art in and of themselves? Why shouldn’t I be interested in my partner’s opinion on that as well?

The truth is, if you’re comfortable in your relationship, you shouldn’t take issue with the fact that your significant other finds someone attractive. If you’re worried that because they find them attractive it means they want to run out to a Motel 6, rent a room for an hour and screw them, then yes, by all means, you do have a problem. But if you believe that, maybe you shouldn’t be in that relationship at all.

Face it, people: even when we aren’t single, good looking and ugly people alike still exist. Just because we find someone attractive doesn’t mean we’re attracted to him or her. And, even if we were, it doesn’t mean we want to bang them for hours on end.

So get over it. If your man tells you on occasion that some other girl is good looking, take the comment for what it is and move on. (Granted, it’s a different situation if he’s constantly commenting on other women or if he fails to ever compliment you.) If you really find his comments worrisome, don’t bother shrieking, hissing or withholding sex for weeks on end. Then it’s just time to evaluate the level of trust in your relationship and really consider if this is someone you want to be with.

Just when I thought girls would grow up...

It was that moment that most women dread every year: the annual checkup with our doctor. As if it’s not annoying enough to hear about all the vitamins we should or shouldn’t be taking, all the unpleasant tests we’ll have in the coming years, we have to be weighed. Maybe it doesn’t sound like a big deal but, for people who are at all concerned with weight management, having to face “THE NUMBER,” especially in front of a medical professional, proves especially daunting, uncomfortable and anxiety-provoking.

So this year, it didn’t help when I mentioned to the doctor that I’m slightly concerned with THE NUMBER. Sure, I’m in great shape and it’s not like my diet include McDonalds or even regular trips to the bakery. But, as is the case for most people, my habits leave something to be desired and there is certainly room for improvement. So, in considering all this, I asked my doc, a female in her mid-thirties, if I should be concerned with what the scale told us.

“No,” she answered, “not really. I mean, we don’t really start to talk about gastric bypass until your BMI reaches a 33 or so.”

GASTRIC BYPASS. The words echoed in my head so forcefully that I really thought it might explode. I glared at her, gripped my stomach and asked “If you were going to do gastric bypass on me, WHAT WOULD YOU EVEN TAKE OUT!?” I was clearly referring to the fact that I’m a healthy size six. That’s less than half the size of the average woman in America!

Needless to say I came home from that appointment shocked, horrified and, of course, a little anxious. No one in my life had ever mentioned that phrase to me in connection to my own body. Why now, especially when it’s clearly so inappropriate considering my physical presentation?

After I finally calmed down, I called a guy friend who I confide in regularly.

“Rach,” he said, “it’s so obvious. It’s sick but it’s clearly that whole catty girl mentality,” he explained. He then went on to ask if the doctor is small or large herself, to which I noted that she’s actually heavyset. It then clicked: yes, the competitive relationship between girls has even entered the clinical setting. For all this doctor knows, I could be a vulnerable girl who, while concerned about my weight, also isn’t the most mentally stable. She could have been “encouraging” my weight loss while also promoting self-destructive or even deadly behavior. Fortunately for her, I’m confident enough to know that I don’t actually have a problem and that, yes, my friend was right: her competitive female behavior penetrated the doctor-patient relationship.

I would have liked to think that a doctor would have more common sense and decency when conversing with a patient. I would like to think, for that matter, that any grown woman would know how to speak to other women with kindness, dignity and respect.

Boy am I wrong. Other recent examples have proved how wrong I really have been.

I work in an office surrounded by many other women. It’s a fabulous place to work and the company really treats us well. Unfortunately for me, not all of the women treat each other with the same standards as the company does. More and more, I’ve learned that this competitive, catty and flat out BITCHY behavior also applies to working professionals in big companies. Apparently my interaction with my doctor was not some of anomaly-- some women are just mean to each other for trivial or even non-apparent reasons. And that’s a fact.

I’ve recently been noticing that a group of these women (all of whom work in close proximity to my cubicle) have decided that it’s OK to not only comment negatively on my performance, but to also stab me with nasty remarks when it seems that no one else is listening. After our manager said that I should use one of these women’s printers, the employee lectured me sternly, saying how she HOPES I’m not “using that printer out of convenience.” That little comment was followed by a barrage of questions about my own printer and whether I was just using hers because mine wasn’t working. At this point I had (foolishly) assumed that offering to purchase her ink and extra paper would be enough, but it seems that she was more interested in having a reason to reprimand me than to accept me printing a page or two at her desk.

Today, another co-worker (also female) shot me back a nasty, three sentence email about how I was so inappropriate to state to a colleague that she was “working from home” for the day. Perhaps that was an over-share on my part, maybe it was not something I should have disclosed. But would I have cared if she had told someone else that if I were doing the same if I truly were? Of course not. Again, another prime example of an angry female just scanning for reasons to condemn a younger, more vulnerable female’s behavior. Fortunately for me, I know that I have my youth, whereas all these women have is the ability to gossip and whisper in front of my face every day. (Yes, they do. I swear.)

What do I make of all of this? I’ve decided that I need to take it all in stride. Girls will be girls no matter what age they are. Such spiteful behavior isn’t acceptable or appropriate, even more so in a work or clinical setting, but it happens. It’s important to not over-analyze these situations or to dwell on them, but it’s also necessary to recognize that there’s a reason that grown women like these choose to pick on others. Maybe they’re jealous of my age or my work capabilities, who knows. Regardless, it’s important to step back and recognize that sometimes the younger (and skinnier!) person can be the bigger person. It’s comforting to know that even if they’re putting on their antics so regularly, I’m still going to treat them with kindness and not let them know they’ve upset me.


My best friend’s mom used to tell her this as a kid and I think it still applies: “I am rubber and you are glue. Whatever you say bounces off of me and sticks to you.” Take that, ladies, and grow up.

Facebook: Making Breakups More Painful

Today I was talking to K, a close friend, about how Facebook makes breakups even more devastating than they already are. There's nothing worse than already being heartbroken than to have 65 of your acquaintances bombard you with emails, texts, gchat messages and calls asking what happened. They're looking for answers about what went wrong when... OH YEAH, you're wondering the same thing. Read below for a truly passionate, heartfelt analysis of how Facebook really complicates an ended relationship even further.

___

R has kindly allowed me to hijack her blog for a post about breaking up in the age of Facebook. Children of the early 80s such as myself (I’m actually 3 years older than Mr. Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg) are in the unique position of having experienced serious breakups in both the pre- and post- Facebook universe. Having just experienced an especially soul-crushing breakup, I’m here to explain why Facebook makes the entire experience a thousand times worse.

First, a brief word of background. We fell in love. We moved in together. We got engaged. We set a date, I bought a wedding dress. He ended it and threw me out. I moved back in with my parents. That about sums it up.

Background out of the way, let me launch into why Facebook makes this situation even more unbearable.

1) The Shame Quotient

In a pre-Facebook world, I grant you that a lot of people would have known that I was engaged. I would have told many of my friends about my wedding dress, as well as other details of my wedding and generally how happy and in love I was. But would 500 of my closest acquaintances, frenemies and ex-boyfriends have been privy to that information? Most definitely not. Part of me thanks God that the ex decided to drop this bomb before the Save the Dates went out, but really, would recalling those be any more shameful than changing my Facebook relationship status? Changing one’s relationship status is akin to saying to everyone you’ve ever met in your life, “Remember how I used to be really happy? Remember how I posted over and over that I was going to be with this person forever? Well I was really really wrong and stupid, ok?”

I will say that I have appreciated the outpouring of support from many members of my Facebook community in this difficult time in my life. But I can’t help but think of every frenemy and ex that I never bothered to de-Friend who must be experiencing no small amount of schadenfreude every time I post a comment expressing my sadness and pain. I could start de-Friending people, but they aren’t really the people that have wronged me, and I don’t actually know what they are thinking. So instead I just live with the shame of thinking about what they might be thinking every time I feel the urge to post.

2) The Ex Factor

Even if you do decide to start culling people to limit your shame, that brings you head to head with the second big issue of the Facebook age: de-Friending the ex. In the old days, once you’d moved out, paid the last utility bill, and had him mail all the stuff you forgot to pack, you had to make an active effort to keep him in your life. That’s not to say that plenty of drunken “why don’t you love me?!?!?” phone calls didn’t occur. But those calls did not give you the all-access pass into What He’s Doing Now You’re Gone that Facebook provides without any effort on your part. Especially when your ex, like mine, is an active user of not only Facebook, but also FourSquare. There’s nothing quite like signing into Facebook in your pajamas at 6:30pm to find out that your ex is currently enjoying a night out at one of the fanciest restaurants in your former hometown. Facebook and FourSquare allow you to bypass the pesky logistical and moral details of stalking someone and let you to launch straight into the crazy that results when you know more than you should about his life After. Before you know it you’re overwhelmed by questions of “how can he be over it so fast? Has he found someone else? DID I MEAN NOTHING?!?!?!”

So you decide that you don’t want to be Crazy Stalker Lady and that you should un-friend him. But now removing him entirely from your life, Facebook-style, has become as active an effort as keeping him in your life was pre-Facebook. Un-Friending forces you to confront all the tiny little breakup voices still lurking in your head. “But what if he posts that he really misses you right after you block him?” one voice might whisper. “Isn’t it better to know what he’s doing than to wonder?” another voice (posing as the voice of reason) might argue. To de-Friend requires a Herculean effort to shut out all the little voices, a task that is often beyond the recently dumped.

And if you have been together a long time (living together three years and friends before that for two more, for example), de-Friending him is only the tip of the iceberg. What about the hundreds of mutual friends that you share? Some are easily categorized as His, but most you don’t want to lose just because he dumped you. But as long as you are friends with them, there is a chance he will continue to infiltrate your Facebook world. And what about photos? In the old days, it was a simple matter of either shoving the photos in a box under your bed or making a little funeral pyre for them (depending on your flare for the dramatic). But now your photos represent Who You Are to the Facebook world. Deleting all the ones of you and him together, or you participating in things you did together, means essentially deleting the last 5 years of your life. You don’t want the world to think you just didn’t exist for most of your twenties, even if, looking back, you wish you had existed a little bit more without him. And if you aren’t going to delete the photos and you aren’t going to un-Friend mutual friends, unfriending him becomes essentially an exercise in futility.

I realize this post is going to out me as a crazy lady to many people, including many people who have no idea who I am. I think bad breakups make all of us a little crazy. I would appreciate any suggestions as to how to keep Facebook from making the little bit of crazy a little bit worse.