I don’t want it…

I haven’t written on here in a while, so hello! It’s great to talk to you all again!

Now, down to business. Let me tell you fellas something: we don’t want pictures of your penises. I hate to be so blunt and topple your world into a pile of bricks and mortar, but it’s just the truth. I can tell you, in all honesty, we don’t even find them that attractive. It’s not like I’m going to look at that picture and think, “You know what, he looks like relationship material. I think I’ll introduce him to my dad.”

If you would get instant gratification off your brain for a short time, I think you would find that being in a relationship is the best way to receive what you want with a little more constancy. Will there be a very small percentage of girls that would actually go over to your house and engage in intercourse with you after being in receipt of your “gift”? Probably. But, they’ll also probably be infested with diseases. Have fun with the herpes.

I don’t understand what it is with guys these days. It’s like there isn’t a decent guy left in the whole world. Every time I’ve gotten on a dating site, it’s gone from bad to worse. I was sent eight inappropriate pictures in 2 days. EIGHT!! And, let me tell you, they really didn’t have anything they should have been bragging about.

Is there no hope left for finding a guy that will actually act like a man? It’s like the only thing out there are horny teenage boys who will hump anything that moves. What has stunted their emotional growth? Is it merely the lack of older male influences? Is it the overabundance of sexual exploitation of women? Is it that women outnumber men and it’s just too easy?

Maybe there are men left, and maybe there aren’t. All I can do is refuse to lower my standards to meet the supply. I will not be taken in by the mediocrity of the dating scene. I refuse to be made to believe that I should accept this eighth grade spin the bottle, seven minutes in heaven grope session as the only type of relationship left to me. I see your penis, sir, and raise you a finger. I am more than flesh. Whether you believe it or not, so are you. Please, grow up!

Late Night Thoughts

Do you ever miss someone so bad that it hurts? Is it ever someone that you know you shouldn’t miss? In moments like this, your brain and your heart are locked in a heated, never-ending battle, and it’s exhausting.

You try and try to forget them, but they always creep back in. You replay the conversations you’ve had in your head so many times that it becomes like an anthem. You just close your eyes and try to remember the exact temperature of their hand on your skin, every fleck of color in their eyes, how they looked when they smiled. At the same time, you’re desperately trying to forget every single one of these things so that you have a chance to retain your sanity.

You go to work, hang out with friends, spend time with family, and you act like everything is completely normal. You put on a smile and say that you’re over it, but you’re not. It’s like an itch you can’t scratch, like a constant, persistent ache.

You had imagined your life with them. You had convinced yourself that your meeting was kismet and that it would be the start of forever. They walked into your life and consumed it. They walked out of it and decimated it, and there was nothing you could do to stop it. No water could quench that fire, so you could only stand there and watch it burn to the ground.

They say that time heals all wounds, but I tend to disagree. Sometimes it is a slow, merciless killer, taking you farther and farther away from what you love. It’s like driving away and watching them shrink into the background of your life, and the worst part is that you’re not the driver. It’s realizing that you were never in control and you still aren’t. I hold more to the adage that time makes fools of us all.

For all this pain that you’re going through and have gone through, the question is was it worth it? Would you go through it again to experience the good times?

In my case, I believe that I’m a better person today for having known him. He made me see the best in myself. I never truly saw myself as special or worthy, but he made me see that I was. I realized how much I truly deserved. He made me stronger, more determined, braver than I ever thought I could be. Even though it’s gone now, I’m so glad that it happened. I’ll never stop being thankful for him.

One day I’ll be able to go a whole day without thinking about him. Then two. Then three. Eventually, I will only think of him every so often, and, when I do, it will not cause me hopeless longing. I will only smile and move on with my day.

One day…

What????

So, this week a woman that I know decided to “educate me” about how the world works. While telling her of a guy that I thought was attractive, she proceeded to tell me that I was cute, but that I needed to start working out. She said that the only thing that guys cared about was an attractive body (which I’m assuming she thinks I don’t have), and that I needed to work on getting one. She told me that she was only telling me this to better me because “that’s just the way the world is”. She said it in such a finite way so as to make me think that there must be some truth to her lunacy. It deeply affected me. I wish that it had not, but it did. So, I set out to separate truth from mere conjecture in order to sort out my feelings on the subject. Here is what I have come up with:

First of all, what may be attractive to one person, may not be attractive to all people. I, for one, am attracted to nerdy guys (glasses, intelligent, funny), while most of my cousins are not. Now, my cousins are all thin and VERY beautiful, but most are still single as well. I don’t think that there have ever been two guys of the same look and build among the men I’ve been involved with, which begs the question, is there even a particular type physically I’m attracted to? The answer to that question would probably be no. What I find attractive in a man cannot be quantified, it is something that goes beyond skin deep. It comes from a place that is so much more pure, more real.

As a Christian woman, I have relied on God my whole life to direct my path. I have tried to see myself through His eyes instead of the eyes of man, and have been pretty successful thus far. However, this recent incident has caused me (however briefly) to question whether or not it is my fault that I am in the place that I am. I have agonized over this guilt for days. The guilt that perhaps I have been impeding His progress in my life. I have been trying to bring the creator of the entire universe (omniscient, omnipresent, all-powerful GOD) down to my pitiful level, to tether Him to the trivial and meaningless opinions of a lustful world. Opinions that He cannot and never will share. I have been trying to take HIS power and give it to their useless opinions. As pointless an endeavor as it was, it caused me grief for days.

Until I realized one important truth: love is not seen with the eyes, but felt with the heart. I am not in the market for silly little hook-ups and a casual dinner that goes nowhere. I am not in the market for years of “I like you”. I want LOVE! I want the kind of love that is frantic, irrational, unrelenting. I want real love, and real love is not lust. Lust fades quickly, but love remains even through the darkest times. After all, when you say that the only thing that you like about a girl is how she looks, that’s lust, not love.

In conclusion, I want to say that there have been a handful of times in my life that have truly tested the limits of my faith. There have been a few times in my life that I have had to take a long, hard look at myself and decide what I saw there. When I had to decide what I wanted to see there. This was one of those times. I am glad to say that (as was the case every time before) I sought God. I sought His heart and heard His voice. I. Am. Enough.

We’re “talking”

Where oh where did this stupid state of being come from? We’re not dating, we’re not boyfriend/girlfriend, we’re just “talking”.

I’ll tell you what you’re really saying when you say that you’re just talking. You’re saying that either one or both of you are afraid to come right out and say that you have feelings for the other and so you flirt and hang on the others every word with absolutely no commitment.

Or maybe that’s what it’s really all about. Maybe you don’t care enough about the other to actually commit to any sort of real relationship because you’re keeping your options open. You believe that down the road there will come this personification of heavenly light in human form that will fulfill your every dream and desire, so you couldn’t possibly tie yourself down to an ordinary person that you have a real connection with. How absurd would that be?

So you talk…

You talk on the phone…

You text…

You talk for hours face to face…

All of this leading to one inevitable conclusion: heartbreak.

Say you’re the guy “talking” to a girl. As she is not the personification of heavenly light that you’re waiting for, but merely killing time, you text her. You call her. You flirt with her in person and talk endlessly about the subjects you both find interesting. But you are careful to be just distant enough so as to be able to claim later that you don’t know where she got the idea that you were together. “I’m so sorry I ‘led you on'”. Like you had no idea.

So, then the plot thickens. You see her talking to another guy. He’s laughing, and she’s laughing, and you’re getting a little peeved. “But that’s my girl!” you object. You rush straight over, throw your arms around her shoulders and “mark your territory”.

What you seem to have forgotten is that you don’t really have the right. That’s not your girl. You have yet to make any sort of commitment to her, and she has the right to “talk” to any guy she pleases. All you have managed to do is further confuse her and blur the lines that were already pretty fuzzy. You don’t want her, but you don’t want anyone else to have her either. She should be there for your sole amusement as you continue your search for perfection with breasts.

Say you’re the girl “talking” to the guy. He’s not your “type” and you don’t feel butterflies when he says your name, but he’s funny and makes you laugh, so you keep him around.

You look forward to his texts because he builds your already considerable ego, and what’s the harm in a little bit of flirting anyway? He buys your dinner, and you flash him a smile so he’ll do it again next time. All the while, you’re hoping that he won’t actually come out and say how you know he feels about you because then your ego boost and meal ticket will go bye bye.

Then there comes that day that he finds a girl that’s worth his time and effort and you act all hurt and wounded like you actually cared about him. “But we were ‘talking'” you say to your girlfriends as they give each other sidelong glances, knowing that you were only using him.

This whole thing has GOT to STOP! We can’t keep treating each other this way! If you are a single person, you should not engage in this behavior unless both parties understand where the other stands!

If you’re friends, make that clear. If you want to be more than that, make that clear. It’s not that hard to just state your intentions.

Dating is hard enough without adding this whole other element.

Dear Basic White Boy

So, there was this guy that I liked, but, much to my dismay, he isn’t smart enough to see how incredible I am. Either that, or he is simply intimidated by the fact that I am confident and self-assured.

For whatever reason, he has apparently chosen to pursue the most basic of basic white girls. I can only assume from that that he himself is…a basic white boy. So, this is a letter to him.

I realize that guys like you don’t generally like girls like me. I am confident, outgoing, funny, smart, and beautiful. I have my own opinion, and I rarely just take someone’s word for anything. I can see how your fragile masculinity would be threatened by that.

No, what you want is a basic girl who is beautiful on the outside, and completely vapid on the inside. A girl who will smile at the right times and never make you feel anything but lust.

Within a few years, you will probably be married to her. You will have tedious, shallow conversations, and increasingly less satisfying sex. Ten years and three kids later, you will look at her across the breakfast table and realize that you have no idea who she is. More importantly, you will realize that you have no idea who you are anymore.

You’ll go out and buy a sports car or get a mistress, trying desperately to reconnect to the person that years of inane prattle and listless emotion has stolen from you, only to find that it is a search that is doomed to fail.

You see, you never realized that as you were tuning out her incessant droning every day, you were dying piece by piece.

You will watch your kids grow up and move out, and then you will have no one but her to keep you company. Her looks will have disappeared by this point, and there will be nothing about her to hold your interest. You will turn into just another bitter old man, and you will have no one but yourself and your short-sightedness to blame.

In conclusion, I think that you are a wonderful person, but I am going places. I have plans for my life that don’t include sitting somewhere and just looking pretty. So, if all you want is someone to lust after, I think you’ve made the right decision.

After all, ultimately, I want love instead of just lust.

Because I am anything but basic.

Just a thought

There is something that has been bugging me lately. I went to a party last Friday which consisted mostly of people my age. It was, for the most part, a pleasant evening. However, I began to see a peculiar trend in the conversation. Perhaps you are familiar with this.

Every time someone came and introduced themselves, they asked what I did for a living.

They didn’t bother to ask what my likes or dislikes are. They didn’t ask my opinions on politics, religion, or the state of the economy. Nope, just what I do for a living. Like that was the sole thing that would define me. Like there was nothing else to know past that.

I believe in many cases, what you do for a living can say a lot about you. Sometimes, though, it can say absolutely nothing. It is not indicative of what and who you are. It is not everything to everyone. Sometimes, it’s just a job.

I know that it can be a way to start a conversation. I get that. But, you cannot base your opinion of someone on whether or not they have a job you deem successful. Some of the most successful people I’ve known have been completely miserable in their lives. No one bothered to ask them if they really even liked to do what they were doing.

Do you know what I think would be a better question to ask? What do you do when you’re NOT working? Chances are, that’s where their heart is, what they do when they don’t have to do anything.

Basically, you work because you have to. You have to have a car, gas money, food money, clothes, rent, etc. It’s not who you are. It doesn’t define you. What you do all the hours you’re not working…that’s what defines you. That’s what says who and what you are.

In conclusion, I would rather be happy than rich. I would rather do what I love than merely what would make me sound the best when asked the aforementioned question. I would rather do something Monday through Friday that better mirrors what I do Saturday and Sunday.

Just my two cents.

Mirror

So, I took a long, hard look in the mirror just now, and do you know what I saw?

Wrinkles!

It got me thinking. If no one has wanted the wrinkle-free me, why would anyone want the me that looks like my mother?

Granted, for a woman her age, my mother is quite attractive. I just don’t want to look like her yet. I’m not ready for “dark spots” and wrinkles…all the things that they put 40 year old women on commercials to advertise wrinkle cream. Because, believe you me, those creams probably work about as well as the acne treatments they try to peddle.

I have this ever-present sense of time passing. It’s like water as it slips through my fingers. I want to scream out at the top of my lungs, “STOP! I’M NOT READY!”

I suppose that if I were married and had a kid or two, the passage of time would seem like a simple inevitability of life. As it is, with no husband, no boyfriend, and no children, I feel as if every day is the hammering of nails in my proverbial coffin.

It seems like a cruel twist of fate to sit across the table from a man that is crazy about me and feel absolutely nothing, while, at the same time, thinking constantly about a man that looks at me the same way.

It’s like being on a sinking ship. The boards you can reach can’t support your weight, while the boards that can support your weight are too far to reach.

Around and around it goes on and on. You think when you’re young that you won’t have to settle because the “right” guy will come along eventually. Two seconds pass, and you’re 30, and he is still nowhere to be found.

There is a hollow that whistles every so often to remind you that you’re still alone. People who have someone don’t understand this. They say, “The moment you stop looking for it, it will happen”. They just don’t know the ache that burns like a dying ember, flaring up every time something touches it.

I want to tell them, I’ll never stop looking for him. I’ll never give up on the belief that, somewhere, he is looking for me too.

You can call me a dreamer or a romantic (I’ve been called worse), but I believe in fate. I believe in soul mates. As the sun pulls the earth around her and the earth pulls the moon, I feel the pull of him. It is inescapable. I will not give up.

Introduction

So, this is my life. I am 31 years old, and I am still single. I honestly never thought that this would happen to me, but here it is.

My Name is Debra. I am a short 5′ 5”, and am fully versed in all forms of sarcasm and/or blunt, awkward candor. I had a wonderful father that always told me that I am beautiful, so I believed without question. I have begun to question now. If I truly am beautiful, why have I been subjected to watching all of my friends walk down the silken aisle as my heart slowly begins to eat itself?

Let’s get one thing straight: I love my friends and I am so so happy for them that they have found the joy that eludes me. I ooo and awww at all their baby’s pictures, I go to the store and buy a different lame dress for all of their weddings, and I listen as they tell me of their complete felicity in the life they’ve been given. And, I mean it all. I just feel the ticking of an ever present clock, telling me that time is running out.

The worst part is the men that do want me. It feels like playing the lottery over and over again, and always missing one or two numbers. The ones that want me are not the ones I want, and the ones I want don’t want me back. It’s honestly enough to make you want to scream.

The kicker is the friends that try to convince you that you really do want the ones you don’t want because they’re the ones that they want for you. I hear it all the time: “You just wait, one of these days you’ll be married to him and completely happy”, “Why won’t you just give him a chance”, “You’re intimidating to guys”, “You’re just too picky”. Picky? Heck yeah I’m picky! I haven’t waited all this time to settle for someone I don’t even like!

That’s what they’re really saying through all of that. I should just settle and go out with him because he’s there and he likes me. Who knows when, or if,  I’ll have someone else’ interest. It’s like they’re doing me a favor by liking me, and I should just be grateful. I may be flattered, but I in no way feel obligated, I can assure you.

Is it wrong to want to feel a spark? Is it an exceptionally unusual request to want the kind of feelings that keep you up at night and steal away your appetite? I’ve felt those feelings before, and I just won’t settle for less. If that means that I will spend my life alone, than I will find a way to do it. I’ve just come too far to give up now. I want it all.