Surprising Compliment

Last weekend, I was leaving a bar with my boyfriend and friends, and when I walked outside (separated from the group) a guy looked straight at me and said, "You're hot!" 

Wow, it was weird to be addressed so strongly by a stranger (albeit a drunk one), but flattering, so I said, "Thank you."

He was so excited! He said, "See! [to his friend] That's what I mean! This other girl was a bitch to me and she didn't need to be."

I smiled and continued walking, but it made me think. Why ARE women so quick, generally, to treat men harshly when they compliment us? Have we allowed feminism to make us cold? Are we so afraid of "bad men" that we can't accept a compliment?

I certainly don't have that answer, but from now on, my policy is: thank you.

The New Year

I guess it's that time of year to begin thinking about what I want to change next year. I've never been much for resolutions. Not because I'm against them, I've just never gotten into making them. It seems too often that people make resolutions that they can't keep or give up on very quickly. Perhaps it's because we believe that our resolutions have to be momentous in order for them to "count." I don't know. Major changes happen over time and cannot truly happen over night. It's not like we can wake up a new person on Jan. 1. 

So, my boyfriend is quitting smoking. That's exciting, but it's something that will be a tough process and one that will take him years (?) to completely, totally be rid of it. He's really going to try. He's starting to jog with me and he's loading up on nicotine gum/patches. I hope that he can make it longer than the 30 hours he made it last year. ha.

Me, well, that's a different story. I guess my goal should be to focus at work more (unlike what I'm currently doing). I definitely want to pursue my New Life Plan (henceforth, NLP) by researching and gathering information. Yep, those two things are it. But then, how do I do that most successfully? I have a lot of trouble focusing in the office and it's a little overwhelming thinking about all the work I need to do to get moving on a project like the one I want to begin. So, perhaps, my resolution should actually be to take my goals one day at a time.

Much better, I believe.

How it feels

It feels good. Very good. 

I thought it wouldn't ever happen again. Honestly. It sounds melodramatic, but after being with an impassioned artist for three years (off-and-on) I was convinced that I could only fall in love with someone who could inspire strong negative and positive emotions. I thought that I would be doomed to either feel lukewarm about a stable, relatively normal guy OR to be with an unstable, but passionate artist/musician/dancer type. 

No one had ever made me feel the extremes of emotion that this ex had made me feel. I was crushed beyond recognition (I felt at the time) when we broke up the first time. I was traumatized when he was dating other women, even though I was with other men. I fell instantly back in love with him when we'd get back together. I thought, "ok, so this fighting, and off-and-on elation and misery are the key to being in love" I believed that someone more easy going or less angsty would not be able to make me love him the way I loved my emotionally fraught relationship with the artist.

It's funny. I think everyone should date someone who drives them crazy. I think everyone should be ridiculously in love with someone who will break his/her heart and who will have his/her heart broken. He once said to me, "I've never felt as passionately about anyone as I do about you." And I believed that I could never have that feeling again.

Then, as the problems bubbled more and more to the surface, and the inevitability of my leaving became clear to me, I was willing to leave that passion behind. I knew I would never be happy, and so I resigned myself to never feeling like that with someone else. I knew I would love someone else, but I thought it couldn't possibly be as good or deep.

Time passed, and as the old song goes, "time is a healer," something I really believe. I let my heart heal, even though it was me who finally left, it still somehow felt like it was him. I made mistakes, I slept with two different best friends and hurt both of them on my path to recovery. I moved to a new city and began a new life.

But I never forgot that I would "never" find love again. Then, I met him. My new boyfriend. And he is everything my ex was not. He is relaxed. He holds down a job. He is "book smart" and likes to read. He has been with 2 women rather than many. He isn't intimidated by my intelligence. He is gentle and sweet. And he loves me. And I love him.

God, it's amazing, but I feel so good. I love him like I thought I couldn't love anyone, and it's better this time. There isn't the terrible low to accompany the high. There aren't the irrational fears and depression. He makes me happy and I motivate him.

Funny how life turns out. I guess I need to remember that we can always find someone who makes sense for us, and we really can fall back in love.