Monthly Archives: November 2011

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An Extraordinarily, Ordinary Life

I always wanted to date someone who woke me up with a cup of coffee. I saw it as a nice gesture: knowing how I like my Joe and bringing it to the bedside each morning – plus my dad did it for my mom, so of course, I’ll think it’s sweet. And Mr. Idea did just that: every night we spent together, I’d rise to the smell of coffee brewing and I’d open my eyes in his tiny little studio to see him busily preparing it, smiling over at me from time-to-time to see if I was awake. On the good days, we’d sit outside and watch the sun come over the mountains, listen to Dave Matthews, talk about something or nothing, sip our coffee and welcome in the day. I became convinced that if he ever proposed, that’d be how he’d do it: right there on that patio furniture, as the light filled the open sky, with a cup of coffee in my hand.

I always wanted someone who would come up behind me in the kitchen and wrap their arms around me. Someone who would pick me up and spin me around for no reason, nuzzling my neck and making me laugh with their antics. Mr. Fire did that and a little more. My favorite memory of him is waking up on a Sunday morning after a night out of college boozing, to find him stumbling into his bedroom in his boxers, carrying a popcorn bowl. Still naked, I gave him a confused look and he plopped down to reveal the bowl was actually full of cereal and two spoons. We sat there Indian style with rays of sun tickling our back, laughing and sharing sugary goodness, sneaking in kisses between bites. When we’d cook together, he would find a way to touch me or wrap himself around me, and somehow it felt just like home.

I always wanted to be with someone who when I laid with them, it felt like our various pieces just fit together. I wanted to feel like our body parts were designed for each other, like we had been waiting for this other soul to come and be pressed against us. And Mr. Possibility felt that way. He was strapping and tall and is the only man I’ve been able to fall asleep with with him completely wrapped around me. We were sitting at some bar at some place when we first started to fall for each other and I noticed how similar our hands looked – almost identical. I showed him and he was amazed too. It would become something I’d always look at in bed or when he’d kiss my hand or rub his face against mine. His touch and his closeness always felt right and I could never imagine laying there, just like that, just that easily, with anyone but him.

Recently, as I’ve started getting used to waking up alone – I’ve curled myself into myself, looking out the window, thinking about all the men who I’ve shared a bed with. And my heart with. I’ve always been looking for these odd characteristics, or really these specific characters to fit into these ideas and fantasies I have about what love is supposed to be. I’ve always imagined how it would feel or how it would look, sometimes how it would taste, and especially how long it would last. These beliefs were just that – beliefs. I never saw them as dealbreakers or a “must” – they were just things I really hoped for, and when I thought I found them, I didn’t want to give it up.

But now, a few heart breaks and several life lessons later, I find myself wondering what it is that I really want. Sure, I still have those dreams of what love will look like: moving into an apartment with someone and fixing it up, walking around the city grocery shopping and creating a life with another person. I even see him with curly hair, though I’ve never quite dated someone with locks like that. I can see it in my head and I can illustrate what I think it’ll feel with – but I don’t want to. I don’t want to have these ideas or these lofty expectations. I don’t want to create my entire love life or relationship before I find it or before I meet him.

Sure some guys check boxes, but they are also the men who check out. Because I tried so hard to make them into my definition of perfect or ideal that I ignored who they really were. I saw the sweetness that I was expecting instead of being open and free to be happily surprised by the unexpected. They say you know more about what you want by dating and having relationships that simply don’t work out – but I can’t even tell you what I’m looking for right now. Honestly, I don’t really want much of anything except for one thing:

I want an ordinary life inside of an extraordinary existence.

I want a normal (however relative that it is) man who has his life together, just as I do, who is happy and satisfied but always wants to shoot for more. Someone who wants the home life and a family, as much as he wants to travel and see the world. Someone who is loyal and faithful, who wants to commit, but isn’t so serious that it scares the youth out of me. Someone who wants the finer things in life, just as I do, but is thankful for the little things that often bring the most happiness. Someone who doesn’t need fixing up or solving, but appreciates gentle encouraging and the kindness that I often extend to most anyone. Someone who has goals and dreams that have nothing to do with me, but they somehow seem sweeter if I’m around to witness them, too. Someone who leads this beautiful ordinary life, inside of an extraordinary existence he’s created for himself, just as I have.

I never thought I’d find that the thing I want the most out of a partner is just that – a partner. Not someone who rescues me or romances me. Not someone who says all the right things or brings me coffee in bed or knows how to hold me. Not someone who makes me laugh or is exactly the height that I want. Those things are wonderful and of course, I love them – but what I want the most is just someone who is…

..already a someone, without me.

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You’re Really Something Special

I’m from the Golden Star generation.

We’re the kids who grew up believing that even if you didn’t succeed, there was something to be said for trying. There was a first — but never a last, more just a group of people who didn’t win (thank you, Ricky Bobby). Our parents, the Baby Boomers, raised us to be as self-sufficient as we are dependent. A few have made their way with a few trials, a quarter are still searching and another quarter probably will never figure it out. And honestly, they really don’t care.

We aren’t necessarily dependent on our families for financial support or even emotional support — it’s not even that we’re that dependent on our clan in general. It’s more so, we’re used to our folks reminding us of a simple fact, over and over again, regardless of the outcome of the spelling bee or pageant, the slide into home run or the goal that was kicked in the opponent’s net. No matter what, under any circumstance, if we bombed the test or we soared – our Baby Boomer mom and dads never let us forget that we’re special.

When boys broke our hearts or the popular girls at school were mean to us, they remind us that our hearts will mend, we’ll meet someone new and those silly girls never end up never leaving town, but we will. We’re so special, so unique, so talented, so everything — that surely, everything we ever wanted would come our way.

But then we get that diploma, we pack up our bags and forget all that we knew to move away. As our special-self, we tackle the vast unknown that is a great, big, ‘ol city and we set our heights high. Why? Because we’re special. Because we have what it takes to make it anywhere, even here Blue Eyes, in the city that was made for dreamers, believers, bankers, artists, druggies, waiters who think they’re actors, and all of this-and-that that’s always in between. And if we’re lucky, like I have been — we do actually find a career path that makes us feel important. That makes us feel like we’re part of a team, that we’re getting paid to do something we thoroughly enjoy. And that feeling — well that feeling makes me feel special.

But even if we get the 9-6 duck-in-a-row, we start searching for something else to make us feel like we matter. And for the majority of us, that comes in the form of a sturdy, handsome and strong man who also happens to be kind, generous, selfless and hopefully, bilingual with a fat wallet. Or even if he’s not all of those things,  if he sees us as strong, beautiful, kind, generous and hopeful, if he reminds us of how important we are, of how irreplaceable we are — even if he kinda sucks — then we’re smitten. We suddenly feel what we’re been wanting to feel — special…to someone else. Or in someone else’s eyes.

Is that why they call it a special someone? Because we all look for someone who thinks we are special to make us feels special, so therefore they become special? Are relationships more about an ego boost than they are about love and partnership? As much as we’d like to think they aren’t self-serving, are they? When you breakup, is it the man that we miss or is it the constant emotional reinforcement that we’re pretty damn fabulous? And beautiful, even when we wake up with stinky breath and pimply skin?

Because when someone who once made you feel special, was once special in your eyes, isn’t there anymore — somehow you feel less important. I think I’ve used the words disposable, forgettable, unimportant in blogs past. But that’s not really the case. Having a relationship end doesn’t make me any of those things, it doesn’t take away my special-ness that many someones once loved. In fact, in an odd sort of way, it makes me more special.

Because I valued my own…value. I took matters into my own hands. I realized that what I wanted wasn’t possible, who I loved wasn’t an actual person, but an idea I had in my head, that having someone to remind me of what makes me shine isn’t nearly as beautiful as reminding myself. I decided that while I love my gold stars and my business card that goes along with the job of my dreams, and having a partner to fall in love with, the thing that makes me special isn’t how well I did in school or how I am in the office, or really how I am as someone’s girlfriend, it’s the fact that I’m just me.

And as adults, the person to hand out the certificate of merit is ourselves. Not our parents, not our teachers or coaches, our bosses or our supervisors. It’s not our very best friends (who are so special themselves) or the men that we hope will never stop seeing us as incredible, gorgeous creatures. The special-ness stops being told to us all the time by other people, so instead, we have to keep telling ourselves.

When we’re upset or sad feeling disconnected or forgotten about, it’s our own spirit, our own saving grace that comes in and whispers: “You’re still special, you’re still going places, you’re still going to find that love you want. Why? Because you’re really someone special. Because someone, someday will really notice that about you because first, you noticed it about yourself.”