When I made my list way back last December, I was newly single and not ready to change that status just yet, but I figured I would be at some point. Dating is a foreign concept for me. I started dating my ex-husband when I was seventeen years old, and at that time dating still meant asking my parent’s permission and being home before curfew. That time is a long way off, but some things have not changed. After a year of dating , I’ve decided I don’t care for it much. Why might you ask?
1. Dating is a game of numbers. Apparently, the more people you date the better. One date told me, I needed to date as many people as possible to figure out what I wanted. In theory I suppose it’s not a terrible idea if you’re not quite sure what you like. In practice though, I’d say differently. My cousin has about eight women he’s dating at any given time. It seems to be his number. He claims he’s looking for the right one, but he does admit that he can’t keep them straight sometimes. So after trying to keep the names of his dates straight, I constantly think on my own dates if I’m one of eight or whatever this guy’s magic number seems to be. I like to know my odds, and the guessing that goes along with the game does not work for me either. It’s difficult to impress someone who can’t even keep your name straight.
2. Dating requires a certain flair for dishonesty. Is it so difficult to tell someone, hey I don’t see a future with you, but we can have a little fun tonight? Or how about I’m dating everyone who’ll tell me yes so I can figure out what I want? Or even better, I’m really not interested in a relationship right now but this was fun. I haven’t met too many people who enjoy being single, but the way this game is played, many will be single a very long time or otherwise they will settle for whoever comes along that doesn’t play by these rules. Which brings me the last reason I haven’t taken to dating.
3. Patience. I have none. Zilch. I don’t like games where I have to follow someone else’s rules. I’m not impressed by messages that pop up on my screen that say hey beautiful or even worse, hey sexy by people I don’t even know. I don’t want married men approaching me when they have supposedly already found Mrs. Right. When I find Mr. Right, I don’t want him to have Mrs. Right waiting at home. If you want to get my attention, find out who I am first because none of those things impress me. (Someone actually told me he never read a book in his life after I told him I was a writer. Really? Was I supposed to be enthralled by this?) I don’t want to wait around for someone to tell me that they just aren’t interested at this time when they’ve clearly shown it through their behavior.
Because when it’s all said it done, I already know what I want. I’m not looking for a bunch of people to be small pieces of my life, I’m looking for someone to share my entire life. I know that may come as a shocker to those people who think I’m missing the romantic trait, but I do think love should be like a country song (The good love ones of course). I do think one conversation can decide whether you’re interested in a person or not. I don’t think I need to date eighty guys to figure out what I want; I just need to meet the one guy that figures out that I’m the one and he convinces me of that (or hey, it’s the twenty-first century, it can work the other way around, too).
I’m not saying I believe in the fairy tale version of love either. I think the reason why first marriages fail is because people learn the hard way that love actually takes work. Not the day to day compromise of living together but the actual love that comes so easy in the beginning requires effort to maintain. I also believe that if you play love as a game and you win, you might not be satisfied with the prize forever if it was simply about the winning.
So I will do it like I do everything else, my own way. It does mean I go on fewer dates, but it also means that the ones that I do accept actually mean something.
No comments:
Post a Comment