Definitely Something

Mac and I have been in regular contact since the last posting. Not every single day, mind you, but more days than not. And we've seen each other a fair bit, too.

The tone has been friendly and interested and casual. No proclamations or physical demonstrativeness, though, which I am completely unused to--and OK with. I haven't done the "take it slow thing" in forever--if at all. And given my propensity for falling out of love quickly and efficiently (9 months is my longest relationship to date, after all), I think slow might be good.

That said, I want him.

I am increasingly charmed and interested, and last night's date definitely had something to do with it. First of all, it was clearly a date. I wasn't sure--we'd been talking about seeing a movie for awhile and I figured it was just another chance to hang out. But when I arrived at his place after work and saw him all freshly scrubbed and be-sweatered, I realized that he was definitely putting the date foot forward.

We got drinks and nibbles before the movie and just talked and talked. We strolled down the streets of St. H____ and looked at storefront windows. TOTGA came up in conversation (briefly)--just as a point of "these are the people we know." And when we were talking about dating and types, he said, "Ruby, I like you. I like you a lot, actually"--and then went on to say that this wasn't necessarily true for him and me, but people are definitely attracted to types. (I'd been relating TOTGA's need for The Crazy in a woman so it seemed like Mac was referring to the more negative side of "types.") The air was cold and I was slow to realize what he was saying. My mind sludged through the possibilities: I was his friend and he liked me but I wasn't his type; I wasn't his type; he wasn't attracted to me ...

I'm an idiot. Is it any wonder I'm single?

Three quarters of the way through the movie, I'm sitting there in my chair reveling in the occasional gentle pressure of his elbow on my arm (yes, dry spell here of Epic Proportions!!) when I realize that he said he liked me and that the convoluted sentence that followed really had to do with his nervousness. For the rest of the movie I obsessed with my inability to loosen up, encourage, flirt. [yes, I'm playing fast and loose with my tenses, O Writers. I can't be bothered to edit]

As we walked back to his house, I grabbed his hand when we dashed across the street. (Or maybe he grabbed mine?) Then we let go.

At my car there was a moment, a pause, and I smiled and said, "What?" And he said, "Ah, get out of here." (friendly/jokey--not rude) I'm willing to bet he wanted to kiss me.

So you're all pulling your hair and gritting your teeth wondering why we're behaving like two virgins. Well, there's his recent breakup and our extremely small social network to consider, and the fact that he's a thoughtful person (as am I). Also, though he's told me he has no interest in getting back together with his ex, he cares about her and is worried about her. (She's going through a rough patch.) Given all those variables, I think the current state of affairs is fair.

But I hope there's resolution before too long. What I would give for just a kiss!

A Former Love Marries

Ugh. TOTGA got married.

I was over him, but still: at first the news (brought to me via a mutual friend's Facebook posts) hit me in the gut. And though I haven't obsessed or rent my hair, I am sad about it. It doesn't help that his new wife is reputably as crazy as his ex. (I like to think I'd be happy for him if he'd married well when in truth I might have given in to jealousy.)

What is it with nice guys and The Crazy? Or maybe TOTGA is less nice and more stupid than I imagined. (Come, come, Ruby. Where's your generous spirit?)

I do have a second date with A/S this coming weekend, so I'm happy about that. He asked me out again right away but through a vicious game of phone tag. We haven't actually spoken since the first date, which seems weird and Not Good to me. But ... I am heeding EMK's advice on mirroring and not stressing. Plus, there's something nice about just saying, "We'll see what happens," and leaving it there.

Otherwise, my dating prospects are slim to nil and that, coupled with TOTGA's marriage and my dark and hopeful thoughts for their unhappiness (so unlike me!), is depressing.

Not Lucky--Yet

August is a busy month here in the wine world. During hotter, more normal summers, we would already be in mad dash harvest. As it is, harvest is delayed until the first of September--at the earliest. Instead I've been busy with events and projects--your normal work fare.

And ... last week I witnessed a suicide. I know: awful, unbelievable, disturbing, and etc. I really can't say more here for searchability reasons, but if you'd like to know what happened, email me. Needless to say, that has taken a lot of dealing. (I know. You wouldn't think so--or maybe you would. I am resilient, after all. But it is rough to witness death, never mind a violent end--and that it was purposeful ...)

So, yes, the normal excuses for not writing--or dating!--busyness and, well, death. (Normal excuse? No, I guess not.)

But that doesn't mean I haven't been thinking about dating.

Did any of you catch the CNN article a couple of weeks ago that basically said that if we haven't found someone yet it's because we haven't been lucky? (I would link to it but can't find it now.)

I know, not particularly earth-shattering at first glance. The setup was perfection, though. How many of you have heard "Oh, but you're so gorgeous/talented/amazing! Why are you single?" (I see a forest of hands out there.) The author pointed out what all of you know--that this "compliment" has a hidden (or not-so-hidden) barb: Fabulous You must be hiding some sort of dark, hairy, insidious Thing that keeps the men/women at bay.

And don't we all feel that way at times? This is why we pay so much money for therapy or dating coaches or books. We want to know How To Be so we can win over that Someone Amazing.

The author asked us readers to consider our married friends. Are they any more perfect than we? Good God, no. They are themselves--a little amazing, a little troubled, a little funny, a little ugly. And they found love. (Or, they found marriage--we know love and marriage aren't givens.) Again, we just haven't been lucky ... yet.

I'm all for self-improvement. I think it is important to be the best person I can be--within reason. (I will not become OCD about it!) But I'll be that person for myself, not in order to woo someone. Also, I think it's important to stay active and get out there, thus increasing the chances for meeting interesting people.

Anyway, I felt encouraged after reading that reminder.

Good thing, because a friend of mine let me know that TOTGA's girlfriend's Facebook profile announces that she's engaged. (It's not clear that she's engaged to TOTGA, but we assume that's the case.) That knocked the wind out of me for about 30 seconds and then I recovered. Earlier this summer I finally, finally got a grip and recovered fully from all that pining. Jesus.

In other, gripping news, someone at work who is so, so crushable (I swear I had written about him before) left his crazy wife. Of course, this is a definite No Go. But it's fun to think about. :)

Catty

I have been getting out. Perhaps not as much as you city girls, but I've been doing my best to get out and about these last couple weeks. (I didn't mean to let so much time lapse since my last post!) In fact, I've actually flirted my way through a couple of gifted drinks and a dessert! (Yes, no big deal, but with my great height and shy nature, I haven't exactly been inviting men to lavish me with treats.) So that's the latest--nothing huge.

Today, however, I ran into TOTGA's girlfriend! (Or ex-girlfriend? I don't know.) She didn't recognize me, I don't think, and I barely recognized her. When I realized who she was I, like a woman obsessed, actually turned around and watched her leave the store! The thing is, she was so skinny. She was slim before, but here she was, with her knobby elbows jutting from her spindly arms! It only made her wattle* that much more prominent! I confess, I gloated.

About 15 minutes into the gloat I realized that she may have some sort of serious, physical ailment and immediately felt badly and reeled in the gloat.

But still: she was in a store at noon on Father's day with a friend and her friend's child. She wasn't with TOTGA. Whereas I never met TOTGA's daughter, this woman wormed her way in immediately. It would stand to reason that a year-plus hence, she would be enjoying something Father's Day-ish with the whole fam.

Oh, none of this matters. It's not like TOTGA and I are going to meet again and have a good laugh over everything and fall into each other's arms while the violins swell ...

In other news, a friend of mine is hem-hawing over a guy who drives me nuts. She isn't sure she's attracted to him, she says, but he's sooo nice and attentive and all those things we ladies want. Well, I met him and I'm not sure why my friend is hemming and hawing: the guy isn't stable. I can't exactly say what the issue is, but something is seriously off. Since meeting him, I've gently suggested ways she could give him the kiss-off. And, finally, Friday night, after a couple of cocktails, I said something absolutely blunt--which I don't remember now, but which made another girlfriend laugh in agreement. Yikes. I just hope I haven't offended.

Men are so rare here in the NV--a girl kinda hates to strike a potential from the list. (Even if its someone else's list.)

Onward.

*This comment pretty much solidifies my having a similar appearance when I am this woman's age.

Calm Before the Storm?

I feel like I haven't been holding up my end of the blogging bargain because, my sweets, I have nothing going on romantically ... and I am fine with it. I have too much going on otherwise! Too much excitement over the new job, too many plans for an updated wardrobe, too many starry-eyed dreams for the future ...

But I have started doing something that I haven't done in ages: I've been noticing men. That is, I scope out rooms and I look around to see if I I, in turn, have been spotted. Vain? Yes. But it's also part of the whole dating ritual. Catch an eye and you never know ... Also, I am taking mental notes on what men I find attractive seem to be drawn to.

And just who do I find attractive? Dammit, the sensitive, artistic types. It's true. Most of my guys fall into this category. Guy (my last boyfriend) was more sensitive than most women I know--ugh! So now I want to swing the other way (though not completely). I still like that strong, silent type--but I'd like a little pinch of outgoingness, too.

Whatever. Show me a handsome man at the back of the room and I'll show you one very interested woman. (TOTGA had this quality in spades, and no matter how much I tell myself that he was a lurker, I know it isn't true. He was an observer, and I love that, damn him.)

I promise I'll scare up a good story soon, but for now it's a lot of quality time with the girlfriends--dining out at fabulous NV restaurants. It's a tough life, but I'm happy to live it.

Shape-Shifter

"You couldn't make yourself stop feeling a certain way, no matter what the other person did.
You just had to wait.
Eventually the feeling went away because others came along.
Or sometimes it didn't go away but got squeezed into something tiny,
and hung like a piece of tinsel in the back of your mind."
--Olive Kitteridge, by Elizabeth Strout

Yes, this is about The One That Got Away (TOTGA) but also about the nature of love and from whence it springs--the shape and size of it. Sort of a "How to Spot Love at Thirty Paces."

(Not that I have a clue.)

God, a wonderful Valentine's day and I spend the last part of it (mid-romantic concert) thinking about dark, brooding TOTGA. Yes, he's the one that got away and good riddance. But ... I can't get him out of my mind, piece of tinsel or not. Others have not replaced him yet.

How does one know that she's in love? Evan Marc Katz brilliantly espouses that it's not how you feel but how he treats you. (I am probably misstating the facts because if this is the case, I have known love more than a half dozen times--an embarrassment of riches, for sure.) Guy treats me amazingly well, but I am not in love. I am fond of him, but that's not enough for me. I want to respect him and be proud of him. I want to walk into a room on his arm and be thrilled to be there, on his arm.

Too much to ask? A mark of a spoiled thirty-something who hasn't made the most of her fading charms?

Blech. So much for the size and shape of love. I suspect this Love thing is a shape-shifter and a glorious, different thing for each of us. And I suspect that Love doesn't choose you--you have to choose Love. (Yes, I fear it's as airy-fairy as that, the horror!) I suspect that if I wanted to, I could love Guy.

I might manage it yet. But how to squeeze out TOTGA?

Run-in with TOTGA

Up to a certain point today, today was gorgeous and good, just as you would expect a Saturday in the Napa Valley to be. I puttered around the house and cleaned and prepared for an event tomorrow and did stuff. I decided to go shopping for food and other necessities, and so pulled on jeans and a top (one that emphasized my chest--an important factor as you will later see). I skipped the makeup (also important, as I am not blessed with perfect skintones and have lately been battling circles and bags) except for a shine of pink gloss.

I was happy; I smiled at clerks, chose my vegetables, treated myself to a new nail polish from OPI. (A wonderfully dark purple--so dark it's practically black.) And then I decided to dart into TJ's for beer and a salad. The moment I stepped into the store I saw him, TOTGA, and his girlfriend. My heart clenched and I made a beeline for the salads, making sure I stayed out of his line of sight. I skirted around to the beer section and grabbed a six-pack of Pilsner. So far, so good--I would make it out of TJ's with my treasures and without having to look at him.

As in a romantic comedy, I was foiled at the checkout. There they were, next to the checkout stand I was planning to use! I decided to continue with the plan and slipped into line, conveniently bending down to examine the chocolate on offer. Maybe I wouldn't be seen, but of course, the checkout stations at TJ's are designed to have the customers face each other ...

I felt ill; my hands were shaking. The checkout girl probably wondered what the heck was up with me. I looked up at TOTGA, pretending to have just seen him and smiled and said hey. He had the phone to his ear and smiled back, all calm, cool and collected--phased by my presence not in the least.

Of course.

I paid and left TJ's so quickly the automatic sliding door couldn't open fast enough. I probably appeared dramatic, but I couldn't stand to be in there. I felt nauseated for the next two hours.

Even without the makeup, I feel confident that I looked good (thanks to Mama and what she gave me). This counts for a fleeting something, as you ladies know.

I just wonder when I'll stop feeling this way. No matter how many times I tell myself he's an old geezer and a bit of an asshole for The Whole Thing*, I can't help but get Weird when I see him. Dammit.

*He wasn't an asshole. On a scale of 1 - 10, 10 being the worst, he was a 3-4 overall.

Match: Day One

So the profile is up and limping along with one picture--and not the picture I hired a photog to take. No, for some reason, though I have received emails from Match telling me the professional shots are approved, they have yet to appear on the site. Well, as luck has it, my eyes had Serious Bags the day of the photo shoot, so maybe it's all well and good that those pictures haven't appeared.

An observation: online dating makes you picky. As I was peering at profiles this evening I came across this good looking guy and in one of his pictures, what do I see but a pair of pleated shorts! It's so hard to envision that a man in pleated shorts (something a middle-aged man might wear to the pier with loafers and a sweater tossed around his shoulders just so) could be The One.

And yet I imagine (because I do have a good imagination) that my next guy will have some abominable habits. Maybe he even has a pair of pleated pants! And, when you think about it, does something this trivial (but unsavory) really mean that much when you love that person? No. The One That Got Away had a hairy back, for Pete's sake and I adored him still.

Ah, but this is a far leap, from Match to love, and I think this is where online dating fails: it's too easy to click the back button on the browser when you come upon an egregious misspelling or some other tiny thing. The guy with a kid at home you ignore online tonight might be the guy you're ogling in the grocery store tomorrow. In real life, we don't hand potential dates our lives on spreadsheets--yet that's essentially what online dating is.

Well, I emailed a guy ... I don't get this winking business, do you? It's like, if you're interested, shoot me a couple of lines. Is it so difficult? Anyway, I emailed a guy who had an interesting profile. No, not even the fact that he has children living at home with him deterred me. I've decided to be really selective about things I wasn't so selective about before. I'm looking for a guy with above-average intelligence who expresses himself well--who isn't out of a recent divorce. The kid thing? That's a complicating factor, but I'm headed towards my mid-thirties. A girl has got to be realistic.

Oh, and the guy? He wrote back already. It's the small successes that keep me motivated.

A Swift Kick in the Pants

I don't know if you read Evan Marc Katz's latest post, but if you haven't, do and then trot back over here. I'll wait.

...

This is exactly the reality check I've needed regarding TOTGA. And it's not that I didn't know these things, it's just that it's so easy to forget them. It helps to have someone grab you by the ears and say, "Listen, Ruby. It wasn't real. It didn't last. And you ended it."

Yes, that's right. I sat TOTGA down and gently said that at five months, the once-a-week phone calls and rare emails just weren't working for me. I said that I cared about him and wished this weren't so, but that I was not going to be the girl waiting by the phone. (Unfortunately I didn't say all of these brave things dry-eyed. I still wish wholeheartedly that I had held it together a little better. Ah well, at least my message was strong, even if the delivery was weak.)

Why, then, have I been pining over this joker? I don't know, but I have decided that the buck stops here. Finally. Evan's post helps a lot--and so does my discovery that TOTGA is apparently still with a woman who (IMHO) is a little whack. Some men are drawn to The Crazy, and while I have charming, semi-obsessive tendencies (hello hangup on TOTGA), I am not crazy. I don't have time for men who have to generate excitement in their lives by latching on to unstable women--I don't care how tall, dark and handsome they are. (How smart, how calm, cool and collected; how much of their shit they have together ...)

Of course, there is a part of me that hopes (so devilishly) that his situation will implode soon. But a bigger, better part of me hopes he's happy--even with The Crazy.

"Ironic. Frickin' ironic!"

This is what I whispered to myself midday as I walked back to my car after bumping into Bill. I'd been in St. Helena for work-related reasons, visiting a few merchants in town. I had this wild hope of running into TOTGA--who I never run into and who I, of course, did not run into today. You really would think, wouldn't you, that in this itty-bitty town of 5,500 some-odd souls, I'd bump into the guy. But, no, the fates are not so kind.

Instead, as I was walking up the sidewalk who do I spy coming down the sidewalk but Bill? I pretended not to see him and looked at a paper in my hand--not obvious at all. And then, to my shock, I saw him enter the very shop I was planning on going into.

Crap. Of course I walked in and said hello and waved again when he very quickly left. So I wanted to see one guy but saw the other guy instead. This is the story of the last 12 months. The story of small-town life. (And it doesn't help that TOTGA hides under rocks--or in the arms of a crazy new girlfriend. Who knows?)

I haven't heard from Ryan, and that's all well and good. Tonight I had drinks with a friend who is launching herself into a City with the hopes of (in addition to having a new, fabulous life) shaking things up a bit man-wise. I have to say I'm envious. I already met one great guy in this town; can lightning strike twice? She, on the other hand, will have a huge population to sift through--which presents its own challenges but also a whole slew of opportunities.

Missing the Ex (for some odd reason)

Today I find I miss my ex. My most recent ex, that is, the one who I couldn't fall in love with, no matter how much I wanted to.

Which brings me to why I started up a dating blog again, after nearly 14 months of being un-single. The first five months were spent with a guy (The One That Got Away--TOTGA) I inconveniently fell in love with. I don't fall in love easily or often--I dare say he may well have been the first. And, alas, it was unrequited and the situation became increasingly painful. I let him go.

In swooped my now most recent ex (let's call him Bill). I let myself get swept up in his enthusiasm. After porridge too cold, porridge too hot was nice, even if I knew the danger. I shouldn't have dated him so soon after TOTGA, but you know how smudgy the heart and head is after a crushing disappointment. Bill loved me, faults and all. It's hard to throw that away, but nine months later, I had to.

He's been devastated--we've been broken up three months, and he's still having a hard time. The irony is, of course, that I felt for TOTGA what Bill feels for me. Where is the justice?

Bill and I have a ton in common--same interests, everything. Aside from my not loving him, though, I took issue with his lack of ambition. He is happy with the status quo; he doesn't take care of his health and drinks too much. I never harped at him about these things--aside from the not going to the doctor business--but all of this made me feel significantly unsafe. (O Cliche! I am a woman who desires security.)

I liked Bill, but there was too much pressure. If he could have reeled in the declarations of love (and etc.) I might have been able to stay on longer. Then again, at nine months if a girl knows this just won't pan out, it's better to move on.

Still, I miss him, and today is his birthday.