Ross and Rachel

Will they? Won't they? Will they? Won't they?

And they danced and danced AND DANCED around their feelings for each other for years...

I have unknowingly become a part of a Ross and Rachel relationship and it sneaked up on me like a ninja. Two years of wishing everything could go back to the way it was, a few well-timed conversations, one too many moments alone, a couple nights that ended in kisses and BAM!

Just call me Rachel.

Since discovering that both parties have had lingering feelings for each other, I have found myself sleepless and frustrated wondering if the mystery of What's Really Going On will ever be solved between this City Girl and Bachelor Number Two.

This is pretty much the gist of it.

Some days there just isn't enough wine in the bottle.

Love is...

Love should look like this: patient, kind, not envious or seeking its own. It should also believe all things, bear all things and it should never fail. To which I would like to add an addendum here: love should be the correct choice you make every moment of every day. And this City Girl is finding out that if you really love someone the decision is an easy one to make.

I’ve found in the past that loving certain people, be they friends or lovers, was sometimes a difficult one. Truth be told, at times it was agonizing. But since meeting The Light In My Eyes, even though there are tears amid the times that call for patience or kindness, the correct way to handle any situation has been so easy. The choice to be patient has not been a difficult one. The choice to be kind has come so naturally. And the decision to bear all things has just felt like the right thing to do.

While it may be uncomfortable at times, it is so sweet to be finding out what love truly is...

Lessons in Learning How to Rest, Part Seven.

Lesson Seven: Don't get stuck in the moment. This too shall pass. 

Remember how I said earlier this year that I'm cutting all the chatter? Well, sometimes the chatter will all but scream at you. I have learned, however, that you don't have to listen to it or let it effect you. Seems like everyone I run into these days (acquaintance, friend, stranger, you name it!) has an opinion on my love life. My everyday life seems to be in order, according to everyone with a mouth, but my love life is clearly in arrears.

Strangers have told me not to give up on love. The other day my chiropractor announced out of nowhere that he's getting me ready for matrimony by correcting my posture. (Nobody loves a hunchback!) Friends from all corners of the world have told me that I need to start dating men, not boys. (As if I'd known those other guys would turn out to be emotionally stunted jerkfaces.) My mother thinks the last guy could still pull it together and morph into my happily ever after. And others think my Prince Charming is just 'round the bend. (If this is true, I'm worried he's a little stupid and can't figure how to make right turns. He should be here by now!)

The only chatter I've heard lately that makes sense to me, the only words that have resonated in my very being, have been these: This too shall pass. 

I was plagued for days this week with a feeling that made me want to crawl under the covers of my bed and not come out until someone checked my closet for The Boogeyman. The feeling was awful. I felt like I was being chased by it. And I couldn't figure out what it was or why it was haunting me until I met up with a friend for one of our Skype dates. As we were talking, the truth, that unidentified feeling, came to the surface. I was sad. I was sad about getting repeatedly kicked in the teeth by love. And I had been hiding it under layers of optimism and big ideas for the business and other parts of my life in hopes that it would eventually dissipate. I was also tired. Tired of dating idiots, boys, whatever you wanna call them. I was tired of feeling bad about myself. I was tired of still caring about these guys who don't really care about me as much as they care about themselves. I was tired of apologizing for feeling the way I do and not having it all together as per my usual. And, lastly, I was tired of waiting for Mr. Right.

The thing about feelings is they don't go away until you confront them, head on, grab them by the horns and stare them straight in the eyes. And so she let me cry big crocodile tears with her via Skype. (Not too unlike a few nights before when I sobbed to my best friend for reasons I wasn't entirely sure of yet.) And while she said a lot of things that night, the advice that stuck with me was to not get stuck in the moment, because as awful as it was it would pass. And while I'm still living out the last bits of this moment, I know in my heart my friend is right. I can't get stuck here. It will pass...

Go Team! Rah Rah Rah! And All That Jazz...

The worst part about breaking up with someone you really cared about isn't the break-up itself, but all the moments that come post break-up. Don't get me wrong, the moment itself is usually somewhat horrifying and uncomfortable. In most cases there are tears, wringing of hands, shifting your weight while trying to come up with words that have more syllables than uh and um followed by some sort of awkward good-bye. The thing that always sucks worse, though, than that whole parting-of-ways scenario are the days that follow.

Just a quick recap on how one gets to those post break-up days:
Once you round the bend of the starting line you will stupidly start to introduce your current love to anyone who is willing to shake hands. In fact, you'll even go so far as to tell everyone you ever met that your mornings are filled with sunshine and everything your dear lover does just makes your sentimental heart beat wildly. Life is good. Ah yes, the beginning of almost every relationship is always so bliss-filled and lovely that you forget how sad all those previous days were that lingered on and on. What days are those, you ask? Those are the post break-up days. The days spent filling in every person who ever met your ex-douche bag on how you are no longer together and responding to their sympathies with an, "Oh yes, I would love to meet Mr. X and go on a double date with you and Mr. Happy Pants."

Cut to this City Girl's reality:
This has been the past month of my life. Although, I can't really call the last guy a douche bag-a butthead on occasion, but not a douche bag-but our break-up was the awful kind. It could have been amiable if neither of us was "feeling it" or if things really weren't working out and it was just time for us to face facts, but that wasn't our gig. And every time I have to fill in just one more person on the heart breaking details of our he said/she said situation I keep getting the same response, "Huh. I'm still pulling for you guys." You guys. As if both of have been seen together about town lately. I've got news for these people! Hell, I've got news for the random readers of this blog, there is no "you guys"!

I will say this, though....I miss that guy. And I've tried to explain him away. I've had days where I pretend like I don't care what he does or where he goes. I've lied and told people that I'm totally ready to date again. I even agreed with a friend the other day that I was over him. But the truth is there's a cheerleader somewhere deep in the recesses of my brain that is waving her pom-poms wildly, rooting for him. She just can't help herself. She's too busy rah, rah-ing it up...

Over Easy or Sunny Side Up?

I've been thinking about my past relationships lately in light of yet another break-up. I was wondering if it was something I did or said. Or maybe it was him. Or maybe as Patti, the Millionaire Matchmaker, says: my picker is off. And while I don't have the answer as to why every relationship I've ever had didn't work out, I did discover something about myself.

Not including the most recent guy, I have never been with someone where I didn't find myself conforming my likes to theirs. In short, I'm Julia Roberts from Runaway Bride. Somewhere along the way I lost myself in all those lovers. I'll always know what style of eggs I like, but when I end up back at square one with way too much time on my hands I have to admit that I have a hard time remembering what it is I like to do.

A few things I can tell you, however, is that I never pay attention to or care about budget cuts that apply to firemen the world over. I will never want to move to the country to raise a brood of children/animals. I don't give a hoot about fast airplanes or cars. I hate talking about math and science. And I'd rather be rockin' a new pair of stilettos in the city than tramping through a muddy hike that always lasts hours longer than I anticipated.

I like pink. And I think I've been apologizing for it and trying to make it look like a different color for far too long...

Truth and the X factor.

Being a truth teller is a tricky thing. You want to find the right words, the perfect words. You want your voice to be even and steady. You want your point to be made without making the recipient of your words confused or trying to grasp blindly at your concept. 

I am a truth teller. I don't know how good my skill level is, but yesterday there was no mistaking me for anything but a teller of what is true and honest.

Yesterday, I told the truth to a friend. A good friend. A love. And while I was hoping for a different answer from this person, I was so happy to have spoken words that my heart felt. I was relieved to breath out words that made me feel as if I had been hiding a big secret from one of my best friends.

The thing about being a truth teller is that you don't know what will happen when you say the very things you mean. And then once you've said those things you still don't know what will happen. You may get a reaction. You may even lose things or titles. You may get words volleyed back to you. But when both sides have said all the words they have in their arsenal, sometimes there is still an X factor that hovers over you. There is still the unknown of what will come next...