the sad, sad state of affairs

I made the mistake of watching the Bachelorette on Tivo last night. If this is all that’s left in the dating pool – men who special order briefs with your name scrawled on the ass, boys who get so tanked that they rip off their shirts to expose chests that should not see the dim light of night, and dudes who kick lemons off another’s head rather than just marking their territory with good old-fashioned urine – take me out back, pour boxed wine down my gullet, and put me out of my misery.

Likeableus Boyfriendus

Every so often a friend picks a good one. He’s not a player. He doesn’t talk about his job ad nauseum with a puffed chest. He doesn’t hit on her friends when she’s in the bathroom. Every once in a while you like a friend’s new beau and want to pull her aside and tell her so, encourage her to hold onto him not because the single life is exhausting, what with all the giggles and hair coloring and leg shaving, but because he seems like a great guy, one of the last of his order who should be tagged and put on display to confirm the existence of his genus.

I met my friend E’s boyfriend on Friday night, as I arrived late to the Nats game, staving off a migraine with commemorative cups of soda and beer. I had the seat next to his, which would normally have me irritated, what with my hating the small talk and the human race and what not. But he was a talker. There was no pulling teeth, no wondering why this guy was ignoring her friends when he should be making even miniscule efforts to know the people important to her. He was funny, kind, and knew odd facts about players on both teams. I happen to love people who could take the series on Worthless Facts Jeopardy. Check.

But a girl knows the truth isn’t in the persona he puts on for the crowd, as evidenced by every bad apple we dumped to the disbelief of the masses. It’s not in the expensive clothes he wears or the people he makes sure you know he knows. It’s in the way he treats her. He treated her. They stole kisses when they thought the spinsters weren’t looking. They whispered to one another. He reached for her hand as they walked a few feet behind the rest of us and made sure she didn’t want for a beer or surprisingly hard soft pretzel at any time. And he introduced her to a friend, which any woman knows means they’ll be buying a king bed and Peapoding their groceries within the year. Check. Check. Check.

The cautious singleton in me wants to tell her to enjoy with limits, to savor each moment while keeping her heart tritely protected, but the romantic in me is clearly winning this thought wrestle. I’m excited to hear her stories about the possibility of an early move-in, about how she now knows what I meant years ago when talking about how the good guys treat you, about how they call when they say they will (and often before) and are proud to have you as their date at each and every wedding. She is over the moon that she found a keeper and has every right to be screaming it from the upper deck. And this spinster is simply thrilled by the confirmation that they’re not yet extinct.

The story of the most recent date, told in most circuitous fashion with multiple dessert references.

I really like chocolate chip mint ice cream. I’ve tried a lot of different flavors in my life, and you know what? It just does it for me. Coffee, vanilla, strawberry – even chocolate brownie chunk, the namesake of my thighs – they’re all good, but I prefer chocolate chip mint to most any variety. When I first tasted it, I knew it was something different, something special. Even in my naïve youth, it was a no-brainer to choose it more and more frequently when treated to dessert. I didn’t worry that it would ever lose its appeal or if it would taste good when mixed with the toppings with which I was already familiar. After all, who thinks of the future when licking an ice cream cone? When someone asked me which of the 32 flavors I preferred, I proudly pointed to the tub of shiny green goodness, so bright that it seemed to reflect proudly off of the protective glass casing. I didn’t think about why I enjoyed it. It just was what it was.

When I begin a new relationship with a hint of that favorite flavor, I embrace it. I hug it and kiss it and squeeze its sweet cheeks. It is so difficult to find people who can communicate, can capture your attention, can make you laugh out loud; why not celebrate finding someone with whom you enjoy spending nights and days and, on occasion, full, unshowered, order-in weekends? If I like you, I like you. If I want you to meet my closest, I will excitedly introduce you to each and every one of this motley bunch, even the really unattractive one. I spread the good word. I call and text when I so desire. I scoff at the warnings of both friends and family who caution me to play by the Rules. And if you return, you return. I do what I feel is true to me.

What I don’t do is panic.

So no. I've never been able to grasp enjoying company on a baker’s dozen dates and asking me to meet friends and family and hinting at future plans and then suddenly worrying about tomorrow. According to my Rulebook of Things That Are Factually So, falling in like and in love is what a departure from reality is all about. It’s abandoning the drudgery of the everyday and feeling like your body is filled with carbonation, even on a marathon phone call that extends well beyond your 10 p.m. bedtime. It isn’t starting a drive through the countryside with the windows down, accompanied by the clearest of 70-degree days and your top if-stranded-on-a-deserted-island CD, only to slam on the brakes and camp roadside out of fear that it might rain. The beginning of anything is not about panic and a fear of timing and the future. It’s about letting yourself go.

So no, the last date with the new man didn’t go either of the routes that Kim imagined. The last date didn’t really go the route I imagined, either.

nostrakimus

Last night was the first time I saw the new man since the - *cough* - incident. Kim showered me with tough love advice before the date.

Kim's thoughts as to how the night should go:

Ah, well, what *I* would do is keep it light at the beginning. Not light and fluffy, just light. Small talkish, but friendly. Not giggly or flirty - friendly. Talk about the race, how Earnhart put up a good fight at the end, and it's a shame he's not in the chase this year.

Then after the first drink, bring up what you need to discuss. Don't spring it on him, just casually work it in.

Either you resolve things and end the night having kinky time or you find he's an asshat, throw a drink in his face, stick him with the bill and storm out just 'cause you've always wanted to do that.

Kim's predictions as to how it would go:

At first it's a little uncomfortable because there's the whole falling out looming over you although neither of you want to talk about it right off the bat to ruin the evening. Things eventually lighten up a little, perhaps due to numerous 3 legged cat jokes, and the drinks are flowing nicely.

After you're good and tanked, you blurt out, "So what was up with you the other night?"

Bringing you right back to where you were before, talking about your "relationship" when you're drunk. He shuts off. You demand respect.

Then you're abducted by aliens.

--------

Neither happened. Entirely. At all, actually.

the right stuff

Last night was date number 4. The Kris of yesteryear would have been picking out china patterns at this point in the relationship, but her current counterpart opted instead for a night of Mexican food and good conversation and ruby red sangria, one of God's true nectars. I think it goes without saying that Eve knew there was a greater purpose for that apple when she yanked it from the tree.

Two drinks and a free tequila shot turned into staying out a little later, lounging on a bar couch and talking about ourselves and pretty much everyone else in the room. For some reason that I currently can't recall, the conversation turned to family.

"What about your grandparents?" he asked.

"Which ones?" I questioned back. "The ones on the left?"

He blinked hard.

For there were no grandparents to my left or my right. Because given that all four are long deceased, bringing them on my date would have been totally inappropriate and downright creepy, much like those jokes I always make about current uses for Bug's now defunct fourth leg. In my head, left meant the left side of something, which still remains unclear. I knew it to mean paternal, just like I know turning the air down means making it warmer, but only to me, but how in Hades was he supposed to know that?

He didn't run, at least not at first, and then it was only under the guise of having to use the restroom. I joke. But I think he'll probably pause again when he hears me speak of "warshing" the dishes. And how "whack" things are. And how I have a monkey's uterus.

At least there was no talk of china patterns.

number 2

You arrive 25 minutes early, the result of your obsession with being prompt for each and every engagement. If you’re being honest, a late entrance would also mean you’d have to walk toward him, revealing once and for all that your skirt does not look nearly as good in motion as it does perched atop a bar stool. You order a pre-emptive drink.

You powder your face with such alarming regularity that you’re quite sure your paleness rivals Ms. Kidman’s. More than once you hop to the bar for a napkin to expend nervous energy. You don’t yet smoke. You try to coax lip gloss from the bottom of its tiny bottle and you write.

You wait.

The clock you’ve checked every five minutes says he shows right on time. He stands close to your side. And when you lift your head, you know your face gives away that this week you’ve been biting your lower lip when you think about him. That yes, you await his emails and wish you could respond to his text messages, the ones he sends even though he knows your phone is broken and you won’t be able to respond. The ones he writes anyway, just to say hello. Because.

He leans in to you and whispers in your ear. He comments that you’re even cuter than he remembers, and you can’t believe that minutes ago you wanted to say the same thing to him. You break into the goofy type of smile that you regularly envy when it’s worn by others. And you’re reminded why, no matter how many times you swear it and every Air Supply song off for good, you choose to be in this wonderful place once again.

jinx

The day before I found the clementine-sized tumor on Bug’s side, I sent an email to his first mom letting him know just how well he was doing. It occurred to me that I might be jinxing his welfare, but Bug had been a healthy cat for many a year, and an innocuous electronic missive wouldn’t change that, now would it? It probably didn’t, but being that I’d like to keep my two legs, I’m a little more wary about putting good news out there. See, I fear that my happiness makes the Universe just a tiny bit disagreeable. It never fails upon trumpets signaling good news that, in an ironic Pay it Forward moment, the big U hurls something big and unpleasant my way in the form of stomach flu or stupid boy move. It’s why I haven’t written about my father’s illness in many moons, why you don’t hear about any of my true successes, and why I haven’t celebrated that my car hasn’t been broken into in a least three days.

So I will write very little about the Date. Suffice it to say that, at 33, there are still men out there who can challenge a woman proud of her wit and who can hold a conversation about both Def Leppard and the AFI. Because such things are important to this girl. As is the kissing. And oh, yes. Apparently there are still men left who didn't skip that day of training.

I’m closing things there. I promise to keep you posted. But right now, I’m a little worried that might be the Universe on Line 1.

Busy bee

My date last night was charming, even more striking in person than I remembered. Our evening was one full of laughter and sweet looks across our table and warm soft pretzels. Sadly, this date didn't put out. Maybe next time.

Tonight, another date, this of a different gender. Details tomorrow.

mending

I’m not sure exactly how it happens. Formulas work well for both NASA launches and cocktails, but matter not when you’re in the depths of It.

I recall naturally and am well reminded by private writings that life was in shambles, that work consisted of showing up and hoping on a fundamental level that even my shoes matched. That I would make it through a regular just-after-9-am call from a caring someone checking to see if I was composed enough to sit with my office door open. To then make it to a 10 o’clock meeting. Why didn’t I try lunch out with a friend? Because naturally that would set the world upright again. Perhaps a new activity? Because that would wipe my psychic slate clean. I’d phone in an entry on this site, something about Cusack or happy hour or new success at swimming. I’d hope he’d read it. After all, if he did, didn’t that mean something for us?

The messages from friends were well intentioned. He doesn’t deserve you. But if he doesn’t, why did I pick him in the first place? This doesn’t say anything about you. Sweet friend, you must not have heard me – he didn’t want me back. Kris, you are complete as you are. If this drunken sobbing is really me, then do I really want to be me anymore? They tried. I appreciated. I bucked and discarded.

I used to drive past his house on the way to work. I knew there were other routes, options that DC and distant friends and a paid Kris advocate and yes, even myself, knew were available, and I cared not. I’d curse him under my breath and remind him via CourtTV telepathy that I was the best Goddamn thing ever to happen to him, knowing full well in my gut that things would never be - and never should be - again. I’d talk of him in the past tense when things were very much present for me. And I’d come home after work to the dark windows and the needy cats. Even in a Pinot haze, the hatred of being alone, of being a me rather than an us, of telling people of the unchanging outcome in a steady stream of weeks and months, was absolute torture. Even though our end was a sewn together series of silences, once having shared a space and a life and all of your reachable memory can almost consume your insides. Every last thing had to go, if not literally then figuratively. Stray clothing was tossed as if it might infect me, music was shelved for a time that it would no longer be self indulgent and ridiculously painful.

All I wanted was a formula, a recipe online or news from confidantes or effing Dr. Phil to make things better. Nothing came.

Months later there were moments during which I could appreciate the humor of the blinding white of the snow and Cricket consuming all of Bug’s food as he groomed himself post-gorging. Expected neighborhood run-ins brought the same amount of pain and often minutes and sometime hours spent on long-distance therapeutic phone calls, but I no longer ruined contacts the day after ripping open the pack. I was reminded that these were simple successes. How I hated those morsels of wisdom with all of my being. I dated again, under a heavy cloak of Spanish reds and California whites, and only found ridiculous amounts of humor in a man who kissed me just as a mason jar might. Life became a series of building blocks that I openly mocked. Of putting myself out there in every forum so life could take me down. Again.

Somehow it didn’t.

And then I drove past his house last night. It was a last-minute necessity given a long trip home and the promise of awaiting traffic that I simply could not stand. And for a moment I remembered the time that I showed up on his doorstep and knocked on the darkened apartment door to find he wasn’t home, only minutes later to call and discover he was a state away surprising me with the very same arrival. This was a rowhouse of countless hours of chilled white wine, nighttime and mid-afternoon and whatever-the-hell-time-it-is sex, napping until the irritating alarm sounded, and checking your blogs from an unknown IP. The associated aftermath was an embarrassing collage of I-know-better-than-this drive bys and full pressed powder application before hitting the corner store. Of thinking there was a chance. That if I made myself pretty enough and somehow emotionally fresh enough that things could work.

They didn’t. And they never should have.

I still have no formula. And I’m not sure exactly how it happens. It isn’t the influence of another person or a tripod cat donning a scar to let you know what’s really important in life. But one day or over a series of them linked together you just wake up and the pull is gone. The ache subsides. The pictoral bits and pieces are fine in the scrapbook on the shelf with those that came before. And you realize with sadness that although it and you all meant something, it also means absolutely nothing at all.

on doing the right thing

As best I can, I’m slowly moving on from the events of last week. Given the current situation with the tripod, I feel almost like a main player in a Little House on the Prairie episode: time’s a wastin’, Half Pint. Can’t spare frettin’ over Nellie’s antics when the barn’s a burnin’. Or something like that. Moving on seems to be where it’s at.

I am giving Kim carte blanche here to leave the conversation and go to Hooters so she can control the urge to smack me upside the head. You gone Kim? Ok. Let us continue.

The weekend was fantastic, but was meant to be spent with him, so reminders were at every turn. Canceled wine bar reservations require one of the parties to call a hostess to take a rain check; changed baseball plans left me in the cheap seats trying to find our unused spots just down the third baseline. I was pleased with how well I made it through what all thought would be a much rougher ride, or as one friend imagined, me showing to happy hour wearing sweatpants, an event less likely than me giving birth. When I reached the weekend, I had accepted his sincere apologies, and as Jorge has so eloquently pointed out avec Canadian accent and some heavy real live maple syrup (God, Toronto, get over it), I understood that this man handed my heart back to me. He didn’t stomp on it and smear it into the ground while speaking words of sacrilege about the Bon Jovi. Or worse, about Billy Joel. Or lastly my mother. But as of yesterday it still wasn’t okay. Because you know what nudged me in the night? That he never made it right. That, unlike myself and the others that I know that feel like they’re selling their souls to be better people, he didn’t keep his side of the street clean. It’s that he seemed to think that text messages and sporadic one-line emails would suffice. That dozens of hours of our connection translated into fewer than 200k of returned electronic space of little substance. It didn’t do us justice. Quite frankly, it didn’t suffice.

And I told him so. Because given that at times we seemed to share the same brain, I knew he knew it too. That even when not riding the church train, we owe people something more in this life. You can try to run from it, you can say that not calling her the day after a drunken lickfest is the way that people do it. But it isn’t the way you or I or we should be doing it. And this isn’t preaching. Plain and simple, it reeks of an era when we didn’t walk upright and beating your hairy chest wasn’t something done as a post-coital joke. You owe something more to the people who you choose to let into your life. Give them anything less than your best and you’re cheating yourself – screw the him or her you’ve known for a month – of the opportunity to be something more than the guy next to you at the bar who drinks Bud bottles* and avoids his wife’s repeated cell calls.

I was well prepared for him to disregard my email, but I needed to be true to myself and share these unresolved feelings I’m describing, along with some candid sadness and just plain good old fashioned missing him. Only then would I be able to put this connection on the “fond memories” shelf, next to the very few other boxes that weren’t somehow tainted by poor behavior or unresolved everything. I hit send and tried to go about my evening, still wondering where he was and if he’d read it.

And you know what? He did the very right thing. He stepped up. He opened up and let me see him again. He confirmed without meaning to do so that he was indeed the person that I thought he was, the person that I’d very much like to know again further down the line. So of course in that very instant I wanted to call him, to hear that familiar voice that makes my stomach swirl, to tell him I loved reading his words and my anger had faded and that I still really did think the world of him. Still adore him. Still have hope. Still and will miss him.

But apparently being a grown up isn’t just about doing only what you want in a particular moment (unless it’s the Cab Sauvignon I had this weekend, which my Trader Joe’s and yours will soon be out of if my paycheck is deposited promptly). Because following my heart in that moment would have involved hopping on a plane headed northwest and knocking on his door and jumping on his back and telling him that we’ve got something too good to let go. Smothering him with kisses and feeling my face on his shoulder and pretending as if none of this had happened.

But it did. And if things were to keep going as they were, I think we both know that we’d be in this very spot again in a few months. And with every failure, because the two of us would undoubtedly label these setbacks such, the chances of us pulling through would plummet. Because he and I are who we are right now. And because no matter how deeply you love, how skillfully you skate around problems and laugh a full 23.5 of your 24 hours together, the issues down in the bowels of a relationship fight their way to the surface and come out with a yell, just like that awful, awful reptile baby in V. Not really what I’m looking for. There's work for both of us to do first.

I do miss him already. Still. I’m hoping now for space in our togetherness, simply because the "we" that he and I are is too precious to me. I would love for us to keep in touch, peppered witty emails and calls just to reach out here and there, looking further ahead to a time when he and I might reconnect after weeks or months or years spent in our own lives, evolving and working and heading off avoidance instead of accepting the familiar, the comfortable, the not so good for us.

Because should we both get there, I have no doubt that the results would be simply amazing.



* Kim, you weren’t really supposed to read that far.

on bailing

You should know that I’ve hidden things from this site, from you, many a time. I’ve been afraid to show you who what lies behind the (at times strained) wit. Of hurting my mother and father. Of being fired. Of shattering your image of me as a somewhat stable woman who eats Easy Mac and who might someday pickle her cats in Tupperware containers. No more. I’m incredibly vulnerable right now. You might as well see it; the record will stand for me and my grandcats if not to help your workday pass with that much more ease.

It started out as an innocent introduction, turned down by me given its reliance on phone conversation. I don’t do the phone. Ask the dozens including those in my bloodline who try to reach me daily and who get an answering machine or a promise of a call back. I’m a telephonephobe who spends hundreds of her hard-earned dollars per year on a technology she avoids. I don’t like being that accessible. Having you hear my voice, quivering at times, or at the other end, its resolve and strength. Fuck nonverbal communication. I’m out there when you hear me, telling you about my father’s progressing illness, the beautiful disasters that are the ties I’ve broken entirely of my own accord, of my fear of amounting to nothing of consequence. I wear the written word as much more of a shield, minutes of strategic adjectives and the choice of an “I” rather than a “you.” My voice has no automatic checks.

Things have been ridiculously difficult for me in the past year. Before 31, I never understood just how it was that folks had difficult years, even difficult decades. Did they not just pick up the pieces and move on, knowing that something delightful awaited them at the next turn? Apparently they do. I did. I worked for money and worked for growth and joined softball and bocce and ate and Pinot-ed my way across DC with not a regret. I kept my side of the street clean in each and every human relationship. Nothing took. And not in the way that you think. I enjoyed it all. I just never felt anything deeply. The stir in your stomach and the entertainment of spending time with someone orbiting with you in shared space. I am complete. Looking to share this new self in all her beauty, yet finding no one to fit the bill.

And then I found him. Kim will shake her head upon reading this post at its overwhelming level of estrogen and vow to buy me an awful draft beer or five at the O’s game on Saturday, the game at which he should have been touching my knee and laughing at my excessive use of puns. The He that isn’t by my side. Who chose to stay on the cul de sac, to play it safe rather than keep a Friday night reservation for wine and a dessert discussed long before dinner.

I knew quickly that I had not felt this way about a person in years. I have not been the person I am right now and felt this way about another . . . ever. I had absolutely no instinct to run, no push to change this man who actually admitted in spoken voice to a penchant for French cuffs. For the first time in my young life, I accepted a man for who he was; for the first moment in his young life, he was taken as he came. There was quiet talk of front porch Adirondack chairs and plans for Napa and pet names and middle-of-the-night marathon cell calls. I welcomed our knowing looks at future corporate functions and stolen kisses on the front lawn that would surely embarrass the neighbors. This was a relationship on the very verge of blossoming into something both of us knew could - and goddammit, would - be spectacular. The magnitude of which neither of us had before experienced. Anticipation and joy and a truly uncanny fit that afforded us access into one another’s heads. I won’t exaggerate and I won’t minimize it. I still believe in the absolute force that we could be, and I know in my heart that he does too.

But when things got too close, when we were coming to fruition and plans were no longer theory but a tangible touch of skin and minds, he ran. He shut down with some warning, red flags I didn’t want to see. His explanation was a cocktail of My gut says I can’t do this and I’m not ready to be happy yet and an acknowledgement that I was the best thing yet to cross his path. I can’t help but thinking that maybe we met at the wrong time, Kris. Disappointment doesn’t capture this feeling, nor does devastation. And it would be easier to process this rejection if my sinking stomach didn’t tell me that every word of his was true. If I were he, without all the tears and months of conversations with my genius, degreed professional, the potential of a successful “us” would scare the bejeezus out of me. Even a year ago I would have ruined this potential. I’ve never run, but I’ve made many a man miserable by making myself emotionally unavailable while figuring out whether or not I wanted to pass my time with him. I understand the urge. Shut the curtains and call it off at the altar before he has the chance to hurt me. Pull away before I ruin the core of yet another human being. Bail because the alternative requires too much risk and an energy reserve that isn’t yet full. Truth be told, he wasn’t there. He wasn’t ready. He chose not to risk it for the me that is here, the me who still stands here with open arms.

I’d told the farm about him. The pigs, the cows, the rooster who crows much too much all too early in the morning. Everyone knew about the beautiful potential I had coming down the pike, because my cup runneth over with excitement and infectious passion at the office doorway and the happy hour. And ultimately I had to hang my head and tell the truth. That he jumped ship. That he opted out. That he clung to the familiarity of fear rather than to me. I was humiliated. By my hope. My lack of caution, my new outfits, by the favorite wines and the embarrasing songs I had chosen to share.

I blamed the tears shed behind a closed door on the touch-and-go recovery of my three-legged cat and cried harder as I’d worried that my lies had jinxed the miniscule progress Bug had made in the days prior. I stubbornly and naively waited for this man's change of heart and just couldn’t admit that I’d fallen, that I’d invested so much and had things collapse on me, mid-smile. That I’d given my heart, only to have someone accept it and embrace it and ultimately decide that it wasn’t the right time for him to keep it, that he wasn’t able to support the healthy, flourishing relationship for which I was ready. For which I am ready.

I know with little reassurance that this decision had absolutely nothing to do with me. His world is a whirlwind of doubts and going through the “shoulds” of motion and the pain of loving both with reservation and on a foundation of unresolved months and years. Unlike every other relationship into which I've entered, this time it wasn't about me, and I knew so before his repeated attempts at comfort began. I knew better than to suspect his whispered words, his returned phone calls, his shared plans and confessions. I don’t give my heart up to just any man who crosses my path with the promises of a future. Know that I chose willingly and with a yes, please to offer him with both hands this fragile heart, even though he gave it back. Know too that my lack of hesitation can do nothing to balance this bottomless hurt and the fact that my emotional walls are already higher than they were only weeks ago.

I’d do it all over again.

cut, color, clarity, carat

My snobbery reached new heights this weekend when, during a matinee showing of Spiderman 3, which was surprisingly well attended by other missed-the-boaters, I cringed when I saw the original gold engagement ring Peter contemplated purchasing for MJ. Seriously? I thought while scarfing down badly reheated pretzel bites. That's the best Spidey can do for her? My shallowness shocked even me.

Know that I am not a woman who dates for a face or money or status or clothes or promises. But I imagine, like any 33-year-old woman with a history of relationships, I know what I like, and more important, possibly, what I need. Much like the four Cs of diamond buying, for me there is an admittedly grossly imperfect makeup (equation?) to the person or persons with whom one really connects in a lifetime. I'm not speaking of the boys with whom we've all bidden our time, the ones we liked but used as placeholders so we'd have someone to take us to the movies or serve as party dates or sex release partners for a year's time. I'm talking connection, people.

In no particular order, we have:

Attraction and Passion.

The kind that for most weeks of the year leaves you with a little stirring feeling in your stomach. It makes you late to some parties and wanting to leave others well before the stroke of midnight. It prompts you to hug him from behind when he's looking in the bathroom mirror, interrupt his religious Post reading with a touch on the neck, makes you want to lick a snowflake/that bead of sea water/stray chocolate sauce right off of his cheek, no matter the PDA factor. It is at times so strong and enviable that you often don't share the details with friends; it is a sacred secret much better kept close to the vest. It can be intimate, often dirty, but the two of you are undeniably tethered to one another by an unrelentless tug, even when 3,000 miles away from him. You want to be close. The thought of either of you sharing this with another drops you to your knees. These are feelings that last.

The core.

Respect. Honesty. Intellect. Commitment. Communication. Kindness. Conflict. Consistency. Time. The whos and the whats of your life and soul with which you, as an individual, long before this someone new surfaced, knew you could not and would not live without. It's the instinct you have when you see a friend's beau at a bar stroking another woman in the small of her back. It's what you do when you see a sibling on the verge of making a dangerous decision. These aren't the preferences people have for sports or video games or blogging; this is the gut reaction you get when you read an inappropriate email (see june 6) or first hear an abusive word used for a coworker. A defensive gesture in front of friends. It's the calls or texts that don't come when promised. More than anything else, these are the factors that don't budge or waver beyond natural flux. At least I hope they don't.

Motivation for life.

Even before you came along, he was on most days a man of action. Does he look for opportunities to expand his world, whether through tackling a new book or taking the scenic route when the destination can wait? He isn't at all times in his comfort zone. It's whether one chooses life to be 9 to 5 or a series of hours linked by a new dish at the regular restaurant, a well-timed office prank involving the remainder of the packing tape in the supply closet, or an impromptu compliment. It's taking up SCUBA for no reason other than the someday and closing the bar on a random Tuesday night. When you don't sit in welcome silence, you engage in rich conversation. There just seems like there isn't enough time between you to cover it all. Because life is life, it isn't every day, every month, or sometimes every year, but the baseline rests at zest.

Plans for the future.

First and foremost, there are some. Will life be spent in New Jersey or Namibia? Will we donate that extra money to the cat shelter or indulge in season tickets, or maybe a little bit of both? Honeymoon in Napa or Crete? Spend the next holiday with your family or his or in front of our TV with Thai takeout? Dogs or llamas? And will he do these things with you or . . . well, he really considers no other long-term option, does he? It's about knowing that no matter the pothole or South of the Border diversion, you are on the trip together. Come work transfer or family illness or natural disaster that renders your new wine cellar and your checkbook useless, in time you pick up and you forge ahead. In the same direction. It's knowing without question that your concessions are worth every single minute of their consideration.

For me, all of this is looking down at your finger and knowing, even on the most trying days when a reminder might be needed for both of you, that you love that ring and the man behind it. And that while you've bent and at times met well past halfway, you never, ever settled.

Why You Should Never Write About Happiness

Because when you do, you start your day with your car being backed into, and although you tell the woman not to worry about the damage on this fine spring morning and send her on her way, thinking that she’ll pay it forward and karma’s goodness may just end up knocking on your door, it just doesn’t happen like that.

Instead, on a beautiful drive home from work, you get the privilege of passing him walking down the street that still connects you, even though you are the absolute furthest thing from being connected. He hasn’t moved apartments, his gait hasn’t changed, the name emblazoned on the back of the softball jersey is the same. And apparently your want to run up and touch him and know him again hasn’t budged much either.

And this time you make it one block before crying, even though it has been so long and life has gone on in countless ways and directions. Because in a split second you never want to go out on one of these blasted dates ever again, or invest your soul in anyone ever, ever again, because it all just ends up like this down the road anyway.

a single girl's valentine's post

I'm betting that many of you came here today for a bitter single woman's diatribe. Written by a girl wearing black down to her underwear, lying on the couch with her 81 cats watching chick flicks with a dozen consoling Cinnabons.

And while the majority of the above statements is true about me at most times, you aren't going to get bitterness here today. Because truth be told: I love love.

A week-old talk segment on my lame lite radio station changed my mind about Valentine's Day. The guest expert person encouraged those without partners to celebrate the possibilities, rather than mourn them.

Light bulbs, people. Light bulbs.

So I shall honor this icy Wednesday as a single woman welcoming the possibilities for love down the road. I simply cannot wait for the ridiculous giddiness that accompanies meeting a man you just know you'll kiss in a matter of days. To finding out you both love that one Indian place just down at the corner, that by work experience or favorite winery or alma mater you actually could have met in your prior lives, to finding out your bodies fit just so while sleeping. I look forward to someone discovering that I unfailingly sob while watching Rudy and am the poster girl for PMS and (redeemingly) love me some college football. And ultimately, I can't wait to call and IM and show up on doorsteps one day proclaiming that I've found someone I want to spend this beautiful life with. I'm smiling just writing about all of it.

And I shall also celebrate this icy Wednesday as a single woman who doesn't have to argue with a significant other about how paying bills one day late is still late. Or how he doesn't help with cleaning when his friends or family come to take over our space. Today, this woman doesn't have to smile when he uses the work "backdrop" while meaning "backup" or when he refuses a shower when his hair spikes begging for shampoo or he wants to chip the ice and snow off the car with a pizza stone. And on this wonderful holiday, she doesn't have to look at his feet.

Not a bad deal.

Anniversary

It occurred to me tonight that a year ago today I posted this. One year.

In true Kris fashion I felt my shoulders and chest involuntarily rise, and the tinge of burning in my face that serves as my two-minute warning to locate tissues and a door that locks.

And then I reconsidered.

Because although you think that it – your hand clasped over your open mouth as your Closest calls to say he’s not sure he’s ever coming back to you and his choice to close years of knowing and loving you with a robotic correspondence about splitting up the Sprint bill – although you think that all of it will cause you to wither on the spot, that the weeping roadside with your hazards on will never stop, that all of it will kill you and on some days you wouldn’t really mind if it did, it doesn’t.

Sadly, it does make you listen to Christina’s Fighter 95 times in a single summer. But no, it doesn’t kill you.

Bygones

K Number 1, if we had married, I'd probably be living in Southern California. I bet we'd have had the ceremony in our hometown and you would have sung at our wedding. Like that teal suit that plagued me through many a college formal, you'd have worn a non-traditional tuxedo for which I'd secretly resent you. I'd be a nagging wife who'd pester you to get a real job. I'd be a loving wife who repeatedly removed from its sacred place in her jewelry box the first ring you gave her when you knew she was the One. I would have been on the verge of breaking up with you over the years for your strange appreciation for Hootie and the Blowfish and a penchant for using slang in love letters. But I would be in awe of your passion for life and your love for your parents and your pick of the perfect engagement ring and your all-time amazing ability to disarm a woman with a kiss. If I had married you I would be a dog mom rather than a cat fiend. If I had married you I'd have been a widow at 29.

K Number 2, if I had married you, I'd probably be living on a street bearing your last name. We'd have a top-of-the-line gas grill and you'd probably coach a little league team. We'd likely travel out of state once a year, and when we did we'd bump heads as to whether it would be to Disney or Yellowstone. We wouldn't have gotten pregnant yet, but we'd hang out with high school friends who had a few little ones of their own. We'd have an in-ground pool and an SUV. We'd go to firehouse fundraisers and church on Sundays. On sweltering summer Fridays we'd make the age-old trek to the Jersey Shore and our neighbors there would know us by first names. At family cookouts I'd close the screen door behind me to find your mom standing alone in the kitchen, and we probably still wouldn't have much to say to one another even in the silence.

Dearest J, if we had gotten hitched, it would have been quite a wedding. Only after a series of hints and possible threats would you have gotten up the persuaded courage to propose to me, and when I told and retold the animated proposal story you would blush and slowly shake your downturned head. I'm pretty sure your bachelor party would have been broadcast on the Internet, and would have involved at least three different bail bondsmen. We'd have a baby boy and we'd live in Northern California. You'd be the most responsive husband and a wonderful father, the man who would go out once at 3 a.m. to appease my cereal craving and again at 3:30 when you confused Froot Loops with Apple Jacks. I would find myself often frustrated by your quiet nature but rewarded at the tiny bubbles of goodness and wit that would make their way to the surface during an odd expressive moment. If we were married it's safe to say I'd be drinking hard liquor.

C, if we had made it this far I think we'd be living in Tallahassee, still doing the grad school thing almost a decade after we both started. We would have been married in a Catholic church in DC, and I probably would not have met half the friends you invited to the wedding. I still wouldn't really know what happened in New Mexico. A good bit of our furniture would be from Ikea, and much to my mother's chagrin, we'd have gotten at least two large tents and a thankfully smaller chocolate lab as wedding presents. I'd force myself on a regular basis to eat seafood and not to use puns to excess. We'd go to Martha's Vineyard for our yearly trip and I would find it amazingly rewarding to see my sunburned cheeks in the annual family photo. I'd remain in awe of your ability to make perfect rice and completely amazed at what a good, good man I had found to put up with me. A good bit of the time our lives would be spent in complete silence.

R, if we had gotten married we'd be living in Alexandria, likely in a small house in the back roads of Del Ray. We'd be regulars at the local coffee house, me writing on my laptop and you reading about the latest social revolution. I'd be doubling up on birth control while you did exercises you'd found on the Internet rumored to make your sperm extra nimble. I'd watch you play inline hockey on Wednesday nights and wonder why I never really fit in with any of the other wives. I'd pray for you to get your front tooth fixed. I'd bake miniature rum cakes and take them to parties at which I'd wish for once you'd mingle. Instead, you'd mostly just sit, writing or singing or whatever it is you did in your own head, while I drank Chianti to excess and contemplated forcing myself on your coworker under the mistletoe.

I should probably stop there.

Living Single

Disclaimer: the following post is not meant to imply that I hate men or marriage, that I hope to remain single for the remainder of my natural life, or that I have anything against those who choose to marry, have children, or watch Lord of the Rings. Or those who have children while watching Lord of the Rings.

This single woman is not about to gripe about the relative affirmation that came in the form of this article and a gazillion others like it after the census data were released. It may seem strange, but I consider this a validation for me and my 20- and 30-something group of closest girlfriends, all of whom are either single or divorced. Currently single women make up nearly half of the female population. We aren’t freaks, or at least it isn’t this particular issue that makes us so; we aren’t just an isolated DC phenomenon, a product of a transient environment and an overabundance of middling Hill candidates; we aren’t alone in the desire for companionship coupled with hesitation about committing before our time. And we aren't settling like some of our mothers or grandmothers might have felt they needed to.

Love it, Love it, LOVE IT.

What strikes me as most interesting is one network’s apparent need to provide examples of famous folk to make the story (or the social situation) a valid or believable one. Stars! They are so just like us! They shop for Camembert at Whole Foods and buy their toilet paper at Nordstrom and some of them are even – gasp – single! It’s the Not that there’s anything wrong with that and the Some of my friends are black and/or gay and/or bionic Syndrome all over again. Ugh.

Oprah has long served as the independent, single woman’s poster girl. She's classy and paired with a supportive man and autonomous and stylish and probably a kick-ass best friend (She and Gale so aren't gay. Not that there'd be anything wrong with that.) But has anyone noticed the other models of singledom news outlets have been trotting out for display? I won’t name any of them here, given that I actually respect these women and would hate to hurt their feelings as I’m pretty sure at least a million famous people read my corner of the Interweb, but please, can you not pick us a hottie? One who didn’t go to school with Laura Ingalls and who has made a movie, spearheaded a philanthropic effort, owned a company, or stood up for herself (or her country), within the past five years?

These latter women represent what most of us as small children feared would result from a life living unmarried past pubescence:

• They are workaholics. They seemingly have no real hobbies. Except for knitting, and not in the cool way, in the smells-like-mothballs way.
• It's not just that they're single. They're pretty much asexual. Asexual, and not in just a preference way, but in an absence-of-female-parts way.
• If you look really, really close, some of them have a third eye. In an extra-eye-kinda way.
• They like men’s clothes. On themselves. And they look like they wear n*de hose and nursing shoes to big events. (That last should be enough for all of you.)

News flash: Not all currently single women over the age of 25 share Gollum’s charming features or are polydactyl, people (and Oprah and Gale SO aren't gay)! We are charming and cute and loving and some of us even have breasts and cool hobbies like blogging and drinking and playing hide and seek with our cats.

(Then again, maybe Oprah should remain the only poster girl.)

him

The weekend was a whirlwind of turkey entrees, turkey sandwiches, very novice poker played with my family – yet again over turkey, two too many drinks and pool with the best of friends, a close talk with my mom, a trip to New York City and back within an 18-hour period, and a good bit of sleep. Did I mention a little text messaging with CNB with dog? And a little shopping.

I indulged in full price (as in non-sale, non-Target) mascara AND foundation at the CVS, party people. That alone surely makes me a rock star, no? And as I left the store, intoxicated by my purchases and the stimulus overload that is the CVS at Christmas, I turned to make sure I held the door for anyone who followed. And that anyone turned out to be none other than Him. The ex, the beau, the love of my life who I once spent most of my dream time on, thinking on more than one occasion about just how this man would ultimately propose to me.

I did a double take. Only after I was quite sure that my heart was not indeed bursting, that I hadn’t started bawling and that I would not require medical assistance did I speak.

“Hi.” I said on the second take. “How are you?”

“I’m good.”

Then nothing. No discussion, no big smiles, no I think of you and I miss you sometimes. And the heavy pain and imminent embarrassment were the only things that prompted me to force one leg out in front of the other, because if I didn’t, the awfulness of the situation might indeed consume me and make my heart stop beating.

And as it continued to strike me as so ridiculous that you can spend three years of your life knowing someone – knowing everything about them, more than their parents and their best friends and their brothers ever will – and traveling and loving and living life side by side, and suddenly your partnership is reduced to three seconds of niceties between the two glass doors at the drug store, I offered nothing remotely close to what I really wanted to say and do, what I struggle with holding back on a daily basis.

“Well I guess I’ll see you around.” And I turned my head and walked away without looking back.

I made it two whole blocks before I burst into tears in my car.

I just keep wondering when it will go away.

How to Lose a Guy in 10 Ways

MSN got all up in my grill this morning with an article detailing the 10 Reasons Men Won’t Commit. I was pretty excited as I thought they were referencing my favorite subject: homicide, but apparently they were talking about the coupling that is marriage. Despite my disappointment, I read on. Their reasons, and my reactions*, follow.

10 Reasons Men Won't Commit

Reason 1: Men can get sex without marriage more easily than in times past. So can women. What’s the point? And given how many Mary Sues have been shipped off for nine months to their “aunt’s house in the country,” I’m gonna go ahead and say it probably hasn’t been all that difficult to get it for some time now.

Reason 2: Men can enjoy the benefits of having a wife by cohabiting rather than marrying. If by enjoy the benefits of having a wife, they mean “have someone pick on you for leaving your towel on the floor, criticize the type of mediciney mouthwash you insist on using, and less frequent sex,” I’m not really getting it. Maybe that’s just my old relationships.

Reason 3: Men want to avoid divorce and its financial risks. Are women still getting 50% of their spouse’s assets? I know some women who are giving that much to their husbands in their divorces. Esquires, please do weigh in on this one. And note that I typed esquires. Escorts can keep quiet.

Reason 4: Men want to wait until they are older to have children. This one makes sense to me. Anyone see that GA-Runaway-Bride-eyed contestant on the Bachelor? The one who’s 23 and incessantly talking about her timeline? And stressing the fact that being on the show and marrying the Blaine look-alike will put her right where she needs to be to procreate by 30? It makes me shudder. I can’t imagine what it does to the opposite sex. Dude repellant.

Reason 5: Men fear that marriage will require too many changes and compromises. Which is clearly so much worse than living in your parents’ basement, Cliff Clavin.

Reason 6: Men are waiting for the perfect soul mate and she hasn't yet appeared. SPOILER ALERT: There is no perfect soul mate, asshats! There are perfect days at the beach with a breeze and without a burn, perfect pizzas with just the right balance of cheese and sauce, and perfect margaritas. Perfection is an unrealistic expectation for someone who will spend decades sharing your roof. Or so my Chicken Soup books tell me.

Reason 7: Men face few social pressures to marry. In all seriousness, do women face social pressures to marry? I feel the pressure to have children (inspired by such insightful statements as, “but who will wash you when you are too old to wash yourself?”), but interestingly enough, no pressure to marry. Discuss.

Reason 8: Men are reluctant to marry a woman who already has children. Because we all know how mean, unnurturing, uncaring, inflexible, and hardhearted mothers can be. Next.

Reason 9: They want to own a house before they get a wife. I’m actually all for this. I’m pretty sure that I will never be financially stable, so if he comes with a home and a working car or skateboard, even better.

Reason 10: Men want to enjoy a single life as long as they can. I don’t have that much to say about this one. I can definitely appreciate the thinking behind this. And we all know that space is hard to compromise and routines hard to break. But I would hate to think that men would miss out on the beauty of a long-term commitment because they were afraid nights with the guys would suddenly be taboo. Which of course they would be.

*I am not married, nor have I ever been, nor will I likely ever be, unless this adopt-a-Malawian-husband thing pans out, so all opinions should be taken with a grain of salt and the knowledge that they are based upon a rather long series of fulfilling yet failed relationships. Awesome.

It's All About You

This isn't really for me. Well, yes it is.

But seriously. I was reading DC legend Kathryn's archives the other day, and she described in detail breakup lines she'd been fed over the years. AWFUL. And then her readers responded in kind, sharing the most damaging and personal situations, as well as the most vivid displays of insensitivity you can imagine.

I must know more. I just find it hard to wrap my head around this happening to people. And the fact that it is so common - that most every person has experienced this sheer lack of humanity MORE THAN ONCE, that people are capable of this! - boggles the mind.

I have never done this before, but I really want this post to be about you. Will you share you worst breakups, your most shocking separations, your most disappointing letdowns with us? At the prom, before the altar, 20 years down the line?

Please feel free to post anonymously. I won't make any effort to link your identity to your comment; I would consider it an honor that you'd even share such information.

I'll share mine as soon as I can. It's just a little too close right now.

Thanks everybody.