Restraining Order for One

It’s no secret that girls are CreepCity, Population: 1.  To mitigate my creep potential, I have a fool-proof system built out to vet whether my actions will be seen as assertive and modern, or straight up stalker with a side of a restraining order. What is that lovely system you might ask? My friends. Only problem…they are just as weird as I am.

The problem with being a seasoned marketing professional like myself is this: I’m scary good at stalking the interwebs. Add a dash of single to the mix and it’s like sticking a recovering alcoholic in the middle of Specs with one of those sweet XL pimp cups. I wish I could say that I am able to resist temptation, but it’s like that giant goblet is whispering to me saying ‘fill me and my bedazzled self up with that trash…you know you want it’. I do, Pimp Cup, I do want to give in and google every guy who could possibly be the future father of my overly-athletic children. With the help of my enterprise-grade social networking tools, that temptation is only a few clicks away. A hop, skip and a jump and I find myself fighting Kathy Bates for the starring role in Misery.

As a young professional in the dating world, I spend my evenings chatting it up with fine fellows about our respective careers. When your life revolves around spreadsheets and revenue model meetings, it’s easy to fall into comfortable conversations, relying on camaraderie built on the foundation of banality, rather than take that first step out onto the thin ice of truly getting to know someone. It’s basically either that or sports. Whichever comes first. Lord knows I’m not going to roll up into a bar discussing my incessant need to document every epic relationship failure by way of this blog. “Hey there. Don’t bother telling me your name, HottyToddy, because I’m just going to refer to you by aforementioned relatively applicable nickname in my wildly read (by 32 people) dating blog”. My night would be spent hacking up the dust left by his rapid exit.

Instead of doing what any normal human being would do, I engage in friendly conversation, ignore any hints of interest and freak out and bolt when he is about to ask for my number (because that’s the healthy option), leaving me to text my friends real-life questions like the following:

Me- “Yo, dude. One a scale of 1-Restraining Order, how creepy is it to LinkedIn a guy when you only knew his name and company to begin with?”

Her-“How many clicks did it take?”

Me-“2”

Her-“I mean it’s definitely not worse than that one time you jumped on a bike with someone in Ireland and that turned out fine…..so I’m all for it.”

Me-“I don’t know if that makes you the most awesome or most awful,friend I have.”

Her-“Awesome. Honesty is the best policy. You’ve got to go after what you want…and all that jazz.”

*Connect Button Clicked*

Her-“….but I’m typically creepy.”

Welp, what’s another restraining order, right? After about five I hear they lose count anyways…

We live in the mixed-up world where the rules our parents lived by are obsolete. A world where face-to-face conversations are no longer the primary way of obtaining information, whether it is related to a business or to your love life. Our world, and our dating, have gone online, but where is the line drawn?

The temptation to forego the tough conversations and conventional methods of asking, accepting and pursuing the opposite sex is a tantalizing enemy because one side is sticky and uncomfortable, while the other allows you the safety of your sweat pants and anonymity.

Where once we had to wait on the dreaded phone call, three days after a successful date, now ladies spend their time analyzing the number of exclamation marks and emoticons used in a string of text messages. What we thought was instant gratification has morphed into instant investigation, each female following the 48 hour rule. Don’t let the trail go stale, or you’ll find youself in 47 cat hell, wallowing in a housecoat, DVR set to a constant slough of Lifetime movies.

It’s exhausting.

This cat and mouse world is evidenced by the multimillion (maybe billion. Don’t fact check me, bro) dollar business of the RomCom. Each heroine following some zany advice of a delightfully off-kilter friend that leads to a love interest, heartache and misery, but always results in a reconciliation of epic proportions. Girls want to know what to do. They want to know that pursuit exists, that the rules they so strictly follow will result in the life Disney always promised them. They want the ends to justify the painfully repeated means.

But ya know what, ladies? They don’t. There is no prescription to this thing we call love. There are no rules to dating. Four days, three days, two hours. It is all a relative timeline in an unchartered world. We kill ourselves over the idea of fate and serendipity, but fail to realize the beauty in the unrepeatable, in the glitches and moments that skirt around the tracks.

We look so hard for the recipe of love, but fail to put the box aside and throw in a few secret ingredients, unafraid of the tasteless failure of a concoction it might produce. If everyday of your life is a beautiful unplanned mess, maybe we should also accept that our love lives may be found somewhere in the chaos.

My future is as bright as my sequin dress.

As the holiday season comes to a close, and couples everywhere go into hibernation to prepare for their pièce de résistance (known to the general public as Valentine’s Day), us poor single chumps are banding together for our one shot at remedying the past month of lonely strolls filled with Christmas lights and chilly mitten-clad hands, left unheld and neglected. Fear not, my single friends. New Year’s Eve is upon us. A night of mayhem, midnight kisses and magic.

Always the best night of the year, filled with epic stories and beautiful people. The perfect capstone to rest the hope and dreams of another year…

….oh wait. It’s New Years Eve. None of that happens. You only wish it did.

I sat at work in anticipation, thinking about how my night would go. Clearly, I would have the perfect hair day, despite the rain and the 7am shower that would have to last through the night, my makeup would be radiant, and my outfit the perfect compliment to the witty banter I would surely be spitting. If I could just get this right, start my 2013 off with a bang, then I’d hit the motherload. The pinnacle of what my awesome single twenties are supposed to look like. They do it in the movies, dude. I can pull it off.

This was my year. After ringing in the last 5 years by shooting stuff in the country, I thought I would dawn my sequined attire and see what midnight looks like when accompanied by champagne, some super sweet hats and an outfit that can be seen from space. Oh I’m sorry….is my dress blinding you? No, that isn’t the sun. It is the soft glow of 10000 sequins shimmering with anticipation at how many compliments I will get because I look so fly. Easy, my sparkly friends, your time will come. At midnight. When that poor unsuspecting bloke gets lured into my clutches (errrr embrace) because his retinas are momentarily rendered useless. We would enter into a coy chat peppered with obscure pop culture references and clever metaphors, he impressed with my breadth of knowledge and wicked cool shoes, I, with his poise and ability to do the Dougie, while still looking like a Kennedy. It would be perfect. Obviously…it’s NYE.

Though imagination has its place, mine seems to kick into overdrive, setting absurd expectations to moments that have not yet come and will more than likely never come to be. Planning conversations, dates, outfits, meals, and interactions, quite possibly months before they are set to take place, I become a controlling crazy person, trying to stack the odds in my favor. My unwarranted expectations are the cause of majority of the tear-filled nights that dot my past. And no night holds more excited expectation than New Year’s Eve. You don’t just dawn sequins for nothing. They are fancy pants….literally.

Since single women tend to be on the eternal relationship advice panel with their not-so-single friends, I hear the stories of repeated disappointment in Girl World. ‘He didn’t tell me I looked pretty when I got dressed up.’ ‘He didn’t propose when I thought he would.’ ‘It’s our anniversary and all I got was dinner at the burger place instead of at the new bistro I’ve been hinting at for months.’ ‘When he commented on my new haircut he said it looks good….not great. I wanted him to say great. He knows that. He hates it. And me.’

So many unfulfilled expectations. Set by us. Covering our hurt hearts with a cloud of repellant that leaves us broken and incapable of the unanticipated adventure that could be lingering just out of our reach. We create our own prisons on a daily basis, walled in by a false reality that does no one any good.

I really hope guys don’t do this….because some day, one of us is going to have to be sane…and we all know it’s not going to be this girl.

As I drove to Austin, stressing about the 43 minute delay when the only place I had to be was the hotel, I realized that my expectations will be the undoing of my yet-to-start perfect NYE. Instead of doing something with the outcome at the forefront of my mind, I vowed to fly by the seat of my pants, going wherever the night took me, my only goal, enjoying my evening. And guess what? It worked.

Facebook is littered with resolutions, each haunted by the ghost of an unmet expectation. Rather than resolve what TO DO this year, I am giving up my own expectations. Giving up my plans for the future, in order to truly experience my now, my current, my life. Losing the weight of a constant need for control and gaining the unexpected surprises that God wants to bless us all with.

“My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him.” Psalm 62:5

In the end, my expecation-less escapade turned out just fine. Best night of my life? Probably not. One for the books? Sure. I was merely one in a sea of sequins, a Richard Simmons-worthy gang, carefully scampering down the streets in shoes as equally awesome as mine. I met some people. Hugged some necks. Laughed a lot. Danced a jig or two. And gained some memories I can be proud of.

When I drop the baggage of trying to create the perfect moment and give up the reins for once in my life, its incredible where you can end up. In a bar with old friends, the American Legion with new friends, or sitting in the back of a cab being a friend to a driver who’s having a less than perfect evening. Our own creations are so small compared to the path God has laid out for us. My resolution is to get out of His way.