Wow Atherton, your Lexi Featherston post was one of the greatest blog posts I've ever read in my long Internet life. Furthermore, the post it was based on - also pure gold.
Now, I never watched Sex and the City. My longterm ex-boyfriend (who will come into play later in this post) did. A lot. But I never really caught on with the program. So I had to do some research on this Lexi Featherston lady:
And you know what? I'd give each of us a bit more credit than comparing either you or I to Lexi Featherston. (Though I LOVE her swansong monologue - I even just made it into my iChat away message). For one, neither of us are callous or so damned loud. And, surely, you're smart enough to stay inside of 18th story windows - Manolo heels or not.
I understand you say it's your age and your friends all pairing up... but keep in mind that in the greater gay world, your committed friends are a minority. And I'll spare you my cynicism (okay i won't, but I'm not wishing ill on them!) But coming from one of ten million divorced families, coupling is hardly the end of the line for anyone.
Yes, I'm coming from a younger generation, but still. I know more single people than not-single. Also - you're not that brash, loud, or annoying. I don't care how "cool" Lexi was, I would have slapped that cunt in the face and thrown her out the window before she had a chance to open it.
But I digress.
I have a motto (which I put in a comment in your post) that I go by ever since my most recent breakup:
"I'm not afraid of commitment, I just know I'm terrible at it."This was the answer I gave to a guy who was trying to get me to be his boyfriend... right after I broke up with my most recent one. I was drinking at the time (one of my favorite activities when single).
I shook my head and said "no, I'm not looking for anything serious right now. I just got out of a six-month relationship."
"Why not? Are you afraid of commitment?"
It didn't take me half a second to respond to him with the above motto before turning on my heels and heading off to get another Madras (note: an Astoria bartender informed me last weekend there's another name for the drink - a Cranberry Toad... I shit you not.)
And really, I know that I am not afraid of commitment. Because I went face-to-face with it for over 5 years with my ex-boyfriend (now great friend) Paul. Sure, at one point that monogamous coupling became a monogamous/polygamous throuple. But even then - it was almost a year of further commitment... there was love there. There was care there. And it also might be why my inner thermostat ain't poppin' as much these days.
I was speaking with Paul the other day, about my recent... proclivity and sexual adventures. About all the guys I'm meeting and spending time with. He mentioned that it seemed like a complete 180 from "who I was" when I was with him. I countered with "it's not who I was, it was who you inspired me to be."
Further proof that I am not afraid of commitment, or even opposed to it, if the guy is right and gives me what I need and lets me give him what he needs. That's a very small amount of words to describe one of the most complicated requirements in the world.
No, I am not afraid of commitment. But maybe, right now, I'm just not ready for it again. After five years in something that didn't work out, am I ready to jump right back in again? Absolutely not. Not when I'm this close to 30. Another 5 year relationship has the potential to drop me off at single on the other side of 30.
So no. Nuh uh. No way. Not while I still have my looks. Not when I can still go out and party every night til 1 or 2 or 3 in the morning, wake up feeling as fresh as a daisy and go to work and do it all over again. I don't want to get into a relationship, see it end, and realize that I shat away the rest of my twenties chasing a serious relationship that I didn't actually want.
No. Not right now.
And yes, I realize that I am annoying to certain friends - friends who would KILL to be coupled. They don't understand how I can choose to be single, how I can turn down perfectly fantastic individuals who want to take the next step to something serious, something committed, something potentially eternal. How I can go out, meet boys, kiss boys, go home with boys, and then continue on with my life, often befriending said boys and never looking back.
But I don't have an answer for them. I can speak in a winding way for hours and hours should they so desire (very much how this post is turning out).
All I know is that when I settle down with someone, I turn into a person I don't like. I stay in more. I eat all the time. I become tunnel-visioned and fat. I look at 10PM as a bedtime, versus the timestamp on the receipt for my first drink of the night. I stop thinking of me and only think of them. I slice my life in half and start living for my other half.
That's what happened with me this past relationship (the six-month one that so many people thought was this big deal. Come on man, it was 6 months! What is that in the face of 5+ years?)
One day I just - woke up - and realized I was living with my boyfriend - literally living with him. We were together every night. I wasn't going out. I wasn't seeing friends. I hadn't had a drink in weeks. I had gained 15 pounds and I was right where I was in my last relationship... except it had all happened in a fast-tracked 4 months versus 4 years.
And I ran. (I ran so far away! sorry... couldn't help it.)
With little to no warning, I high-tailed it. And I haven't regretted it one bit. I love being single. I know I love being single because I have (and will continue to) turn down opportunities to un-single myself. I have a lot on my plate that I need to focus on. And a committed Plus One of the romantic variety is not the thing for me. (I mean, I can't even keep a co-blogger for more than a week! wakka wakka).
And now I'll turn this around and say the same for you. Being single is the ultimate spa treatment. It is a license to focus on you - to perfect everything about you from brains and brawn to manners and mentality. If you look at your single life as a time for self-reflection and hard work, not a moment is wasted. I'm glad you realized this, because the Atherton Bartelby in the original post was obviously in a very emo place (please tell me you were wearing nylons on your arms while typing that first go-round post).
I'm glad to see that you and I are in the same place - happily single and living life for us. Because let us not forget that Sex and the City is fiction. It is television. We can party and party and have a blast of our lives for many years to come.
"Live fast, die young, leave a beautiful corpse."
That was a line from a piece of erotica I published while still in college. Not sure why that just came to mind.
Any way. This time, I mean it. No serious dating til 30.
Okay, clearly I don't mean that. Let me rephrase: I'm not LOOKING for it until then. If someone comes and offers to buy me a lychee-tini and take me to see the Eiffel Tower in Paris, if he has money and passion and drive, if he has humor and smarts and a nice body to boot. Well... if he's out there, and decides to buy me a drink sometime, I won't turn down his offer, or his number.
Until then, I'll just go out and have a great time doing what I do best - living for me.
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