The Dating Cycle

This weekend, it felt like fall had finally found New York (nevermind that it is supposed to be 89 degrees tomorrow).  I love fall.  I love the sound of leaves crunching underfoot and being able to sleep with the windows open.  I love how fall comes with so many mixed feelings - giddily looking forward to a new school year full of potential while wistfully saying goodbye to the carefree days of summer, eagerly picking crisp, red apples while noticing the sudden absence of lush, summer berries from the produce aisle, wrapping a warm scarf around your neck while reluctantly tucking away your flip flops.  I love how fall feels quiet, but hurried, as though everyone is trying to get as much done as they can before turning in for the winter.

This year, the tidings of fall came with the usual melancholic mix of feelings.  But more present than ever this year was dread.  This fall will usher in my third year at my job.  This fall will mark five years of living alone.  This fall will mean two years have passed since I last saw or spoke to 'C'.  And this fall will mean that I've been actively dating for two years, with not much to show for beyond a few more proverbial notches on the bedpost.

As if I haven't said this enough already, dating is exhausting.  First, there's the exhaustion of trying to get a date - going to bars, weeding through the online profiles and flirting, flirting, flirting.  And then there's the exhaustion of going on first dates - making small talk, putting your best foot forward and smiling, smiling, smiling.  And then there's the exhaustion of the second, third and fourth dates - actually getting to know someone, determining whether you're compatible and analyzing, analyzing, analyzing.

I have yet to make it much further than these stages.  It's like I'm stuck in the board game Chutes and Ladders.  I keep plugging along, square by square.  Occasionally, I get lucky, land on a ladder, get really excited, climb up, and then boom.  On the next roll, I land on a chute and get spiraled right back down to the beginning, where the game begins all. over. again.  

Right now, I feel like I'm at the starting line and it's my turn to roll, but I just don't want to.  I don't want to put myself back through the cycle and risk landing on chute after chute after chute.  I just want to sit here for a moment.  Sit on the sidelines.  Take a moment to stop thinking about boys all the time.  Take a break from thinking about how lonely it would be to live by myself for the next five years, much less the rest of my life. 

I guess this dating break has a lot to do with why I am dreading the fall.  That same quiet, hurried feeling that seems to wash over New Yorkers (and squirrels) as they try to get as much done before winter arrives is taking over me.  I have a completely self-imposed sense of urgency that I need to get to the end of this board game before the sand in the hourglass runs out.  Hence my dreading the fall.  The change of seasons seems to remind me that as long as time is tick, tick, ticking, then I need to keep dating, dating, dating.

But I don't want to.  I just want time to stand still with me for a sec while I take a moment to prepare myself to roll the dice again.

Letting Go, A Follow-Up

When I re-read what I wrote last night in the light of day, it just suddenly seemed so clear to me.  I mean, sure, maybe the reason nothing has changed in my life in the last two years is simply that I have been waiting for the Perfect Guy, the Perfect Apartment, the Perfect Puppy or the Perfect Job to come along before plunging into a relationship, home-ownership, "motherhood" or a new career.

Or, maybe I am just a huge commitment-phobe.

Letting Go

Last weekend, I was catching up with a friend I hadn't seen in a couple months.  My friend had all sorts of new developments in his life.  He had a new nephew.  He and his long-term girlfriend had broken up.  He had already gone out on a first date (with a cougar!).  He was entering a new stage in his career.

And then we turned to me.   "So, where are you living now?"  "Oh...the same place as before."  "I thought the last time I saw you, you were looking at moving?"  "Oh...yeah, still looking."  "Did you get a puppy?" "Oh...no, still no puppy."  "And did you quit yet?" "Oh...uhh no...not yet..."  (At least he spared me the "are you seeing anyone" question.  I suppose he knows me well enough to know that the answer to that question never changes.)  "Wow," he said, "What happened to all your plans?!"

We laughed, but then later, I couldn't help but think, what DID happen to all my plans?  Or, more precisely, why haven't I followed through with any of these things that I talk and obsess about all the time?  These things - apartment, dog, job - are all things that are more or less in my control, and yet I simply cannot seem to pull the trigger.  I keep hesitating, stalling.  Sure, they're big life decisions and certainly choices not to be made hastily, but still.  What am I waiting for?  What is holding me back?

And then this weekend, I avoided going on a third date for absolutely no good reason.  I didn't have any real set plans, and it would've been easy to have met up with him on Saturday or Sunday night.  But I didn't.  I lied.  I made stuff up.  And then I made plans so I wouldn't feel as guilty about making stuff up.  I was purposefully trying to stall our progress.  The thing is, he's actually a pretty great guy.  We have a good rapport, and he is genuinely nice without being boring.  And to me, he seems, well, safe.  Drama-free.  So why am I hesitant to move things forward with him?  Why am I shying away from a chance to actually try to have a stable, adult relationship?  What am I waiting for?  What am I holding on to?

When you're single, it can be so easy to cling to the dream that maybe one day things will magically work out with the one who got away - the ex-boyfriend, the best friend, the summer fling, the boy who moved 500 miles away.  It's so easy to keep retreating back into the comfort and familiarity of that someone, even when you know deep down that it would never actually work out.  It's easier to hold on to even just the idea of that someone than it is to get out there, start fresh and go on those first, second and third dates.

I don't think I'm holding on to the idea of things working out with a specific person so much anymore as I am to just the idea of the Perfect Guy.  And no matter what I've said in the past, maybe I'm still not quite ready to give up the dream of someone else, the dream of the Perfect Guy.

Feeling Restless

When I moved to New York, it was the first time in my entire life that I moved somewhere not knowing when I was going to leave.  I found the fact that I could be living here in New York indefinitely really, really unsettling.  It also didn't help that I felt like I had wound up in New York by default.  It wasn't so much the best option as it was the least bad option. There really wasn't any other place in the country where I would've wanted to live as a single 25-year-old, single being the operative word in this sentence.

So initially, I was rather negative on the City before deciding that I needed an attitude adjustment.  I convinced myself that yes, this was the best place to be as a single 25-year-old.  And then I convinced myself that since I was here indefinitely, it was time to buckle down and actively concentrate on dating and relationships. I like to call it my "time-to-stay-put-mentality."

I tend to attribute my perpetual singleness to the fact that I've always been sort of focused on where I was going with my life (even if I never really knew where that was).  In the back of my mind, there's always been this hesitation of not wanting to get entangled in a relationship and be forced to give up my dreams to follow some boy.  But now that I was indefinitely stationary, it seemed logical to start concentrating on my personal life.  Stay put.  Grow up.  Stop dreaming about traveling and moving around every few years.

Today, probably for the first time in a really long time, the I-wish-I-was-living-in-a-foreign-country wave hit me.

I blame my Afghan coffee cart guy, who may be one of the nicest people I interact with on a day-to-day basis, for this sudden surge of restlessness.  He was just chatting with the guy from the coffee cart across the street and eating a plate of food from the food cart next to his, and as he poured me my coffee, he told me that the guy from the coffee cart across the street was actually his uncle.  I don't know why that made me smile.  It reminded me of how all the shopkeepers at street markets in Cairo knew each other.  It reminded me of the sense of community that suddenly bonds even the most typically unfriendly Americans when displaced in a foreign environment.  I suddenly longed to be somewhere else, soaking up a local culture, learning a new language and, when struck by homesickness, retreating back into a community of Americans with whom I never would have been friends back at home.

It wasn't quite enough to make me immediately sign up to move to Kabul, but it did get me thinking.  If I weren't for the fact that I decided that my odds of meeting someone were best in New York, would I still be  here?  Would I still be practicing law?  Doubtful.  If I wasn't so worried about being single for the rest of my life, I would have done everything in my power to move to some random country.  I wouldn't be limiting my current job search to New York. 

You hear about people all the time who put their personal life on hold for their careers.  I guess in a way, I am sort of doing the opposite.  I've put that dream of working abroad on hold in pursuit of this pipe dream of finding true love...

A Trip Down Memory Lane

So, last weekend, I went back to a city where I went to school, where all my friends from that school would be reuniting for a wedding and where 'E', an old summer fling of mine, was now living.  I mean, talk about a trip down memory lane.  More like three memory lanes merging.

I can't even really begin to describe my pre-departure excitement surrounding this trip.  I should have been more apprehensive.  I knew going into the trip that there was a whole host of uncertain variables which could either add up to a fabulous or a disastrous weekend.  There was the possibility that I would have to work all weekend, and then there was the possibility that 'E' had a new girlfriend or it would just be awkward, and then there was the possibility that there were so many planned group activities that I wouldn't get to really catch-up with my friends.  Even knowing all this though, I couldn't help it.  I was totally giddy.

And for once, I wasn't disappointed!  Everything went perfectly.  Being together with all my friends from school again was just as lively and rambunctious as I remembered, and still I was able to catch up and spend some quality time with a few of my closer friends in that group. 'E' did have a new girlfriend...but they broke up (win!) and it was surprisingly un-awkward seeing him (every day I was there).  I revisited my favorite restaurants and watering holes.  My BlackBerry stayed remarkable quiet.  I got a massage.  The wedding was lovely.  And at the end of the weekend, I didn't really want to leave, but I didn't want to stay either.

This was not at all the reaction that I was expecting to have.

Usually, when I go back to a city that I used to live in, I am struck by an overwhelming sense of nostalgia.  Inevitably things have changed; stores have closed, new buildings have been constructed, the people are all different.  That was only sort of the case this time.  Sure the skyline had some new indentations, and the downtown area was peppered with new bars, but my friends were all there again.  It was as though we had all just returned from a really extended winter break.

Usually, when I see old friends again, I'm a little saddened by how much we've changed and grown apart.  So many changes in our collective lives had occurred in just a year and a half - marriages, engagements, pregnancies, babies, cross-country moves, home ownership, new cars (lots of them), new jobs, new significant others, new exes.  Yet our group vibe was still the same.  Everyone had entered a new stage in life, but once we were drinking pitcher after pitcher of beer at our favorite bar in the middle of the afternoon, it was as if everything picked up right back where we had left off.

And usually when I see an ex, I just don't know what to feel.  There's always something awkward and uncomfortable; that odd dynamic where you are both wondering whether the other still has feelings for you.  Two and a half years had passed since I had last seen 'E'.  I worried whether we would have anything to talk about, how I should act around him, what he was expecting from that weekend, if any emotional repercussions would result from seeing him again.  But when I was with him, all of that worrying went away.   He was exactly how I remembered him.  We were exactly how I remembered us.

So when the weekend was over, I felt far from nostalgic.  Everything had been familiar and comfortable. It was a true trip down memory lane. Things were just how I remembered them.  And things were just as wonderful as I had remembered them.  Which pretty much explains why I had nothing to be nostalgic for.  

Now, I don't like change.  But not feeling nostalgic at the end of the weekend made me realize that as much as I dislike change, I don't like when things are stagnant either.  I've struggled a lot in the past year with the feeling that I have no idea where I'm heading with my life.  I've never had a ten-year plan, but for the last 26 years, I at least had a three or four-year plan.  Now it's 2010, and I have no idea what I will be doing or where I will be in 2011, 2012, 2013.  I am settled and happy in New York.  But sometimes it is just easy to become complacent, and I worry that if I let it, it will inevitably become like this past weekend - a little too comfortable and ultimately, stagnant.  The weekend was a reminder that I need to keep reevaluating and moving forward.