I ran into my ex last week. There's some issue with my store rewards card and my checking account; he was standing in line behind me. I guess that's what happens when there are hundreds of people throughout the U.S. with the same name. (The strangest thing that had ever happened to me was that I was standing at a social event and someone behind me said I'd like to introduce you to...and said my name. I turned around and it was someone that I had never met introducing two other people. Ahhh...the matrix.)
He had me thinking about him and how it was from beginning to end, the strangest relationship I had ever had with a man. Sometimes it's best to go with the flow and let the universe put the man in front of you that's supposed to be there for the experience of having had it.
Let me start off with the statement 'a sesame bagel with light vegetable cream cheese'. That's the statement that all questions should end with. What's you're favorite breakfast, why are you chubby, what can I bring you, and certainly, why are there seeds all over your car?
Now that I've brought you up to speed, it was July, it was hot out, I had the top down on my convertible, my hair up in a clip, and I was wearing a tank top and shorts. I was vacuuming the remnants of yesterday's breakfast when a guy pulled up next to me looking for a particular family--that he was sure lived on my block. I told him that I had lived there for four years, and I didn't know the name. After about an hour, he came back--and yes, there were that many stray seeds that I was still cleaning when he started chatting me up.
He told me that I was really nice to him and asked if I had a husband or boyfriend. I didn't. He asked me to have dinner with him and said that I would. I don't even know how to explain to you how odd this guy was. The best way to describe the date was that he was too weird for words. I like words, I write; I was in gifted and talented classes in English when I was in high school. I had the second highest grade in English in my incoming freshman class in college. I had professors try to get me to change my major and yet here I was, in the sobering morning light not being able to describe what had happened the night before. All that I knew was that I didn't want to go out with him again. My 'no vacancy' sign was on.
I told him I was heading to Florida for a month. I had hoped that would discourage him; I was wrong. I was about 10 weeks past our date when the phone rang. I was vacuuming (again) and I didn't check my caller ID. I picked up the phone and said hello. He said to me 'have dinner with me Saturday night'. I reluctantly accepted. It wasn't because I was excited to see him--heck I had done everything I could to discourage him. I said yes, because he didn't ask me; he told me...and that difference made all of the difference to me. Half man/half shark...power is sexy.
Ed couldn't have been kinder to me over the next few months. I did head to Florida; he cleaned the snow off of my car while I was gone. I moved and not only did he take care of my plants at his place until I was situated, but the morning of the day after the move he showed up at 8 a.m. with coffee and buttered rolls before he went to work--driving ten miles out of his way to do so.
At some point I had asked him why he had asked me out. I knew that I wasn't looking good that July day. Perspiration, my hair up in a potato chip bag clip, no makeup on... He told me that after he passed me he looked in the rear view mirror of his car and saw the sunlight glistening in my hair...now before you say awwwww just the way that I did, let me explain that some months later, I asked the same question and got a completely different answer.
The second time around he told me the truth...that when he looked in the rear view mirror I was bending over and the view that he got in his rear view, was mine...peaking out from the bottom of my shorts.
It lead to think back at the times in my life when a man might have approached me and my forehead was blinking 'no vacancy' or in other words, I'm not available. When in reality, I was...I was saying that yes, I'm available--but not to you.
My girlfriend Elie has had life altering experiences being 'intentioned' as in book 'The Secret'. Every time we speak she asks me if I've worked on my 'vision board' to call into my life the deepest desires of my heart and soul. My answer is no.
There's a reason I haven't worked on it and the reason is 'the list'. Every woman that I know has one--of what she thinks her perfect guy should be. Many years ago, I had someone ask me to do this and I did. I had 98 items on that list before I put the pen down. You read that correctly: 98--and I didn't think that I was being unreasonable. I had the same sort of reality shock when one of my movers said to me that I had more clothes than any single person they had ever moved. Really? I didn't even know this was an issue for me. Shoes yes; nail polish? OK, even I can say that I have a lot, but a mere 98 attributes in a myriad of a billion different personality types and quirks didn't seem that much...until...Robyn. Robyn told me that she had done the same thing years before. She is now with her man for 16 years, but she had her list before they met. They are well suited for each other, so I asked her what she was looking for....She said here list had 5 things that she wanted and needed in a man. That's all? Yup.
Then Dr. Pat made it even worse. She whittled it down to THREE. I get three non-negotiables beyond anything illegal, immoral or unethical. Crap; those three things had better really be what I need... but I think I have it distilled. I need a man who's smarter than I am--and I'm no slouch! I need a man who's emotionally stronger than I am and I (I used to say that I need a man who's refined, but I've changed that) need a man who has both 'sophistication' and 'street' in him--and the good sense to know the difference between when each of those parts of him are appropriate. I can't be with a man who's all blue collar; I can't be with a man who's all white collar. I need a man who's both. He has to have some tough parts of him or I don't have enough chemistry to be sexually attracted....half man/half shark...a hybrid. So for today, I've just decided to go with the flow, say yes to anyone who asks and look for his finer points...all men have them if you take the time to look.
Because I have regrets about 2 men that would have been perfect for me had I known then what I know now about them. Had I only looked past my list and had 'vacancy' sign lit. One made me laugh, and one is so much like me that he couldn't be more perfect. I understand him and the more that I know about him, the more that I like him, but he now has his 'no vacancy' sign up when it comes to me. He thought I rejected him; I didn't-- I rejected some behavior that I felt went beyond just some flirting...it was too sexual for me to be comfortable. I had asked him if he would treat me the way that he would want a man to treat his daughter when she comes of age, because I, too was my father's daughter. I gave him the quality information that he needed to dial it back to a place where we could move forward; but in a different direction. He didn't see it that way.
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