I wish I could say it was love at first sight. That I looked at you and knew that you were all that I had been missing all this time, that the light from your eyes and the warmth of your smile was everything my dark, cold days were without. A love story that perfect is what you deserve.
But thats not life. Feelings that magical don’t happen and if they do - they rarely last.
The first time I met you, I was more nervous than I have ever been. I must’ve spent at least three hours getting ready, even though five minutes before you picked me up I was still fretting that something was out of place - that I didn’t look quite good enough. That first date was as near to perfect as meeting anyone should or could be. There were no gimmicks, no awkward silences, no cheesy lines. You were the perfect gentleman and I felt more comfortable than I probably should have and ever expected to, and despite the fact that I probably talked non-stop the whole night - you still wanted to see me again (and if I’m completely honest with myself - I will never understand why that was). At the end of the night I had an inexplicable urge to kiss you, but when you dropped me home all I managed was the faintest brush of my lips on your cheek.
It was not love at first sight that night, but I knew by then end of it that I liked you, that I could see possibilites of what could be…
I think thats what made us special. It was what made our story so different, it was no fairytale. It didn’t all happen at once, I spent time with you…less able to leave you each time we met. Our days were savoured, as the beginnings of something as near to perfection as I’d ever known should be.
I had no voids, no empty loneliness that needed to be filled by you - thats not what a lover should do. You completed me for the little while we were together because everything I was and did was that much better because I was with you. You enhanced my very being. I didn’t realise that life could be this enriched by another. And even though we didn’t work out, I thank you for being the first to open my eyes to the ways of love - the good and the bad.
Life is a mystery, everyone must stand alone.… Who knew that lyrics from the song that was a number one in the year when I was born would summarise my experience of life almost 22 years later.
Don’t get me wrong I am not one of these eternally depressive, always sees the glass as half empty types – infact I am quite the opposite, much preferring to see the bright and, as more often is the case, the highly hilarious side of things. But I am stumped. Utterly dumfounded about the meaning of life and living, about my purpose, my destiny, my fate and all the things on my one journey till I meet my maker.
And being alone? I’m no socialite with facebook friends in the hundreds and more numbers than my iPhone can handle but I have enough of the important people to count. I’m lucky enough to have the kind of friends that laugh with you about the fashion faux pars of your year 6 teacher, that cheer you up after not getting asked to the end of school prom by boycotting the after party and having a sleepover and playing singstar til your hoarse, friends that make you drink jaegerbombs no matter how much you despise them and knowing full well of the hangover pain you will endure the next day (reasoning that you will face the pain together!) and the very same ones that are there preening you to perfection before every date and are eventually there with Kleenex, girly movies and a tub of ben and jerry’s after each breakup.
Then there’s the family – I’m lucky to be close to mine. My mum who is one of life’s great givers, having given me opportunities, patience, pocket money and her eyes; brown, slightly almond shape with charcoal black lashes (the gene lottery did good), Dad who despite his quiet brooding exterior and short temper has these amazing moments of empathy when you least expect them, my brother who is the silent optimist will go days making fun of me, and trying every angle he can to spring an argument but then comes out with the most thought provoking, wise-beyond-his-years speeches that make me re-evaluate whole situations and opinions and then finally my sister who although 2 years younger than me can be fiercely protective (apparently due to my “naivety to the world and people in it”) and whom I can talk to after weeks like it was just yesterday that we last spoke.
My family, we don’t live in each others pockets but deep down we all know we can count on each other for anything and that kind of bond is like an invisible safety net for us all.
So I’m not and probably never would be alone alone…but these people who travel through our lives with us, no matter how greatly or irreversibly they influence our lives – they cannot live it for us. We must stand alone on our own two feet fuelled by adrenalin and ambition whilst teetering on indecisiveness. We alone must make the mistakes, face the challenges and rejoice in the triumphs whilst we figure out what this life of ours is all about.
Better to be wanted….
Imagine a 12 year old me, slightly shorter and chubbier with a mass of unruly hair sitting reading a harlequin romance for teens. I love and still love to read about the perfect romances that never seem to exist anywhere other than the worn pages of the books that I can read a hundred times over.
Within this novel, just after the hero had rather turbulently proclaimed his love for the pretty heroine and she had replied with “yes, but you do not need me”, I read his reply of “Yes, but surely it is better to be wanted rather than needed”.
Even as a love foolish totally inexperienced pre-teen, this got me thinking and I decided there and then that I indeed, one day wanted to be wanted.
The years that followed brought puberty and life like I’d never known it. The first crush, the “L” plates guy, the first love, the casual flings, the one who I could have been serious about and almost everything inbetween and yet I couldn’t understand why nothing ever worked out. I did the usual girly thing after every break up or “I think we should just be friends” text; I ate chocolate, watched soppy movies and tried to figure out where I went wrong.
Then one day, after a massive clear out I came across the childhood books that had moulded my perception of love and relationships and the all too incommon happy ever afters. Right then I suddenly realised that I had never done anything wrong in my past relationships and trysts….but then neither had the men. I realised that I have one explicable flaw when it comes to boys….I am inherently attracted to the ones who need, rather than want me.
Once I admitted it to myself it immediately made sense. For some unknown reason I am attracted to the men I think I can fix, anything from trying to correct their perception of females because of all the “bitches” they dated before, to the commitment phobes who I wanted to show that I’d stick around, to the ones who don’t have any job or ambitions and who I think I can re-invent. No wonder none of them ever worked out.
Fastrack almost 10 years later from the little girl who loved to read and day dream of the perfect romance and deep down I am still the same. All be it the puppy fat has gone, I’ve grown a good few inches and found out how to tame my tresses – but deep down all I want….and all I think anyone ever wants is to be wanted.
Simple.
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