surprisingly nice and a little spooky

It was one of those days. I was PMSing big time, and every time someone at the office told me anything about anything, I burst into tears. My dad called me from China and told me he had a dream about me when I was 5 years old again and I started crying. I was in the middle of a meeting and I had to step out because my boss told me off and my eyes were watery. The kind of day where your hormones take a hold of you and you just let it flow.

Just to add to the lot, I've been on a diet for the past ten days and haven't had a carb in my system for that entire period, I've sprained my ankle, and I've developed a thorough ability to complain if you haven't noticed. Anyway, bad day.

But, bright spot in my day: my friend Wiserat had been wanting to introduce me to a guy for the last 3 months. He kept telling me about him, so cute, so perfect, I would love him, he would love me, blablabla. So I was excited because I was finally gonna get to meet this perfect man --for the simple reason that I never meet anyone new and that in itself was exciting. Anyway, feeling like crap, I decided to spoil myself a little and go shopping so I would feel better. Very bad idea since everything I tried on wouldn't even close. I ended buying a black dress that hides every shape in my body and was finally feeling better to go meet mystery man. Turns out he's super cute --when his tongue isn't down another girl's mouth.

It was just one of those days, I'm telling you.

And then, around 11pm, I drive home because my phone is dead and I need to charge it before I meet up with other friends. Ten minutes later, I come back and there is a paper underneath my windshield wiper. I take it out and it says: "Yas ur cute U write really well I love your blog ur a star Leo" Of course, at first I smiled, woohoo I have a fan! Then I got a little iffy --who is this person who knows where I live, knows what my car is, knows I write a blog, and manages to slip this within the ten minutes I was home? Stalker much? No offense if you're reading this because I mean it in the sweetest way possible, but there is a fine line between surprisingly nice and a little spooky. Sorry dude.

the rats' block

I miss my Rats.

Now they are all in committed, loving, happy relationships, I have nothing to write about anymore. Never knew how much I relied on them for information, but the truth is, every conversation with them use to spark something, make me want to write, give me inspiration, and now, it's just blah.

I mean don't get me wrong, I'm happy they're happy... But seriously Rats "in a relationship" lose all of their rattitude. Which just goes to show that everything I ever said about them is annulled the minute they fall in love. No more hunting, no more games, no more Cigar Sundays. And for me, no more stories. You might think I get enough of my own stories to write about, but the truth is, lately, I've been working so much I can't remember the last time I met someone --even if it was just for two seconds.

Now I go for drinks with the Rats and their respective significant others and I can't help but feel like the odd one out, always complaining that it impossible to find a decent guy in this forsaken city.  Now they say it's because I've been leaving the house in hoodies and converse and never bother to put an ounce of blush and I guess they have a point... But it's a vicious cycle: You start out by making an effort, you fix your hair and you dress up nicely and you go out with that "open" attitude because that's what everyone says right, it's not about looks they say, it's all in the attitude. "People will know if you're open to them or not. You always look so closed of course no one is going to approach you." What the f*** does that even mean? I kind of get it, but seriously, I don't know how to do it any other way. I'm not the kind of person who is overly sociable, I don't usually make an effort to talk to random people, and honestly, I don't want to pretend like I do. "Be yourself" isn't that at the core of it?

So then I decided to stop making an effort. It'll happen when it happens. I'll just make an effort with myself from now on, and to be honest, it works most days. My life is more fulfilling now then it ever was when I wasn't single.

Yet I would be lying if I said it doesn't get lonely. You can be as independent as you want, it's human nature to want to share your life with someone. Have someone who cares about you specifically, asks about you everyday, has you on their radar. One of my best friends is having a virtual relationship over BBM and it's been going on for the past four months. And there is no real potential because the guy lives in another country and they have no plans to change that and they don't even know what it is that is going between them, and every so often, she wonders if she should stop texting him. But we talked about it, I told her honestly: I think it's always good to have that someone that keeps your phone ringing. Sometimes I look at my phone and I realize that I'm not waiting for anyone to call, and that depresses the hell out of me. And it's a tad lonelier still when your Rats are in their own holes. Yesterday I asked them "don't you have anything to give me for my blog???"

"Write about how much you miss us."

when you've got the face on

There is a song from Arctic Monkeys, "Mardy Bum," that I find absolutely perfect in the sense that it describes the exact way we react when we're are pissed off at our boyfriends. And that exact feeling is the one reason I'm happy I'm not in a relationship right now.

Basically we all start off happy. We start off playful and full of humor and everything he does makes us smile. We find the way he chews so cute, and when he's late to pick us up we're just that much happier to see him because we missed him so much more when we were waiting for him that extra half hour, and when he goes off on a guy's night we're A-ok with it and we cheerfully go on a girl's night too. And then comes the point in the relationship when all these things that never got to us start getting to us. And we start putting "the face on." He takes one look at us and he knows he's in trouble again because we're in our corner pulling that silent disappointment face.

It's the face we get when he forgets to do something we asked, when we think he talked to that girl more than he talked to us the other night, when he says something out of place in front of other people, or when he's late to our date-night because he forgot about it even though we reminded him twenty times in the last week. And so we can't help but pull the silent treatment, waiting for him to realize he's done something wrong and apologize. He says he's sorry he was late, the traffic was a state and he can't be arsed to carry on in this debate that reoccurs and we get mad because he doesn't care and then he gets mad because we said that. And then instead of taking advantage of the time we have together, we spend an hour silent, another hour arguing, and finally, in the third hour, we make-up and make-out.

But then, slowly, you realize that we put on that face more than any other. It becomes who we are in this relationship and we don't like who we've become and they don't like who we've become and everything starts to change. The times when we'd laugh and joke around and cuddled in the kitchen are what we are striving to get back to, and we have a hard time accepting that we've entered this "comfort zone" and maybe he's taking us for granted and maybe we're taking him for granted and the more we fight it the harder it becomes to get back to that special place.

I did that a lot in my last relationship. I spent so much energy being upset I forgot to enjoy the present moment and soon enough it was hard to remember why we were still trying. It's a mistake, I think, to get caught up in those little things and let them ruin the "us" that was so happy to begin with. Maybe if we spend more energy smiling instead of frowning, then we'd be happier as a whole. Something I'd like to try my next time around.

Rhapsodian Guest Blogger: At least the illusion of it

 I have another Rhapsodian guest blogger this week. My friend Blushing gives us a glimpse into that feeling you get when there's a build-up for that first kiss... and it just really made me want to kiss someone! The type of kiss that makes you blush. 

At least the illusion of it
[follow Blushing on her blog  www.yupthisisit.wordpress.com]

For some reason, I’m incapable of kissing on the first date. Usually not on the second or third either. And I definitely can’t kiss someone I just met at a bar. I actually find this to be a rather boring feature about myself. And it’s not because I want to be a ‘good’ girl. It’s not because I want to play hard to get, or appear a certain way. I couldn’t care less about those things.

The thing is, I like a kiss to feel a certain way. This might make me a romantic, or a kid, or warrant a: ‘you’re such a girl!’. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I want to be in a 'relationship' before I kiss someone, nor is it that I want us to be hopelessly in love. It’s just that I want that feeling. I want my heart to pound even though I know it’s only hormones and chemicals. I want to loose my breath and feel weak in the knees just for a quick moment, even though if we were to get into a discussion you’d find that I probably don’t believe in love. I want even the hand-holding to feel special, discovering each other’s fingers, skin, and how they fit. And you can infer that all these things apply to sex as well.

Let’s think about that first kiss for a moment. Yeah you never get the first kiss back, bla bla bla. Scratch all that.  You can have plenty of amazing kisses with the same person, even for years and years. But back to the kissing a new date or stranger. If you’re hanging out with people you just met and one of them is drinking a bottle of water and you’re thirsty, would you just drink out of theirs? I’m not germaphobe or anything, but I prefer to know people a bit before I share bodily secretions with them. With my close friends, we share water bottles all the time. So I’m not gonna just suck face with some guy I just met who has smoky breath and sweaty palms (no offense to anyone). I have to feel I know the guy at least a bit, have a modicum of respect for him, and find him reasonably intelligent and interesting.

So it’s not love I need, but it is an illusion of something that looks a bit like a cousin of love. When I kiss someone, I want to feel we are both really enjoying it and kinda forgetting everything around us. When we stop kissing, I like to feel a bit surprised that there are still people around us, a bit like when you walk out of an early movie screening and are surprised it’s still daylight. Most of all, I just can’t look langouresement (no word in English good enough for this) into someone’s eyes and see nothing there.