A late night disaster

What is it with me and drinking and getting hurt?  I think it is normal to wake up with a bump or bruise after you drink heavily and wonder where it came from, or at least that was normal for me in my college days.   But Memorial day 2011 I broke a beer pong table and I have a scar on my arm. 

This past weekend I was out in New York City.  After a long night of drinking I was stumbling back to my hotel room around 5am.

 

Times Square in the wee  hours of the morning - no one is around.

I decided to run across the street before the creepy guy behind me who kept yelling at me to 'slow down lady' got too close to me.  BAM, I fell so hard on the street, my knees hit first and then my face.  It was like the scene in The Wedding Planner when her shoe gets stuck and she doesn't know what to do as a taxi is approaching does she save her shoe or get hit by a car? ...well, here I was laying face down on the street, my brand new phone fell (I didn't get insurance for it) and a taxi is coming...will he see me? I have on a black jacket and dark jeans. Will he run over my new phone? What to do in just a few seconds, and being drunk doesn't help my reasoning. I grab the phone and manage to get up as the taxi swerves around me.  I stumble into the hotel. I knew my knee was bleeding.  I pass out fully dressed on my bed. 

The next morning I realize that my nice size 8 jeans that I've barely worn have a nice size whole in them and are stuck to my skin.

and my knee is a bit banged up.

but what I don't realize because I was way too hung over was that the fibers of my jeans and bits of street were in my wound.  I throw a band aid on and head down to work.  But my wound seeps liquid.  The next day I have nasty puss oozing out...crap it is infected.  I can handle the slight pain and discomfort, but I have a hard time actually cleaning it.   I am left wondering, if I can't clean my own wound, how can I care for a child's issues? Perhaps motherhood isn't in my future.

What is more important passion or love?

It is a weekday night, you and your partner have been together for 4 years or more, there is no question that you love him/her, but you are missing something - passion. Do you remember passion? The strong, powerful feelings of sexual desire, when you can’t take your hands off each other. No doubt that most of your relationships started out with some degree of passion or lust. When I think of lust, the uncontrolled appetite or craving for sexual desire, I think temporary, perhaps like a fling or someone you don’t really see a future with.


What is so wonderful about passion is the feeling of being physically satisfied and the fun physical connection. You can’t wait to see someone because you can’t keep your hands off them; you know that the foreplay and sex will be fantastic. Passion, it is what keeps you going back for more and is one of the foundations of a relationship.

Soon enough all the passion leads to seeing each other more and then building a stronger relationship of getting to know one another on a different kind of level which eventually leads to respect and love. Love - the feeling of warmth and deep emotional attachment towards another person. Love is wonderful because you have the capability of being so comfortable with someone, having someone to count on and the ability to connect on an emotional level.

Even if your relationship started out as just sex but moved into a relationship can the passion be disguised as love? You go from casual sex to doing it more frequently to dating because of this one connection. After a while your heart may confuse this passion with feelings of love. What happened to the agreement of ‘just sex’? It was thrown out the door because something in your brain was telling you wanted to know that person more so you spend more time doing things other than having sex. Perhaps you know that it is not the best choice to start a relationship with this person based on some big differences, but your head is in the clouds because the pull for passion and feelings of the heart is larger than the argument in your head. You tell yourself that those differences can work out later because with feelings like this, how can you not be together forever?

But routines set in and soon you are left with love but little passion. Where did it go? Is it capable of coming back? Sure there are times you look at your partner and you find them attractive and you still are capable of having some great sex, but more often than not, something is missing, that little light of ignition that turns you on quickly is gone. What you are left with is an amazing level of comfort and reliability for the other person.

Obviously I am not an expert in this area, but I feel that most of the people I know are in relationships where the passion is gone. When I searched for passion on Google, I found articles more about turning each other on and giving into sex, than I did about keeping the passion. Sure you can have a great night here or there by trying something new but would it be long lasting or would it fizzle back out after a week? Even in my past when I can say I had a decent sex life in a relationship, it wasn’t always filled with passion; it was consumed by routine sex. I think it is healthy to have a decent sex life, to me meaning somewhere between 5 – 15 times a week. If I can do it that often then one could argue that there must be a little passion there and many times there was a small flirty spark but I think it was also habit: doing it in the morning at night and sometimes in the afternoon. Habits are hard to break. So was it a habit or was it passion or a little bit of both?

In relationships we tend to let ourselves go so if our partner gains a bit of weight, and we are slightly less attracted to them, we lose some passion. Sure the yellow flag could go up and we can tell our partner we should start exercising or dieting, doing things together to get back into shape and hope that it is enough to restore some of that passion. In some cases, such as mine, it is important to realize that both parties gained weight and it is unfair to only blame one person. Is the simple act of gaining weight enough to break up with someone or even an excuse to find passion elsewhere? Does the lack of passion that leaves you unsatisfied lead to cheating? Is that why my ex cheated? If we had enough passion what was his other reasons for his infidelity? Was he unsatisfied and if he was satisfied with his mistress, why did he still need me, something about her was unsatisfying too?

Can one remain satisfied without passion? If you aren’t getting hot for your lover, can you remain satisfied enough to stay with them for years to come? Will you be happy? Or is this something that a few years into the relationship you should be thinking about to end the relationship and hope that the next might work out better – or left to regret the passion decision.

What are you more fulfilled by: passion or love? And is it possible to have both in the long run?

I'll make love to you

Have you thought about all the different words for intercourse?  To name just a few we have:
sex
making love
making woopie
fornication
f*cking
screwing
banging
sleeping together
copulation
fooling around
nooky
coitus
bedding
mating
IT
poinking
getting it on
the nasty
pounding
hanky panky
tap that
the wild thing

baby making
and of course there is many more.

When I speak of this act, I usually use the word sex. Because to me the word sex is the act of what you are doing and then there is different variations of how.  For example to me - f*cking means hard and fast with no intimacy, while nooky sounds playful, banging had no feelings, making love is sweet, tender and slow, screwing is fairly routine but with more eagerness, and fooling around seems a bit more innocent.

It is always interesting to hear how other people phrase it.  What type of sex are they having?  In the past if I were to think of what kind of sex I had...I'd have to put it somewhere between sex, screwing and banging and most of my sexual encounters have been while I was in a relationship. What does that say about me? It says that while I enjoyed sex...perhaps I lacked a certain level of intimacy.  It was just an act, a thing to do with someone else that felt really good.  I knew no different, I figured this is what everyone did.  But it is not.

Recently I met someone who by our second encounter stated "I want to make love to you".  Kind of a crazy thing to say to someone new. How on Earth can he make love to me when we barely know each other? I dismissed it and thought he was just old-fashioned since he was a bit older.  But when the time came, it was amazingly different; something so new and I felt unprepared for it.  Even though the man under me was practically a stranger I felt this different kind of feeling as I slowly moved around.  This new feeling led me to want to see him more often because for once I felt like the man I was with wanted to be with me - not just using my body to relieve himself of his sexual urges.  The only problem is that with someone so new, I still don't have that connection and with no connection I am more reserved, I am not ready to do certain things and that hinders my ability to be fully satisfied.  It is my problem, one that several people have commented on - I still have this fear of sex and what is required of me and making mistakes and doing things wrong that I am not fully there in the moment yet...and I want to be.

While this new style has been a learning experience into tenderness and creating some type of intimacy I can't do that every time.  Perhaps it is because the last thirteen years I have been screwing but I need some deep hard thrusts more regularly.  I am sure it is very fulfilling when you have that deeper level connection with someone - I can see how it can lead to a huge orgasm, but for now it is not enough.  Shouldn't new relationships/partnering have more urgency to it? How am I expected to go nice and slow when I am so excited?

Don't be so quick to walk away

Was it wrong of me to get upset when someone kind of ignored me all weekend after alluding to wanting to see me all weekend?  I do not believe I overreacted. 

See, in the past I allowed men to treat me like shit, so they did. They knew they could get away with it because the nice sweet wonderful person I was, I forgave them and the cycle would continue.  I thought that being in a relationship that I was expected to do that; after all I loved someone and something small is worth forgiving.  But the issue come when that small thing happens all the time. It becomes frequent...and because I started a trend of it not being a big deal, it was hard to come out of that. I suffered inside and eventually it took a toll.

Since then I haven't really dated anyone seriously, but that doesn't stop the men from acting similar to the old bf.  Cancelling plans at the last minute, forgetting to call, saying you are going to do something and not following through - these are things that have annoyed the crap out of me for the last ten years. I vowed to myself I wouldn't take it anymore - why should I? Don't I deserve more respect?

So this weekend when someone new forgot to take 10 seconds out of their day to at least text me he was ill - I wrote him off as I told myself I would.  But a few days later he pretended nothing happened, it was no big deal.  And while I understand men and women think differently, I have a hard time grasping that men can be so naive when it comes down to consideration [Although truthfully, if I were to meet a super considerate man, I probably wouldn't find him attractive in other areas].  While being a bit snotty in my return texts I finally give in and say what I felt and wouldn't you know, a really super simple apology still works.  I am not saying I didn't continue to hold a small grudge for a few hours/days...but we all know I will cave in.  After all, how can I hold him responsible for something he had no idea pisses me off? We never talked about that nor does he realize that 80% of the men I've talked to or been with in the last 8 years have done this and that I am a bit more sensitive to it than other women.

I am not saying I wouldn't understand if something was cancelled. I am one of the most understanding people out there...for good reasons.  Don't blow me off because something/someone better came along, but if you are legitimately sick or have a last minute work meeting, I totally get it.  Let's reschedule and then make it up to me. Do one thing extra nice.  Even something as simple as when you are out on the day we were supposed to do something -send a short text "this meeting sucks would rather be spending the night with you" or anything really to show that you are thinking of me.

This consideration thing applies to all different levels of friendship or relationships from the married to the very new and casual.  It is not rocket science - if you want to see someone again or be in some one's good graces be honest and truthful and show some respect.

follow through

Somewhere along the lines I grew a fear of commitment. Of course we all know where that came from - but I didn't realize how bad it has become.  I am not talking about the commitment to another man, but things way less important such as what to eat, where to go, how to style my hair or even what color towels to buy. 

I am a planner, but yet, planning things too far away has become very hard for me because I don't want to be single, and I don't want to plan trips for one, nor do I buy concert tickets because I'd want to bring someone along.  But being single with few friends makes it hard to do things I want to do...so I don't do anything.

But one thing I can commit to, is plans I make, unless of course I get the flu.    I am a stickler for following through and it really upsets me when other people can't.   I know I sound like a broken record, but is it so hard for people to actually return calls when they said they would? Is it hard to follow through?  Do people joke around and say things they don't mean on a regular basis assuming that the person on the receiving end will know they don't mean it instead of getting annoyed or upset for that lack of follow through?  Why don't they value MY time?

Just when I think I can get over my biggest fear of trust and maybe actually start dating, I am left wondering if I can ever really get there.   But I know I can because these things wouldn't bother me so much if in fact I had no feelings.  One thing I know I will be able to overcome is trusting someone and committing faithfully to a man regardless of my past.

Another one bites the dust.

Getting tired of this single thing

I am convinced 2012 will be my year.  I've had a really sucky decade and it is my turn for something good.  Wishing time away isn't good but I just want it to fast forward. I want to meet my future husband and I want to start my family and I want to stop working. 

But sometimes, like now, I feel like it will never happen.  I ponder past lives and karma and wonder what I've done in my past.  There is that one thing that I did that was 'bad', but it wouldn't have happened if SI didn't leave me.  I hope that won't lead me to Hell, because if I am going to go there, should I be bad more frequently.   But aside from my one big sin, I think I am an overall decent person.

It is really hard to see or read about all my former friends - and their life's progression.  Some have been married for seven years, some have a few children, some are divorced.  But what they all have in common is that they haven't spent so much time as an adult alone.  They have people that love them and that want to spend time with them.

I am so tired of this. 

Be nice to your single friends and invite them to dinner or out for a drink once in a while because they get really tired of sitting at home doing nothing and pondering how sucky their lives turned out.

A Californication Weekend

There is nothing I hate more than to have nothing to do on the weekend. This weekend happened to be a four day weekend for me.  Friday I went to Woodbury Commons (outlets); didn't do well.  I had hoped for a weekend of hanging out with someone in particular based on texts to that point...but instead I am sitting here watching Californication.  I am not sure if I even like this show, although you would think by mid season two I would have decided that by now.  So, it looks like I'll spend the rest of my weekend watching TV.  Ugh.

Tiffany Cleaning

I've started to wear some of my old Tiffany jewelry, but the silver was getting dark and yucky looking.  I tried to clean my items at home.  First I made my own home made formula, it cleaned they but not enough.  Then I bought a jewelry cleaner; big mistake - it turned one of my necklaces almost black.   I took my 4 pieces into a Tiffany store and had them clean it.  To clean the silver, it takes a at least two hours.  When I picked up my items, I was shocked how shiny and new they looked!  They cost $15 per piece (two earrings = 1 piece); money I wasn't planning on spending, but now I will wear the items more often.

While I was looking at their website, I was browsing all the areas looking for items for possible future purchases but I was also looking at engagement rings.  WOAH, don't worry, I am no where near close to marriage, but it is one of those things that you think about on rare occasion, and I haven't seen many rings I liked.   I can't remember what exactly the ring looked like that I picked out seven years ago at Fortunoff, but I think it looked something like the lucida.

Freshen Up

One of my goals is to freshen my look.  I have a hard time doing that for myself, so I enlisted my friend to help me.  In two hours we removed a HUGE pile of clothes from my closet. I would estimate the total worth to be over $5,000. 

We went through each piece and decided if it was warn out, had a stain/holes, was no longer 'in', too old lady, too young, not right for my body, too big, too small, etc.  By the end of the two hours there were more clothes on the floor than in my closet.


clothes packed up for donation

Before:
Barely any room for more hangers.  A lot of clothes in there that I don't wear.

After:
More space between the clothes, plenty of room for wardrobe growth.

We aren't done. I still have a bin or two of summer clothes and shoes to go through. I also have to do some shopping.  Once I find new pieces for my new wardrobe, I will remove a few other items from my closet that I know need to be gotten rid of but I still need some variety of clothes to hold me over.

I also tried on some old jeans that I still had.  I bought them about 8 years ago but then they got small after my breakup, but I kept them because they look good on me.  And wouldn't you know it, they mostly fit! One of them is a little snug still...but with a loose top others can't tell.  I am so happy that I am back down to my SI weight.  With more work I am sure I can get to pre-SI weight (when I was 22) if I wanted to, but exercise was not one of my resolutions (too cliche) and I am not sure I want to be that size.

2012 wishes & dreams

Last year I posted about my 2011 wishes & dreams, I achieved about half of what I set out to do: 

• lowered my blood pressure
• do things out of my comfort zone
• do things alone
• eat healthier
• cook a little more
• no group gifts
• no planning things for my family
• inner transformation

What I did not achieve:

• pick my own berries
• see an opera
• go to a book signing I could go to numerous ones...but I want it to matter. I want it to be a topic or author I actually like, not just to go to cross it off my list.
• 1 date per month  I did go on more dates in 2011 than I did in 2010 & 2009 combined.  I missed three months May, August and October I didn't go out with anyone new...but that means that I had at least 9 first dates in 2011, which is really quite good.  (some of those resulted in second, third or more dates).
• send out X resumes per month There were some months I sent out 20, other months I sent out none.
• take a trip somewhere  I went away for work trips, and took a few extra days here & there, but I didn't go on a vacation somewhere like I had originally thought. I was thinking Costa Rica, Iceland or Peru.
• volunteer
• find a new job

So with 8 out of 16 goals accomplished in 2011 (50%) - but if you look the ones I achieved rank higher than some that I didn't.  I hope to have a higher percentage completed for this year especially since I've taken some action in 2011 to make 2 of them happen in 2012. 

These are my 2012 goals:

• pay down credit card debt
• start to use cash more regularly
• volunteer
• find a new job
• save a little more money
• make new friends
• date. become more secure in my body & how it works
• lower cholesterol & triglyceride levels
• cook more often
• take a vacation
• some fun activities including:  book signing, berry picking, opera, etc.
• freshen style
• move/plan to move

On a side note, my New Year's Eve was more fun this year than in the last 8 years.  I hate that holiday; normally I'd see a movie during the day, order in Chinese food and go to bed at 11pm.  I like to think that since I started 2012 in a very happy & exciting way, that I will be able to continue that trend through out the year.

Finding Time

Isn't it amazing that you can be so busy (my month of October)

But yet there is always a lot more free time than what meets the initial eye.  At quick glance it looks like I was 80% busy (and I didn't show you another 2 calendars [I have 5 calendars in 1, I like color coding and labeling!] which filled up 4 other days), and while that is true, some of my items were short.

Is it is really no wonder that when you begin dating someone, you can always find time to see the the other person, especially if they live close by.  It isn't surprising that all of a sudden you start off with 2 nights a week, then move that up to 4 or more occurrences per week.  Or not just dinner, but running errands, meeting for a quick lunch, or taking the train together.  Sure it takes a little work, when there is a will, there is a way. 

Which makes me think back to other people I have a history with and wonder why they claimed they couldn't see me as often.  They could have, they just didn't want to.  Lesson learned.  Don't pursue someone intently if they can't find time for you.  There is always a little time.

Eyes Wide Open

How do you kiss? 

I lean in, tilt my head, close my eyes, make contact with the other person's mouth and start kissing.  Softly at first then a little more aggressive.  Some light kisses mixed in with some tongue. I think I kiss really well (since I really only kissed until I was 19; I had a lot of practice).

Everyone has different styles, and as long as you can blend the two together, it isn't a problem.  Sometimes the styles are just too different and you know right away you can't date, let alone end up with that person without a LOT of change, most of the time it isn't worth it especially if that is a predictor on what else doesn't align so well.

But what about if the joint kissing style is really enjoyable but when you open your eyes, the person is staring at you?  Maybe it was one time because he was thinking holy crap was that amazing, who is this person?  But it isn't.  You've kissed a lot on more occasions and his eyes are always open, staring at you.

Eyes staring at you in such moments can make you feel uncomfortable.  So uncomfortable you even point out that you notice the staring eyes and make a joke about changing up your eyeshadow colors/designs so he has something to look at.

Are eyes wide open when kissing a deal breaker?  In my opinion, I don't think so, not immediately anyway.