lessons, charity work—just do something. Look, moving is a big adjustment let alone adding a new relationship to the mix. So do some deep thinking. Get a piece of paper and write down all the things you have always wanted to try or do. Anything from starting a band to losing weight is an excuse to get you out the door and into the world. Plus don’t be afraid to spend some time alone. Trust me, as a married father of two, I read your letter with a spot of envy. I love my life like no other, but there are days when I’d eat a bee’s nest for a couple hours alone. Okay, that’s not entirely true, but you get my meaning.
THE CHICK THAT BLEW IT
Sienna and I worked for the same Internet marketing company for about two years but I only ever spent time around her at company functions, retreats, team-building events, etc. … Then I got promoted and ended up being in charge of her division. I thought, “Cool, now I’ll get to know her better.” So I asked her out and we went on a few dates that were great. I realized that I really liked her a lot and I wanted to see her all the time. I’d call her from business meetings and ask her to sneak out to meet me during work hours, but she wouldn’t. It was delicious torture. We’d meet up after work a couple times a week but that was it. Her sister and she do dinner together on Tuesdays, she has Pilates on Thursdays, does her laundry and housekeeping on Sunday and had just signed up for a pottery class Saturday morning. She was pretty scheduled out so that didn’t leave that much time for me. Finally a girl with a life of her own, how sexy is that? I was really getting into her and loved having to juggle my own schedule to match any openings she had. It made the time we did spend together really valuable. But then it’s like she flipped a switch and just ditched everything to hang out with me all the time. She even blew off her Tuesday dinners with her sister and was just always there. All the things that made her so interesting and almost unattainable were just gone. I tried to hang in there but when she stopped doing all those things she stopped being the girl I was so attracted to and became totally dependent on me to fill her time. It was too much pressure and I bailed after three weeks.
Enzo
Berkeley, CA
IT WORKED FOR ME!
I spent years being unfulfilled by my life, my job, my boyfriends and my friend-friends. I just couldn’t get everything in sync to a place where it all felt good instead of just okay. So now I’m here. I love my job and get great satisfaction from doing it well. I’ve narrowed down my friends to just the ones where the friendship is effortless, secure and supportive. I have a dog who keeps me busy and well loved and have my little rituals that I do, be it bubble baths, crossword puzzles, Sunday matinees with the girls or riding my bike to work once a week that make me feel pretty happy on a daily basis. Things felt better than good because I liked my life. So when Mitchell and I started dating I was really reluctant to give any of it up because I had worked so hard to find the perfect balance in my life. It was the first time ever that I wasn’t trying to escape from my life into a relationship. But Mitchell not only didn’t want me to give up my life, he liked that about me and even had his own that he didn’t want to give up. What a concept! Because we both had lives that we liked we didn’t just rush into spending all our time together and have really built our relationship slowly. The time we spend together is time we’re dying to spend together because we have so much to tell each other and have had time (even if it’s just been a day) to miss each other. It’s the best-feeling relationship I’ve ever had and it’s because my boyfriend is part of my life, not my life.
Gerilyn
Edmonton, Canada
FIRST PERSON SINGLE by Amiira
I like being alone, in fact I love it, so when I was single it was a great luxury for me to get to design my life around the basic parameters of work, friendships and spare time. Though I’ve never been one to go to the movies or dinner at a restaurant on my own (not because I was afraid to but because it never occurred to me) I was always up for a solo adventure in the city and found that I often preferred being alone to having plans. How antisocial, right? Maybe or maybe not … The thing about having things that are important to you and that don’t depend on anyone else’s availability or interest is that you can fuel your life and happiness without others. That in my estimation is a very powerful thing to be able to do. I’m very in touch with what makes me feel good, less than good, powerful and pathetic. Filling my life with things, people, events, pastimes and hobbies of value made my life and my time valuable. It also made it something worth building on instead of scrapping every time I had a good date. Not only that, I didn’t need a man in my life to make my life great and found quite a few of them actually just complicated and detracted from it, which was definitely not a bonus to what I already had going on. My advice to anyone who is living a life that they don’t love is to change it! If you don’t like your job, find another one that you will like. If you don’t like your wardrobe, get creative and make it better (Project Runway anyone??). If you don’t like your friends, the color of your apartment, the stuff you put in your fridge, the way you go to work, whatever the hell it is—it’s up to you to improve it and mold it into something that you genuinely like. It’s only when you get a good life, have a good life and maintain a good life that you’ll find a man worth spending time away from it.
THOUGHTS FROM MAN CITY
I like the chase. I always have, the more challenging the course the more rewarding the catch. I don’t care if it’s an antiquated thought. And I believe it to be true for most men. When I’ve told women this they always respond with, “Well I don’t want to come off like a bitch who doesn’t have time for the guy I like.” You don’t have to be a bitch about it. There is a nice way of letting someone know your life matters to you. If I look back the great loves of my life they were always women who were self-possessed, confident and goal-oriented. They were women who challenged me. I remember I dated a painter who when she was working on a painting wouldn’t see me until it was done. Sometimes that would take weeks. Weeks! If I were lucky she’d let me visit her at her bar-tending gig where she would make out with me for 10 minutes in the utility closet before sending me home. That’s it. But I was fascinated with her. So why didn’t it work with any of the other women? Because usually I’d end up giving my life away or being okay with seeing someone for only ten minutes a week in a utility closet. See, for a relationship to really work it has to be the coming together of two great very valued lives that over a period of time merge while staying true to who they are. It’s great when we fall in love with you, but it’s even better when we fall in love with your life as well.
You are the architect of your own life, so build one that you love living in … and put in a pool and a walk-in closet while you’re at it.
WORST DATE EVER
Every year my girlfriends and I go to Las Vegas for our girls’ weekend. I know it sounds a little corny but I love blackjack and a good martini. I’m not a big partier, I’m a lab tech at a veterinary hospital and I’m studying to be a vet. So needless to say I really look forward to our girls’ getaway and last year was no exception, as my father had passed
