Love on the Rocks

Dating… love… relationships… Funny things, aren’t they?  As I’ve been getting back in the game [feel free to exclaim “heeeeeey girl” – totally acceptable], it’s almost been amusing to see how many of us single folk, living in the same city, all within the range of a decade – are somehow all on different pages from each other.  What we want out of dating, out of flirtatious interactions, out of communication, out of showing affection – the lengths we’re willing to go to, the lengths we refuse to go to… Every new person I meet has a whole new take on it all – and a whole new set of characteristics to both amuse and bemuse me. 

I’ve always been floored by grand romantic gestures.  They’re in the movies all over the place – they’re in art, in poetry, in song.  Girls like me have been daydreaming about them since childhood – imagining future suitors unveiling handmade mosaics or dueling with swords for our love, for our hand in marriage, for our attention. 

One of the first times I found such a sighting in real life was as a junior high kid, on a walk through the Northwestern University campus.  

Have you been?  Lovely place.  And the loveliest place is walking on the rocks there, that line the waters of Lake Michigan.  They’re painted – tons and tons of them – with tributes to what’s been important to different daring and dramatic young people’s lives over the years.  Some simply reflect sorority or fraternity friendships, but some, some of them are straight-up, swoon-worthy love letters painted on rocks.  Poems to girlfriends, first loves, to people who break your heart at such a formative time they’re destined to stay in it forever.  There are marriage proposals… there are anniversary dates, there are artworks… All with the waves of Lake Michigan crashing around – full of drama, power, and a certain amount of eternity. 

I’ve been back to these rocks many times in my life since junior high school – have taken people I’ve cared about to them, have photographed them, have dreamt about them… They inspire me – they move me. 

And yes, one day a rock along Lake Michigan, painted just for me might be nice.  (Oh, who are we kidding? I’d flip out like a kid at Christmas.)  But truthfully, honestly – I’d love to start with the basics.  Openness… Honesty… Someone who just says how they feel rather than hide behind fear or personal hang-ups.  Someone who calls on the phone to talk, rather than just taking the easy way out with text message-only communication.

And I certainly don’t lay blame to men only.  Let’s face it: women are squirrelly, unpredictable creatures.  And heartbreak knows no gender – we’re all capable of inflicting it, and of being utterly wounded by it.  Some of us just drift more commonly to one versus the other. 

In the past year and a half of my single ladyness, I’ve had time to observe and reflect much on love.  So many beautiful relationships around me – good friends in loving relationships who’ve let me tag along for a number of “third wheel” hangouts… It’s so neat to be allowed into the world of a relationship that you aren’t a part of.  To see how other couples show affection, how they chide each other, how they state their needs and sort through problems.  How they show each other love.  Some of my third wheelin’ experiences have been better influences on me than my own past relationships.  I send so much love to all you amazing couples out there who’ve shown me that being the third wheel doesn’t have to have a stigma to it, at all.

So you see – this summer, finally, the ball is in my court. [- sports analogy?  Believe me, I’m as surprised as you are that that just happened.]  I’m finally in a place in my life where I can see and own my own power.  I finally know the goddess-within well enough that I can let her shine through.  And I’m pretty excited, my friends.  Happy.

I can wait for my Lake Michigan rock – I can wait for grand gestures of romance and pledges of love.  For once, I’m not craving any of that.  I’m simply craving openness, honesty, and affection.  And a little bit of fun and recklessness thrown in for good measure :) 

So while I am still that girl – looking at the dark waves crashing on the rocks – pensive and brooding… it’s much more directed these days to where it needs to be: on myself and on my writings.  In terms of guys?  It’s such a weight off my shoulders to finally have realized: none of this has to be a big deal.  The world isn’t going to end if I give my number to a cute guy and he never calls. I finally know that.  I also know - he’d be pretty STUPID not to call me.  I. am. awesome.  And I say that with complete seriousness.

*grin*