Relationships
Monday, Mar. 12, 2007 5:58 PM

"The reverse side also has a reverse side." - Japanese proverb

I talked to Will on Friday. He had called me on Wednesday while I was at work. I planned on calling him back on Friday night after I got home from work, but I ended up going out to dinner with my mom. By the time I made it home from that, he was calling me on the phone. I told him that I was just about to call him but he beat me to it. He asked me out to eat, but I had all ready had dinner with my mom. Then we compared schedules. He told me he had every Friday and Saturday off from work. I could have said, "well, I have every Saturday off so why don't we go out to eat tomorrow night?" Did I do that, though? No. Why didn't I do that? I have yet to figure that one out.

I've never been good at the dating scene. I tend to chalk this up to a lack of confidence. I figure I've never had the confidence most women have when it comes to going out with a guy who is interested in getting to know me because of my past. To this day, it still blows my mind that men are interested in getting to know me; and not because they want to jump inbetween the sheets for an easy lay. (Of course, I'm not really an easy lay. I do have standards even when I'm drunk.)

Oh, let's be honest here. For some reason, the idea of going out on a date with somebody makes me uncomfortable. I don't know if it's because I hate first impressions or if it's because I hate having to make an impression to begin with.

If you really want to get down to the bottom of it, the real reason I can't seem to get into the groove of dating somebody is because real intimacy scares the hell out of me. There are boundaries that I have had up for over 20 years, issues that I've dealt with in every intimate relationship I have ever had. For the most part, these boundaries have ruled over me to the point where I have kept every man at a certain level of distance. It keeps me from having to face my past completely. It keeps me from dealing with my vulnerability, from revealing my desires and exposing my fears, and from showing the real me inside and out. It's safer that way.

It's odd to admit this, but the majority of my boyfriends fell into my lap, becoming a part of my life out of the blue. I was just going about my everyday business and woke up one day to find out I was in this intimate relationship with somebody. Usually the relationship didn't impact me until after it ended, and by that time it was to late to start committing myself to it completely. The relationships that mattered the most to me were the ones where the man pushed his way past some of the boundaries I had built up around me. I won't lie to you. It took a lot of effort and work on their part, a dedication to the relationship that I wish I had shown before it was too late.

A lot of the men I meet ask me if I'm ready to get tied down because of my age. I won't lie about this either. I have given it a lot of thought, but mostly because society is pressuring me to think I must be married and popping out children by a certain age. And to be completely honest, my biggest concern about getting into an intimate relationship with somebody is not about whether they'll marry me or not so I can start popping out those children. It's about allowing the relationship to evolve to the point that I'm letting that man completely in.

I try to be an open book. I figure that if everybody knows everything about me and I'm not afraid to admit anything from my past, they have nothing to hurt me with. Yet, I find it difficult to be this way when I'm meeting somebody who might become more than just somebody to me. I haven't even told Av about my past, even though I know him well enough by now to know that he would never judge me for it. Would it affect him and the way he looks at me? I don't think so. But there's that small part of me deep inside that is scared of that, of being judged for something that was and has always been out of my control... something that will affect me for the rest of my life no matter how hard I try to move on from it.

And I think that's what I fear the most about actually going on a date with Will. I fear the date will evolve into more than just a date, and that one day I'll wake up and find that I'm sharing a bed with a man who doesn't even know me.