Lessons to be Learnt?
A few months ago, two of my friends met for the first time. Moments after they clapped eyes on one another, they each grabbed me aside and announced they wanted an introduction. Shortly after said introduction, they fell cheerfully in love, and a couple of months later fell equally cheerfully back out of love and became the best of friends. Failing the ideal Prince-Charming-or-at-least-J.D.-Fortune happy ever after scenario, it seems to me that that situation was pretty much as good as it gets for us singletons. The only catch was, they are both men. Might there be a lesson to be learned?
Why is it that all the Wills and Sanfords in my life happily breeze through the dating scene thoroughly enjoying themselves and I panic and question and think and panic some more? Why do I get mixed signals and they get honest conversations?
On a long drive from Vancouver to L.A. with a hetero-but-platonic mate a few months ago, we had a conversation on the different ways straight men and women approach relationships. We realized, that it is precisely the opposite to how each sex approaches learning to swim. I can remember cautiously venturing into the sea, enough flotation devices about my person to keep me afloat on steam and yet still clinging to my dad's hand and keeping one toe on the sand lest my face get wet. Meanwhile, my brother had raced - without so much as waiting to get sunscreen or a swimsuit on - headlong into the waves, dived in nose first and ended up with a jellyfish sting and grazing half of his forehead off on the rocky sea bed. Fast forward a decade or so, and I realize that I tend to approach a new relationship like my brother tackled the Adriatic Sea - head first, no protective gear and cheerfully accepting that sometimes you just have to get stung by a jellyfish. Men on the other hand, become like me - barracading themselves behind the flotation device of possibly being in love with the ex they haven't seen in years, clinging on to 'commitment issues' (whatever the heck that means) and keeping one toe firmly anchored in the dating pool.
Unless, it seems, they are gay. Then they are all about rushing headlong into in luurrvve bliss and just as cheerfully rushing straight out, building a sandcastle and sharing an ice cream. Which - and I truly hate to say this - begs the question: would all men be that straightforward if only women let them? Are all those flotation devices simply a reaction against us yelling "come on you big jessie, duck your face under" and a sneaking suspicion that given half a chance we'd have them gasping for air at the bottom of the pool with our feet on their chests? Have I taken this analogy way too far?
Last night I chatted on the phone with my gay husband and couldn't help but note that when he asked me how my love life was going, I huffed and puffed about there being narry a man to be found in London or the Home Counties for love nor money (conveniently forgetting that I'd been on two dates - with two men! - a couple of weeks ago) and when I asked him if he had anyone special he cheerfully replied "nope, but plenty of of unspecial ones!" I think that he's on to something.
