Friday, October 28, 2011

Halloween is the One Night of the Year when Girls Can Dress Like a Total Slut and No Other Girls Can Say Anything About

I love Halloween. I have my costume planned. It's not slutty, it's fabulous! Last year I wanted to coordinate a costume with A, and it was pretty cute. We did a from-the-store costume run, he went as the Mad Hatter, and I was the March Hare. We even held teacups with our names on them. (These posts are getting sappy aren't they? I'm sorry, I have a cynical point in here I promise.)

THIS year, I thought it might be fun to both be Disney Villains... see that's much cooler, I knew you'd be on board. It didn't work out however, I will be riding the Disney Villian express solo. But that's okay. It occurred to me that often times, couples really do tend to conform to each others' lives in more than one way. (In this case, the not-so-serious costume choice.) But, how much of ourselves do we give to our partners in habit/rituals etc?

I noticed initially in our relationship that I began to used phrases that A used. (I still do sometimes.) I think that's pretty common, we tend to retain some of the mannerisms of our close friends and family the more time we spend with them. As children we are sponges to the mannerisms and phrases we hear. I very distinctly remember as a child repeating things I heard and not really understood what I meant. This begs the question, how much of ourselves, is... well, us?

I know another "who I am blog post" but if you think about how much other people actually influence who we become it's pretty mind boggling and a little scary. This is a meaty topic in itself, just looking at how we evolve from child to adult and all of the people who influence our soul. Still, there is always that inner voice we all have that ultimately decides what we say, what we love, and how we truly feel about the world. And that piece is completely ours, free of influential tyranny!

The most important lesson I think you can take away from this, and what I believe makes a relationship most successful is to spend time on that part of you that is yours. In order for a relationship to be a success you have to know who you are and be willing to spend time with yourself alone. If you don't like spending time with you, why would your partner? If you don't know who you are, well, how do you know what's kind of person is good for you?

Most of us are still learning to nourish that part of ourselves that makes us unique and discovering new things about it everyday. Take time from your loved one and go indulge in those things that appeal most to you. In my case, that sometimes involves going to a fancy restaurant alone or taking a bubble-bath with my trashy magazines. Or... going solo with my Halloween costume.



Sometimes a girl just needs to sit in her underwater layer, and plan to take over the ocean. Why not?


Title Quote from Mean Girls

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Speaking of Chronic Conditions, Happy Anniversary!

I'm celebrating my anniversary Friday. I'm celebrating my two year anniversary. This is officially... since the year mark last year... my longest relationship ever. I feel so grown up! Of course I wanted to do something special to celebrate the occasion. Initially my boyfriend was going to decide what we were doing, but in the end we both decided to have a lavish dinner at the Mexican place where we first met. Aw. I know. Honestly, they have really good tequila and fajitas.

These days when people are taking longer to date each other before they get married, these kind of milestones are sort of a gray area in the world of Hallmark. It's not a wedding anniversary so most of the cards you'll find are marriage humor or sappy "you're the best wife/husband ever" themed. (I'll write on my constant need to vomit in the Hallmark store another time, suffice to say, it can take me a long time to buy a card.)

I love cards though, I think this is because I grew up in with parents who loved giving and receiving cards. Some people find the cookie-cutter sayings they contain sappy, contrived, generic, and unoriginal. I tend to write a little extra under the coin phrase of the card myself, but in my mind, making the effort to physically go out, pick out a card, and write on it, is more sentimental than an e-mail any day.

But I digress. With this flux of long term non-marital relationships existing, there aren't really presidents for how to treat the occasion. If it's a marital anniversary, well, according tradition, the second anniversary is: Cotton. "Happy Anniversary Honey, we now own a cotton field!" "Hmm, well, I guess this means I can get her a t-shirt and she can't yell at me?" I do love this whole history of wedding anniversary gifts thing, but again, this is more marriage applicable. And what non-marital anniversary requires the gift to be a diamond?

This is something I try not to over think. Overall, I've mostly been reflecting on my how our relationship started and where we are today. Things between us started off very emotionally fast and now they are slowing down a bit in terms of conventional milestones. I'm learning more about how relationship work every day, and how time effects them both in positive and negative ways. It's naive to think things will stay exactly the same as the day you met, that's impossible. And not desirable.

I think about the spark between myself and A and I think fondly on those beginning months. But I also think about how hard being apart was for both of us when we lived in different places. We only saw each other twice a week, money was a lot tighter, I was dealing with the crazed rules of my ex-roommate, who later decided to hate A. These days, I get to see A every day, we can cook together, share our days... it's a much more comfortable, relaxed, romantic arrangement in my mind. We know each other so well, and it's okay. More than okay. That's the goal. I can't wait to see what another year together will bring!





Maybe even a sparkly new outfit for my left ring finger...







Title Quote from Guys and Dolls (1955)

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Can you believe these new girls? None of them use birth control and they eat all the steak!

I want nothing more than to have a baby someday. I want nothing more than to not have a baby until I'm ready. In 2010, birth control celebrated it's 50th birthday. (We are talking FDA approved birth control in pill form, no antiquated herbal forms, although I hear the Ancient Greeks used a plant called Laserwort... ew.) It's pretty mind boggling how big a step birth control was in our society, all of a sudden woman have a real choice about when to begin having children... or when not to. Quite a step for women's rights.

I myself have always felt very on the fence about using a birth control method other than condoms. Something about altering my body's natural processes always made be a little, cautious. Knowing your body is important and it can be jarring when chemicals are messing with your rhythm. But. Nothing else short of abstinence can completely guarantee not having a baby before you're ready.

Although, these days you wouldn't think birth control exists what with all the teen pregnancies making reality TV and the "accidental" pregnancies that happen to all of our favorite celebrities. Seriously, in my my mind, accidents should be pretty rare these days. I mean either you're using something, or you're not. (I'm willing to acknowledge some times it might happen, but if you are pulling in millions a year, don't tell me you don't know if you're using a pill.)

I think I figured it out though. I read an article recently that talked about more and more women these days playing "Baby Roulette." I'm hoping I don't have to explain that too much, suffice to say, the gist of the article is that women don't want to make the decision about when to start a family, so they leave it to fate. Then anything that happens was, "meant to be." In a society where marriage has little to do with having a baby, I find this mentality troubling.

I consider myself pretty liberal minded, I support a woman's right to choice, even if it's a choice I don't personally agree with, but when it comes to marriage and having a family, I'm very old fashioned. I think children deserve to be born in to a family that really wanted them, and has the support of two parents, whether that be mother/father, father/father, or mother/mother. And this is where my liberal self comes back. I think more thought should be given in to bringing a new person in to the world; they didn't ask to be alive and should have the absolute best situation when they arrive.

As much as I might like the idea of having a baby right now, I know I'm not ready. Babies are a lot of work and expensive, and completely change your relationship with your lover. You need more room, more patience, more money, and more work to raise a human as best you can. It's a huge decision. I know what I'd decide if I did get pregnant now by accident. I'd be okay... we'd be okay, but it would be very hard. Harder than I'm ready for at 25.

So, I, like many women, am choosing not to leave that part up to chance. Although it's awfully tempting when I see things like this:



Adorable. Ugh.


Time Quote from Almost Famous

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Life's Short, You Might Wanna Consider Holding His Hand

I'm an advocate of hand holding. I'm an advocate of hand holding to a point. I'll get to "the point" a little later. In a world filled with communicable diseases and paranoia, it's kind of amazing anyone is willing to hold hands with anyone. (No I haven't seen Contagion yet, but it seems like it might push me from careful to OCD.) We all carry hand sanitizers in our purses and try and remember how many verses of Happy Birthday we're supposed to sing in our heads to indicate a thorough hand washing. (It's 2 verses.) More to the point, a hand hold seems an innocent enough gesture emotionally, but it's often an intimacy step missed in some relationships.

If you have a casual night with a guy (or a girl) you might have skipped the hand holding stage and moved right on to well, yeah know. When did our nether regions become more active than our hands? Anatomically, hands have about more nerve endings than most other parts of your body. We are programmed to touch and explore both to prevent harm and learn about our surroundings. Yet, often we ignore this impulse to explore and prevent harm with others. For fear of moving too fast, physically, emotionally?

These days hand holding is mainly reserved for couples and parent/child scenarios. For most it induces a level of trust, protection, and love between the two people. Although often as children we couldn't wait until we were big enough to stop holding Mom's hand while crossing the street. Abandoning this connection becomes a rite of passage in our lives somehow. And then we spend the rest our lives trying to find the person we want to hold our hand for (hopefully) the rest of our lives.

While I may hold issue with touching a stranger's hand (I'm a bubble prayer Catholic, don't touch my hand during the Our Father), except those times a professional hand shake might be required, there are few things I love more than when my boyfriend will subtly grab my hand as we are walking down the street.

Not to be confused with this nonsense:



Yes folks, that's called a Smitten. Feel free to throw up a little bit. This is what I meant by holding hands "to a point." First off, I'd like to point out that this couple's other hands are uncovered, so why bother? Secondly, if your mittens are interfering with your romantic grip that much, then maybe it's you, not the mittens. Aren't there operations to prevent this exact scenario in twins? This brings clingy relationships to a whole new level, what guy would EVER wear this? Can you imagine if Kate and Leo had one of these?


I guess one of their hands would have been warm right?

Title Quote from Sex and the City