Case of the second date curse.

As a symbol of my sheer dedication to my newest infatuation I hereby vow to never stop eating until he finally realises how great I am and asks me out on a third date.

It’s been 2 weeks.  I’m still hopeful.

Date número deux

“Hey you! YES YOU. Are you dithering on a date and looking for ways to entertain yourself? Bring up the notion of freezing your eggs, a foolproof way to a priceless face.”

Yes, yes it happened. No I would not take it back if I could.

From smiling from ear to ear to wishing you an eternal bout of herpes

*It’s a long un

Prologue:
Now that I’ve ticked off practically every stereotypical heartbreak fix that is known I’ve decided to re-watch 500 Days of Summer for the umpteenth time to try and make some sense of it all.  As one of the only films that is a little more true to the point when it comes to infatuations and falling in love, without falling into the Disney nor the Revolutionary Road-esque sides of the spectrum.  But the fact is no reason nor explanation is going to make me feel any better right now so I’ve no idea what I’m looking for.  It really is just a sad attempt to stop myself from going completely and utterly insane, as is this post, if just for a moment.

I was having this conversation with a male mate of mine a couple of weeks ago over dinner, about how he believes all women are crazy, and to some degree, I can’t help but agree, especially in the state I’m in now.

It’s important that I make it clear that I’m not depressed, I’d say it’s more of an emotional come down.

The beginning:
So I met this man-child, by chance, over a year ago on my travels.  One trip back to reality and a move to the Big Smoke for me and a break up with his then long term girlfriend, and a move back to his home in NZ for him, along with some bizarro online ‘something not quite a nothing’ relationship that we built for a year later, that I find myself back in that joyous blue state that can only be induced by boy.

As my last but one post suggests, I fell for him madly deeply, and not right away.  I thought him cute when I met him, but he had a girlfriend at the time, and there really was absolutely nothing remotely romantic about our conversations whilst they were together, he was just a laugh, intelligent, and for some reason unbeknown had taken an interest in me.  Anyway we both gained a sort of solace in it I guess, me having moved city, finding my feet and yet another attempt to re-discover myself.  And with him, the shock of moving home after travelling for over a year to find much had changed, or perhaps everything wasn’t as rosy as he’d come to remember.  Having lived the life of an adventurer for a year, to returning to the dreary reality of joblessness and moving back into his parents we both found some level of comfort in each other.  He was the very person I wanted to tell the ridiculous fact I’d learnt that day to and I was the girl that’d get first look at the song he’d just written.  It was awesome.

Another point to be clear on was that I didn’t push for what this became, he did, whole-heartedly, with his overly emotional say exactly what he thought self.  I however wasn’t up for being hurt, nor day dreaming about something that was crazy.  Okk day dream I did, but I didn’t talk about it.  He talked lots of moving here, planning, even looking for jobs.  And I knew it was too big a chance for someone to take on me, on a whim, based on what 2 meetings in real life?  I wasn’t trying to be cold, or heartless, he was planning a change of career and I wasn’t going to be the person to come in the way of that.

We carried on as we did, him with a plan of his career, visits, and then eventually a move if things worked out.  And me with a ‘what happens happens’ attitude, I didn’t want to dictate any choices he made, nor be to blame should it be a bad one for him, and what if we were to learn much of what we felt was down to it being the unknown?  Yes I was shitting myself at the prospect.  I said we should still date people, he should still date, but just not tell me about it.

I had a few drunken kisses, all wholly guilt ridden, and really not remotely fun.  My friends knew that I was utterly besotted, the most content I’d been in I can’t even recall how long, but they didn’t want me clutching to something that may well not materialise, so a few made it clear that I shouldn’t be switching off to any guys here and now.  I usually take little notice of what anyone says, but for my best friend to warn to be a little careful, I went with it.  I never actively looked to date anyone, nor get with them, the prospect made me ill to the stomach, and honestly no-one would ever compare, so it was pointless.

Anyway, he hated this, I never mentioned the kisses, only a date once, when he’d asked, and that was enough to rile up the anger and jealousy, which is fair, but without us really knowing whether we’d ever be together, it seemed the only logical thing to do.

So we continue to potter on, still pretty mad for each other, he finally gets a job!  It’s been months on end, the unemployment and all else has been getting him down and yay he’s finally on his way to where he wants to be.  He was interning, run off his feet, and way busier than I was, I do get it, I’ve been there, but I went from being absolutely everything to nothing, nada.  From the girl he’d marry (ha yes it was intense) to pretty much a nobody.  The conversations became ones that I could have with strangers on a train, and remember us Londoners aren’t even a particularly friendly bunch.

The first month, I thought he’s settling in, the second, well it’s super busy, the third, it was getting silly.  Barely a word with days in between, after we used to talk for hours on end, practically everyday, even with the ridiculous time difference.

I wasn’t angry, instead I was convinced I’d clearly cocked something up along the way and had fabricated this entire thing.

Ok so this is where I start to sound crazy.  Keep in mind that I’m the girl who feels claustrophobic if she has to meet up with a guy she’s dating more than once a week.  I don’t open up to others willingly.  I have a select group for every relationship, friends, co-workers, even family to some extent.  But for the first time in 10 years I gave in again, after much resistance, with the promise of not being hurt.

It got to the point where I had to say bye for now, he clearly had lost interest, but didn’t have the balls to say it, and I wasn’t going to be the loon waiting on the other end of it all.  I missed him like mad, finally cracked, and asked him how he was, and he finally confessed.

• He was seeing, sorry dating a girl for a while.  They broke up, apparently his heart was elsewhere, ha.
• Work has been manic, all he has time for is work and socialising, poor guy.
• He finally realised that he did want to cement his career, and financially there was no way of him getting here.

And that’s all I needed, except instead of allowing me the courtesy of knowing, he was a cold twat and made me go positively insane.  We got talking again for a little bit, he apologised for going about it the way he did, claimed he really did care for me and that we did have something great but he didn’t know how to make it work.  That’s all he had to bloody say.  I was the first to tell him that this was mental, it wasn’t fair nor realistic that he should move, so it wasn’t this that was so upsetting.  It was the ability to be able to switch it off completely, practically instantaneously upon the realisation is what actually hurt.

The end:
A month on from this, he’s got a girlfriend, who is painfully beautiful.  Although seeing it makes me feel physically sick, it’s probably in some horrible way exactly what I need.  I’ve deleted every single message, unfollowed him from all that I can, and deleted any crap the crops up on my computer under his name.  Until that point I still found myself day dreaming, that someday it’ll work out and it’ll go back to the way it was, after all it was perfect all of a few months ago.

He’s the first person that has ever made me feel like it’s ok to be me and had me believe it, that’s something I won’t be giving up for a while.  Now just to rid myself of these darned blues… xxx