I love chips. I love TV. I'm a size fourteen when I should be a size ten. I also have a tummy I sometimes have to cinch into my jeans by pulling on my belt a little harder than I'd like to, thanks to the eight and a half pound male tenant who moved out of there almost fourteen years ago. According to designer Karl Lagerfeld's definition of the term, that would make me a Curvy Woman, were it not for one tiny thing: I have never called anyone, be they large, medium or small, ugly in my life. Yes, I have been known to shake my head when I see pretty young girls walking stony-faced down a runway, ribs poking out through dresses that hang on them like living room curtains, but I don't disparage them. Far from it; I worry for them. I worry that they are making themselves ill in order to fit someone Else's definition of the word 'Beautiful.' I worry that they feel they have to live up to the standards of elderly fashion designers whose opinions should actually resonate with them at their age about as much as a fly fart in a hurricane. I also worry that they hate themselves for going balls out and eating a cheeseburger. Mainly, I worry about what will become of their self esteem when they are batted around like tennis balls by the sharply contrasting appraisals of people who have no idea what they're going through; it's just as hateful and ignorant for a person in the street or in a club to dismissively tell them to 'eat something, for fucks sake,' as it is for their bosses to guilt them into staying thin.
'What would you know about it?' I hear some of you ask, and rightly so. Being thirty nine years of age and having a kid in high school, one would think I had more important things to worry about than how my butt looked in a pair of jeans, but the fact is, I do still struggle with insecurity over my appearance. I sometimes worry that the sight of me naked might send potential suitors screaming for the exit, which is categorically insane, because I'm only two sizes above what is considered 'normal.' When you add this to the myriad of issues I already have with my self worth, it's a wonder I'm not posting this from within a rubber room. Despite this, I'm happy to say intermittent, lack of self esteem, Lagerfeld's assertion that people did not want to see Curvy Women didn't make me hate myself.
I did, indeed, scream obscenities at my TV the night Lagerfeld's wretched opinion aired on the news, but it wasn't at skinny models. It wasn't even at Lagerfeld. It was at myself. The words of an octogenarian fashion designer caused me to drop what I was doing, go to my room, strip down to my undies, look at myself in the mirror and say:
'Shit; I'm hot!'
Showing posts with label low self esteem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label low self esteem. Show all posts
Friday, 10 February 2012
Saturday, 14 January 2012
Comparatively Incomparable
As some of you may have noticed, I have added a You Tube vlog to my list of projects with which to distract myself from the fact that the only male who has kissed me in the last two and a half years that isn't a blood relative has four legs and a tail; (I kid...at least about the need for distraction). I started 'The Confidence Project' in an effort to throw myself back into the outside world, and thus the dating world, one webisode at a time by putting myself through a series of challenges designed to loosen me up and make me feel like my existence was a valid one. It's starting to work already, thanks to the comments I've received from the people who've viewed it so far (you know who you all are; I love you dearly). It's also left me pondering the reasons people like myself suffer from this crippling lack of self esteem, and the one I'm going to focus on here is all too common: comparison. I'm all too guilty of weighing up other people's assets and liabilities against my own, but does it serve any real purpose? I'm thirty nine years old, and yet I still find myself looking at pictures of much younger celebrities like Lily Allen and Zooey Deschanel with awe, and casting an intensely critical eye upon my reflection. I have dark hair. I'm of roughly the same diminutive stature. I'm reasonably attractive (my ability to admit this is only a recent development), so why don't I look like I could grace the cover of In Style or Harper's Bazaar? Why does donning a baby doll dress similar to Lilly's make me feel more like Baby Huey than Indie Princess? And why do I end up looking like a crack addict going cold turkey when I attempt the smokey eyed look that Zooey pulls off so well? Because I'm not Lily Allen or Zooey Deschanel. I'm Melissa Jane Moore, a thirty nine year old writer and mother of one who enjoys Junior Mints and Coca Cola, doesn't run unless something's on fire, and consequently has curves in a couple of places she shouldn't.
Lately, I've taken to beholding that thirty nine year old writer and mother of one in the mirror a little longer, and reminding her that she has fantastic skin, lovely eyes, and a figure that allows her to fill out her favourite red polka dot wiggle dress in a manner most pleasing to the eye, (and some lucky person's hands one day, I shouldn't wonder). I then sit in front of my laptop and take pictures of her to post on Facebook, despite her misgivings, to let the rest of the world look upon her, and bring her that much closer to being a part of it again.
Lately, I've taken to beholding that thirty nine year old writer and mother of one in the mirror a little longer, and reminding her that she has fantastic skin, lovely eyes, and a figure that allows her to fill out her favourite red polka dot wiggle dress in a manner most pleasing to the eye, (and some lucky person's hands one day, I shouldn't wonder). I then sit in front of my laptop and take pictures of her to post on Facebook, despite her misgivings, to let the rest of the world look upon her, and bring her that much closer to being a part of it again.
Saturday, 15 October 2011
High school never ends
Rereading my last post, wherein I lamented the return of my chronic shyness, has lead me to reflect on a time when it was at its peak: my teen years. Why would I want to do that in a blog about the horrors of dating past thirty? Allow me to explain. Adolescence is like a glorious sort of limbo; you're not a kid anymore, but you're not a grown up. You can do all the fun things like date, party, eat crappy food and drink without having to worry about kids, work, rent/mortgage, bills, etc. Then when you hit adulthood and take on all the responsibilities that come with it, you can always look back fondly on that time and know that you didn't miss out on anything. But not everybody has that luxury. Some people, and this is purely a hypothesis, you understand, spent their teens hiding from the tough kids in the library, writing poetry about one of the hundreds of boys their hormone addled heart was fixated on and cursing the fact that they won their dad's nose and jaw in the genetic lottery. Anyone who inhaled sharply at this (purely hypothetical) account of adolescence will probably be familiar with the following scenario.
Say you're a single woman in her mid to late thirties. Your love life has hit a slump, as has your social life, and you find yourself transported back to a time you thought dead and buried, wondering whether things would be better now had you done something differently then. Maybe that guy in seventh grade whose timetable you memorised just so you'd be able to bump into him would have liked you if you'd been 'normal.' Maybe if you'd tried to make yourself look prettier, he would have asked you out. Then you would have had your first kiss a lot earlier, and probably dated a few more boys before graduation, which would have made you a bit more streetwise when it came to choosing guys post high school. Maybe then you wouldn't have fallen for the wrong guy, had your heart broken, and ended up alone at a time when it's statistically less likely for you to find love. The solution to this problem is to remember that high school was twenty plus years ago, and that time and Karma make excellent bedfellows. The hot bad boy you drooled over when you were fourteen? Years of smoking and sunbathing have probably left him looking like an imitation leather purse from South East Asia, which is where the hot girl he married has to visit him while he does time for drug trafficking. The Thor lookalike with the biceps that could crack walnuts? Decades of throwing parties you were never invited to have undoubtedly given him a beer belly that could double as an end table. The cool guy with girls dripping off him like diamonds, who held you in the same esteem as dog leavings? It's hard to woo women when child support takes three quarters of your income. The past is a great place for a vacation. Visit the old haunts, marvel at how different they look now that you're an inch or two taller and a great deal wiser; but if you stay too long, you'll never leave, and fun as The Breakfast Club is to watch, who wants to be stuck in eternal detention with those arseholes?
Say you're a single woman in her mid to late thirties. Your love life has hit a slump, as has your social life, and you find yourself transported back to a time you thought dead and buried, wondering whether things would be better now had you done something differently then. Maybe that guy in seventh grade whose timetable you memorised just so you'd be able to bump into him would have liked you if you'd been 'normal.' Maybe if you'd tried to make yourself look prettier, he would have asked you out. Then you would have had your first kiss a lot earlier, and probably dated a few more boys before graduation, which would have made you a bit more streetwise when it came to choosing guys post high school. Maybe then you wouldn't have fallen for the wrong guy, had your heart broken, and ended up alone at a time when it's statistically less likely for you to find love. The solution to this problem is to remember that high school was twenty plus years ago, and that time and Karma make excellent bedfellows. The hot bad boy you drooled over when you were fourteen? Years of smoking and sunbathing have probably left him looking like an imitation leather purse from South East Asia, which is where the hot girl he married has to visit him while he does time for drug trafficking. The Thor lookalike with the biceps that could crack walnuts? Decades of throwing parties you were never invited to have undoubtedly given him a beer belly that could double as an end table. The cool guy with girls dripping off him like diamonds, who held you in the same esteem as dog leavings? It's hard to woo women when child support takes three quarters of your income. The past is a great place for a vacation. Visit the old haunts, marvel at how different they look now that you're an inch or two taller and a great deal wiser; but if you stay too long, you'll never leave, and fun as The Breakfast Club is to watch, who wants to be stuck in eternal detention with those arseholes?
Thursday, 13 October 2011
My glittering anti-social life.
I was scrolling through the friends list on my Facebook page when I came to the realisation that I had more Facebook friends than regular friends. I know I'm not alone there; most profiles have a one to two hundred strong friends list, and nobody can say they've actually met that many people, but what if I was to tell you that my tally came to a grand total of eight? Yes, you read right, eight. I then did some investigating into why my social circle was so small, and once again, my trusty laptop provided the answer. The grid list that pops up on screen whenever I open up a new tab revealed something startling: I was addicted to social media. Saturday nights for my flesh and blood friends (all three of them) consist of drinking, partying, eating food that doesn't come flat-packed in cardboard and meeting real live men. A kid-free Saturday evening at Mel's is usually spent adding to the list of people I follow on Twitter who will never follow me back, eating pizza that could double as a steering wheel for Mario Kart, laughing at dating site profiles, and posting hourly status updates on Facebook (8.00 p.m: ate dinner...9.00 pm: watched Buffy...10.00 p.m: hid the painkillers...you get the idea).
My shyness has been with me for as long as I can remember, and the reason I find it difficult to let go of, believe it or not, is that it has been as much a friend as it has an enemy. Had I not been too shy to go out and play with the kids in my neighbourhood as a little girl, I probably wouldn't have fallen in love with writing as early as I did. But who's to say I wouldn't have fallen in love with it anyway, at some point? I have spent the past few days dreaming up dozens of plausible sounding excuses to get me out of going out this Saturday night on what my regular readers will know is the first date I've had in over a year. Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? Well, the madness doesn't stop there. My best friend Corrina turns forty in two weeks time, and has invited me to her party. Given the fact that she is the closest thing I've ever had to a sister, and that we've known each other since we were eleven and twelve, you would think I'd be dress shopping and writing a speech. Instead, I'm sweating bullets at the thought of her twenty plus guests seeing me out of my jeans and judging my style. I'm letting something I can control take control of me and jip me out of what will probably be an absolute blast. What's worse is that I did actually manage to kick the shyness habit for a long time. Once high school was behind me, I went wild. A large chunk of the first half of my twenties is a blissful blur; I made all the mistakes and faux pas I should have made in my teens, and then some...it was awesome! Somewhere around the time of my thirty seventh birthday, however, a toxic relationship (I call it a relationship because I can't think of a PG euphemism for it), and dozens of other little things ganged up to wage an all out assault on my ego, which resulted in me bowing to the irresistible temptation to throw in the towel and weld my rapidly expanding bum to the couch. I've since dropped all the weight, but can't quite seem to shift the ten kilos of self doubt that's crushing down on my brain like a bag of cement.
To put it simply; I know I'm a cool, interesting, funny person with a lot to say; the thing that's intermittently holding me back is that I'm terrified no one else will listen. I feel utterly ridiculous just reading that back; I've spent the past four weeks or so telling you all to get off your arses and get what you want before someone else grabs it, yet I'm stuck posing for the before shot in a self esteem wonder drug ad! Okay, enough of this. This post was really just to let you know that we all have our down days/weeks/months/years, and that they do pass; whether these dark times stroll off at an infuriatingly leisurely pace, or streak by and jump out the window to a grizzly death is up to one person, and one person alone. I am now about to tear that person a new one, thereby forcing her to take those dark times and send them to the Bermuda Triangle in a single engine plane.
My shyness has been with me for as long as I can remember, and the reason I find it difficult to let go of, believe it or not, is that it has been as much a friend as it has an enemy. Had I not been too shy to go out and play with the kids in my neighbourhood as a little girl, I probably wouldn't have fallen in love with writing as early as I did. But who's to say I wouldn't have fallen in love with it anyway, at some point? I have spent the past few days dreaming up dozens of plausible sounding excuses to get me out of going out this Saturday night on what my regular readers will know is the first date I've had in over a year. Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? Well, the madness doesn't stop there. My best friend Corrina turns forty in two weeks time, and has invited me to her party. Given the fact that she is the closest thing I've ever had to a sister, and that we've known each other since we were eleven and twelve, you would think I'd be dress shopping and writing a speech. Instead, I'm sweating bullets at the thought of her twenty plus guests seeing me out of my jeans and judging my style. I'm letting something I can control take control of me and jip me out of what will probably be an absolute blast. What's worse is that I did actually manage to kick the shyness habit for a long time. Once high school was behind me, I went wild. A large chunk of the first half of my twenties is a blissful blur; I made all the mistakes and faux pas I should have made in my teens, and then some...it was awesome! Somewhere around the time of my thirty seventh birthday, however, a toxic relationship (I call it a relationship because I can't think of a PG euphemism for it), and dozens of other little things ganged up to wage an all out assault on my ego, which resulted in me bowing to the irresistible temptation to throw in the towel and weld my rapidly expanding bum to the couch. I've since dropped all the weight, but can't quite seem to shift the ten kilos of self doubt that's crushing down on my brain like a bag of cement.
To put it simply; I know I'm a cool, interesting, funny person with a lot to say; the thing that's intermittently holding me back is that I'm terrified no one else will listen. I feel utterly ridiculous just reading that back; I've spent the past four weeks or so telling you all to get off your arses and get what you want before someone else grabs it, yet I'm stuck posing for the before shot in a self esteem wonder drug ad! Okay, enough of this. This post was really just to let you know that we all have our down days/weeks/months/years, and that they do pass; whether these dark times stroll off at an infuriatingly leisurely pace, or streak by and jump out the window to a grizzly death is up to one person, and one person alone. I am now about to tear that person a new one, thereby forcing her to take those dark times and send them to the Bermuda Triangle in a single engine plane.
Thursday, 6 October 2011
Who says I'm not cool?
Sitting here in my pink hoodie, ugg boots and p.j's reading over yesterday's post, (yes, I am that obsessive), it occurs to me that I should expand on the ending a little. Rather than just tell you to focus on what's cool about yourself, I should provide a practical example, so what follows is a list of some of the stuff I think is great about me and that should make me irresistible to the opposite sex.
*Note: I have had roughly four hours sleep, so you'll forgive me if my train of thought seems somewhat scattered. Hey, I'm not Anthony friggin' Robbins!
1. I don't wear trackies/sweats. Maybe it's because I lived through the seventies and saw first hand the devastating effects of velour tracksuit addiction, but the only time this behind is clad in fleece is when it's lying in bed in the middle of a Melbourne winter.
2. I have a pathological hatred for soap operas. The appeal of the derivative, repetitive, mind raping phenomena known as 'Daytime Drama' has always escaped me. How many times can one woman marry into the same family/stand trial for murder/return from the dead? Maybe it's because I have some semblance of a life (such as it is), but the thought of surrendering an hour of my time to this crap makes me want to rig my T.V with a truckload of C4 explosive. Want to watch Saw five for the seventieth time, Babe? You're on!
3. I'm not a neat freak. I suppose this could also be considered a bad trait, but when it comes to being house proud, I did not take after my mother. I dust once a month, or when the top of my T.V unit starts to look like winter in Switzerland; I iron my jeans by chucking them in the dryer on high, and my kid and I have enough odd socks to start a dating service for hosiery. The lucky dude who ends up with me won't have to worry about putting a beer can on the coffee table without a coaster, and as for executing a perfect three-point fold before hanging up a bath towel? In my house, it's a bonus if the damn thing isn't on the floor!
4. I can be immature. I may be celebrating my fourth decade of existence next year, but that doesn't mean I'm going to start listening to talk radio and eating All Bran. I know what a Meme is, I still laugh at a well-timed Michael Hawk joke, I think monthly left over pizza breakfasts are mandatory, and I shop in clothing stores where the person serving me was probably an amoeba when I graduated high school. Got a problem with that?
5. I can laugh at myself. This should come as no surprise to my regular readers, who will have guessed by now that my blog is a giant exercise in comical self-flagellation, but I think it's absolutely imperative to a person's well being that they don't take themselves too seriously.
6. I'm not a princess. Ever wanted to let out a ground-shaking belch without reproach? Enjoy the odd distasteful joke? Want to borrow my IPod before you go for a run and not have to scroll through Britney Spears, Miley Cyrus, and Celine Dion tracks? I'm your girl.
7. I have a vocabulary. I enjoy conversation; it's good for the soul, keeps the brain active, and allows me to interact with people on a personal level. It's also a way of letting the world know that I can, and indeed have, read a book, and that I think syllables are a terrible thing to waste.
Well I'll be damned; I do feel good about myself again! Give it a try and see if it works for you. Better yet, post your list on my Mad Mel Facebook page, tweet it to me, or leave it in the comments section.
*Note: I have had roughly four hours sleep, so you'll forgive me if my train of thought seems somewhat scattered. Hey, I'm not Anthony friggin' Robbins!
1. I don't wear trackies/sweats. Maybe it's because I lived through the seventies and saw first hand the devastating effects of velour tracksuit addiction, but the only time this behind is clad in fleece is when it's lying in bed in the middle of a Melbourne winter.
2. I have a pathological hatred for soap operas. The appeal of the derivative, repetitive, mind raping phenomena known as 'Daytime Drama' has always escaped me. How many times can one woman marry into the same family/stand trial for murder/return from the dead? Maybe it's because I have some semblance of a life (such as it is), but the thought of surrendering an hour of my time to this crap makes me want to rig my T.V with a truckload of C4 explosive. Want to watch Saw five for the seventieth time, Babe? You're on!
3. I'm not a neat freak. I suppose this could also be considered a bad trait, but when it comes to being house proud, I did not take after my mother. I dust once a month, or when the top of my T.V unit starts to look like winter in Switzerland; I iron my jeans by chucking them in the dryer on high, and my kid and I have enough odd socks to start a dating service for hosiery. The lucky dude who ends up with me won't have to worry about putting a beer can on the coffee table without a coaster, and as for executing a perfect three-point fold before hanging up a bath towel? In my house, it's a bonus if the damn thing isn't on the floor!
4. I can be immature. I may be celebrating my fourth decade of existence next year, but that doesn't mean I'm going to start listening to talk radio and eating All Bran. I know what a Meme is, I still laugh at a well-timed Michael Hawk joke, I think monthly left over pizza breakfasts are mandatory, and I shop in clothing stores where the person serving me was probably an amoeba when I graduated high school. Got a problem with that?
5. I can laugh at myself. This should come as no surprise to my regular readers, who will have guessed by now that my blog is a giant exercise in comical self-flagellation, but I think it's absolutely imperative to a person's well being that they don't take themselves too seriously.
6. I'm not a princess. Ever wanted to let out a ground-shaking belch without reproach? Enjoy the odd distasteful joke? Want to borrow my IPod before you go for a run and not have to scroll through Britney Spears, Miley Cyrus, and Celine Dion tracks? I'm your girl.
7. I have a vocabulary. I enjoy conversation; it's good for the soul, keeps the brain active, and allows me to interact with people on a personal level. It's also a way of letting the world know that I can, and indeed have, read a book, and that I think syllables are a terrible thing to waste.
Well I'll be damned; I do feel good about myself again! Give it a try and see if it works for you. Better yet, post your list on my Mad Mel Facebook page, tweet it to me, or leave it in the comments section.
Tuesday, 4 October 2011
My son, the love philosopher
I don't think there's a person in the world who hasn't suffered low self-esteem. Even if your last name's Kardashian, I'd bet my limited edition Buffy box set you've encountered that little ol' devil somewhere along the line. Fortunately, life usually finds a way to cushion your fall just as you make the proverbial twelve story leap. My air mattress came in the form of my thirteen year old son, G. I had just received an email from a friend of mine who was honeymooning in America and, while I was (and am) absolutely stoked for her, I'm ashamed to confess that the attached photos of the blissed-out couple posing in front of every damn Hollywood landmark Google Maps ever listed did bring me down somewhat. We were both in our thirties, (I'm three years older, but there's no point dwelling on that), we both had children, and you could fill two equally huge volumes with stories of the mistakes we've both made, so why had it worked out so well for her and not for me? Yes, I was coming down with a serious case of the 'Why-not-Me's.'
One of the reasons I would make a terrible criminal is that I am so easy to read, which is why G was able to see straight through my 'I'm fine' routine within ten seconds of entering the room and sitting down next to me on the couch. He glanced furtively at the pictures on my laptop, then put his arm around my shoulder and kissed me on the cheek.
'You're beautiful, Mum.'
I hugged him, grateful that I forgot to take that little white pill all those years ago, and regretting the verbal barrage I'd unleashed upon him earlier for failing to clean the crack den he called a room. My son is the single most brutally honest person you are ever likely to meet. He will give you his unbiased, uncensored opinion, like it or not, so I took the compliment as more than just obligatory pity. I kissed his cheek and sent him off to bed, proud of my free range child raising philosophy.
'It's your age that's the problem!'
If anyone has a windowless barn available for rent, let me know.
One of the reasons I would make a terrible criminal is that I am so easy to read, which is why G was able to see straight through my 'I'm fine' routine within ten seconds of entering the room and sitting down next to me on the couch. He glanced furtively at the pictures on my laptop, then put his arm around my shoulder and kissed me on the cheek.
'You're beautiful, Mum.'
I hugged him, grateful that I forgot to take that little white pill all those years ago, and regretting the verbal barrage I'd unleashed upon him earlier for failing to clean the crack den he called a room. My son is the single most brutally honest person you are ever likely to meet. He will give you his unbiased, uncensored opinion, like it or not, so I took the compliment as more than just obligatory pity. I kissed his cheek and sent him off to bed, proud of my free range child raising philosophy.
'It's your age that's the problem!'
If anyone has a windowless barn available for rent, let me know.
Monday, 5 September 2011
My date with a demi-god, or: how my inner critic played coitus interruptus.
I was enjoying what had become a typical Saturday evening at home - watching Buffy DVDs, wishing I could relive my twenties sober and self medicating with Tim Tams - when I felt 'The Tug.' There are countless euphamisms for it, but basically The Tug is that realisation most single women get somewhere between thirty-five and forty that, although they don't nessecarily need a man to live their best life, there is only so much satisfaction to be gained from being the master of one's own domain, and there is a limit to the euphoric powers of chocolate. Up until this point, I had steadfastly avoided internet dating sites, but as my finances precluded any sort of night out beyond trolling the local bus stops for passables (the definition of which will be explained in my next blog - The dating glossary), my self esteem conceded defeat and I whipped up a profile.
Two weeks later I was scrolling through the profiles of men the site matched me with, harbouring the sneaking suspicion that the only criteria used to calculate their compatablility with me was the fact that they were as desperate as I was at the time, when I struck hormonal gold. I can say without the slightest hint of exaggeration that 'Patrick' was just about the most beautiful creature I ever saw. How Beautiful? Well, if someone found proof that the greek gods actually existed, went back in time, took a sample of Eros' dna (he was the greek god of love and beauty-look it up, people), went back to the future and cloned him, the product would be Patrick. Reading through his profile, I discovered that Patrick was witty, intelligent, articulate and adored his kids. In short, he was perfect...which is why I exited his profile post haste and resumed the mental drudgery of perusing the list of suitors hack science chose for me. Come on, I thought to myself, the only way you're in with a chance there is if he has kidney disease and you happen to be a donor match.
Now imagine my reaction when, while struggling to read the profile of a guy who I'm certain only got out of sixth grade because he couldn't fit in the chairs anymore, a message appeared in the top right corner of the screen. Patrick wanted to chat! We exchanged phone numbers after ten minutes messaging, there's only so much one can express with emotocons, and he promised to call me sometime. Yeah, I thought, Sometime next century. I was certain I'd insulted his mother, called him a nutbar in gaelic or made some other gaff that would be unimaginable for anyone whose mouth wasn't running sixty seconds faster than her brain. Then the phone rang. Fully expecting it to be my mother calling for approximately the eighty-fifth time that day, my greeting was less than enthusiastic. Lucky for me, Patrick was well aquainted with the concept of yo-yo parenting, and laughed it off. We arranged to meet at my place the following week, not something I would normally do - see above, re: hormones.
I spent the better part of the next seven days cleaning my house, an upshot of which was hitting upon roughly the mixture and concentration of chemicals I'll need should I ever decide to kill myself. By the time Saturday came, I had become anticipation's bitch, obsessing over everything from my make up to getting the peak of my eyebrows centimetre perfect (oh, how I wish I were kidding). Patrick arrived bang on time, pot plant in hand (remembering that I prefer potted plants to bouquets because they last longer), looking like the spokesperson from an aftershave add. We sat down on the couch to talk, and that was when my inner critic decided I deserved a kick in the cocxix. It would have been a stimulating conversation, had I contributed anything to it beyond 'Yeah,' 'I know,' and 'Exactly.' Here was a guy clearly interested in me, and all I could do was tell myself that he deserved better! He soldiered on, going through my movie and music collections and joking about how different our tastes were, and I laughed. An appropriate response, one would think. Not when you spit accross the room. Hey, it's hard to control what comes out of your mouth when you're busy thinking of ways to put someone off so that they may be spared the humiliation of being seen in public with a woman whose greatest achievement to date is winning a New kids on the block album in a radio contest in 1990.
The date ended, he gave me a kiss on the cheek and I waited until he was out of sight before headbutting the front door and running into the kitchen to gorge myself on consolation chocolate, which pacified the shrill, nasty little voice in my head that put the kibosh on what I was sure would one day have turned into a sexual experience bordering on Nirvana. Despite the confidence and strength we like to project, and we have every right to, our number one enemy when it comes to getting what we want is still us. So the next time you're getting ready for a date, and your inner critic starts flipping through the catalogue of screw ups that is your life, do me a favour: flip it the bird for me!
Two weeks later I was scrolling through the profiles of men the site matched me with, harbouring the sneaking suspicion that the only criteria used to calculate their compatablility with me was the fact that they were as desperate as I was at the time, when I struck hormonal gold. I can say without the slightest hint of exaggeration that 'Patrick' was just about the most beautiful creature I ever saw. How Beautiful? Well, if someone found proof that the greek gods actually existed, went back in time, took a sample of Eros' dna (he was the greek god of love and beauty-look it up, people), went back to the future and cloned him, the product would be Patrick. Reading through his profile, I discovered that Patrick was witty, intelligent, articulate and adored his kids. In short, he was perfect...which is why I exited his profile post haste and resumed the mental drudgery of perusing the list of suitors hack science chose for me. Come on, I thought to myself, the only way you're in with a chance there is if he has kidney disease and you happen to be a donor match.
Now imagine my reaction when, while struggling to read the profile of a guy who I'm certain only got out of sixth grade because he couldn't fit in the chairs anymore, a message appeared in the top right corner of the screen. Patrick wanted to chat! We exchanged phone numbers after ten minutes messaging, there's only so much one can express with emotocons, and he promised to call me sometime. Yeah, I thought, Sometime next century. I was certain I'd insulted his mother, called him a nutbar in gaelic or made some other gaff that would be unimaginable for anyone whose mouth wasn't running sixty seconds faster than her brain. Then the phone rang. Fully expecting it to be my mother calling for approximately the eighty-fifth time that day, my greeting was less than enthusiastic. Lucky for me, Patrick was well aquainted with the concept of yo-yo parenting, and laughed it off. We arranged to meet at my place the following week, not something I would normally do - see above, re: hormones.
I spent the better part of the next seven days cleaning my house, an upshot of which was hitting upon roughly the mixture and concentration of chemicals I'll need should I ever decide to kill myself. By the time Saturday came, I had become anticipation's bitch, obsessing over everything from my make up to getting the peak of my eyebrows centimetre perfect (oh, how I wish I were kidding). Patrick arrived bang on time, pot plant in hand (remembering that I prefer potted plants to bouquets because they last longer), looking like the spokesperson from an aftershave add. We sat down on the couch to talk, and that was when my inner critic decided I deserved a kick in the cocxix. It would have been a stimulating conversation, had I contributed anything to it beyond 'Yeah,' 'I know,' and 'Exactly.' Here was a guy clearly interested in me, and all I could do was tell myself that he deserved better! He soldiered on, going through my movie and music collections and joking about how different our tastes were, and I laughed. An appropriate response, one would think. Not when you spit accross the room. Hey, it's hard to control what comes out of your mouth when you're busy thinking of ways to put someone off so that they may be spared the humiliation of being seen in public with a woman whose greatest achievement to date is winning a New kids on the block album in a radio contest in 1990.
The date ended, he gave me a kiss on the cheek and I waited until he was out of sight before headbutting the front door and running into the kitchen to gorge myself on consolation chocolate, which pacified the shrill, nasty little voice in my head that put the kibosh on what I was sure would one day have turned into a sexual experience bordering on Nirvana. Despite the confidence and strength we like to project, and we have every right to, our number one enemy when it comes to getting what we want is still us. So the next time you're getting ready for a date, and your inner critic starts flipping through the catalogue of screw ups that is your life, do me a favour: flip it the bird for me!
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