💔 Well, here I am post-breakup, yet again. As far as breakups go it went pretty well, but the after math is always
the hardest. Elbows deep in a a half gallon of ice cream, the endless stream of chick-flicks that always seems to be a good idea until you are pulling yourself out of the puddle that used to be your couch. Then of course there is always the problem of
having too much time by yourself thinking about what's wrong with him, what's wrong with me....
Somewhere in the middle of my ill-thought out movie marathon, including by not limited to: Autumn in New York, Pearl Harbor, and You've Got
Mail (a disastrous combination of hopelessly romantic and tragically romantic), it occurred to me that one of the problems between men and women is that we have two different ideas of what a healthy relationship looks like.
Women, for the most
part, want a movie relationship. The boombox held over head with the meaningful song blaring, the sketch drawn of you - at the hands of your lover - while you're wearing nothing but a priceless blue diamond, the first enchanting dance at a ball that
you weren't supposed to be at.... all of theses things and more... And when he does make mistakes, because we all do, the grand gesture, a new found clarity, and the proclamation of never-ending, never waning, heart-bursting true blue L.O.V.E., always
follows. And, he'll never make a mistake. Ever. Again. Why? Because, that is when the movie ends.
Men, again - for the most part, also want a movie relationship, but it is more of a HBO version. The slave girl in the 'Gold Bikini', the black vinyl Cat-suit,
female characters that are either totally helpless needing to be rescued, or completely dominant and feeding into every sadomasochistic desire, all while wearing a fabric closer to plastic than cotton. it is Fifty Shades of anything but gray. A woman
who is always wearing, tight, short, low-cut clothing anywhere and everywhere, at bedtime it is always satin and lace, if anything at all, and she will always be 30 seconds away from an orgasm, if not sooner.
There were times I wanted to cover
my manfriend's eyes when a love scene would come on, not because it was uncomfortable, but because I didn't want him to get any more ideas.
We watch the same things, we listen to the same music, we go to the same places, but we cherry pick different
parts of the same world.
Do I have a solution for this One-World - Two-Truths problem?..... No, I don't. I do think that it does help me feel less dysfunctional to at least partially identify where some of these short-comings in myself and unfair expectations
in others may come from.
Do I intend to correct these issues within myself?..... Perhaps, but not right now, Pride & Prejudice is about to start.... Oh, how I love that Mr. Darcy. ❤