Free Dating: Your New Guide to Single Enlightenment

Apologies for the long dramatic pause between postings. That's what moving to a new city will do I suppose!

Well I've been off and running and have been dating and enjoying some of the men of the greater Chicagoland area. Baseline conclusion: most men are mostly the same most of the time. Got that? Good.

So, I've been discussing with guy and girl friends alike about the pitfalls of being single, the suckiness of dating and why we all do this nonsense in the first place and I came to a pretty fun conclusion that I think I'm going to stick to.

My conclusion is that once you realize how silly, stupid and awkward dating is, the more fun you can have with it. Don't take it seriously is the bottom line. Call it "Free Dating". (Similar to Free Running, which I mistakenly called Free Basing once... boy was that awkward.) In this Free Dating, you more or less take it as it comes.

For instance, first dates are horrible, we can all agree on this one. Nothing makes people more nervous than meeting someone who may or may not reject them without really knowing anything about them. Trust me, it used to strike daggers of fear into my being. I mean in reality you're instantly being judged, its like the American Idol of dating. (If only I had a condensed tape of the "audition" episodes of my dating life... how perfect would that be?). So why take it so seriously? I'm not saying be a total jackass about it, but I think we all need to stop worrying about the other person and what they're feeling and only go with your own intuition. I consider myself quite a dating chameleon in the fact that I can pretty much change up my style and personality to accommodate the person sitting across from me. Call it date-switching. It's a fun trick I've picked up over the years. But lately I realized that all its doing is returning men to me that I have utterly no interest in being around, because that's not really who I am. So, rule on first dates with Free Dating is: "Screw it. Do you."

Now one of the things that drives me absolutely crazy with dating coaches, advice givers, mothers and BFF's is that they tell you "avoid awkward conversations like religion, politics, money, etc." Why? Think about it. These are three of the main things that married folks argue about and possibly get divorces over. Maybe its because someone told them not to discuss... hmmm maybe? So rule number two with Free Dating: "Discuss whatever you want."

Finally the most IMPORTANT aspect of free dating is just to have fun with it. In the end you're out, about, meeting someone new. Sometimes the person has nothing in common with you, or you aren't very interested, well so what? Try to enjoy the time as best as you can. Be silly, laugh a lot and let yourself be fascinated by the fact that you are meeting someone outside of your circle. Rule number three "If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with." Well, maybe not love, love. But, just enjoy the moments. You did take the time out of your precious day, don't totally waste it.

Thank you... the offering basket will now be passed around.

Got Bros in Different Area Codes?

As some of you may or may not know, I no longer live on the exciting, thrilling, fast paced E-coast. I know, shed your tears now. And yes, I know this somewhat defeats the name of the blog, but I think for posterity sake it still has relevance. So... now I'm back in the Midwest cornfields of Ohio searching for love, or something like it. It may not be as glamorous, but it still has it's share of funny stories, interesting observations and anecdotal advice.

Recently, I switched one of my online dating accounts to reflect my new locale and immediately I have noticed SIGNIFICANT differences in the courting/dating style of East Coast versus Midwest men. So, let's break it down, shall we?

Observation #1: Taste in men needs to change drastically.

All right, I know I won't win the adoration of Midwest men on this one, but I believe this theory has been confirmed by enough sources for me to assure its validity. Ok, so it's no surprise that men in each location vary in terms of looks, aspirations, jobs, values, etc. So, let me make a parallel to my point and look at dating much like working in different locations. Now, many people look at NYC as one of the "cream of the crop" locations in terms of finding competitive work. People there just have a certain sort of gusto about their career and inevitably that means you are working around some the smartest, most creative and diverse people in the world. Not to say these people don't reside anywhere else, but it always seems that there are large clusters of these people in metropolitan areas.

Now, in Ohio... well, I've noticed that first thing, diversity is extremely hard to find. I consider myself a fairly equal opportunity dater, but I do have a special place in my heart for those of the darker skinned persuasion, and well let's just say the pool of men dropped significantly moving to Ohio.

The other thing I noticed is that the looks of the men are completely different. In New York, you always saw the metrosexual type men who dressed in suits, wore hip clothing and were always on the cutting edge of style. Here... not so much. It's jeans and t-shirts all the way.

Observation #2: Less upfronted-ness (yeah, coin that phrase)

We all know New Yorkers and New Jersey folks are in your face about everything. Not much is left unsaid in a conversation with anyone from there, and no topic is off limits, especially sex. I was explaining this phenomenon to one of my friends and her husband the other night and I said that talking about sex on the East Coast is as breezy as talking about the weather. It's just one of those things that always comes up in conversation. Maybe it's the sexual energy of the city, or something in the water, but inevitably sex ALWAYS comes up in conversation, and it comes up QUICK. Here, I've been speaking with a few people with the potential of dating and NOT ONCE has sex come up. It's odd, yet very refreshing.

Observation #3: Dating radius is widened.

I live in the middle of nowhere of Ohio, so it's very refreshing that people here have no problem traveling 2-3 hours simply to date someone. It helps me, simply because if I had to date in a 20 mile radius I'd be completely f'ed. Big time. In NJ, you rarely, if ever could get a Manhattan guy to cross the bridge to NJ for a date (and that's only 3 miles). Hell, I even did it. "Oh you live in Queens? Man that's the furthest borough away from me....I think I'll pass." Or "You live down near the shore in South Jersey? That's a lot of tolls...I don't think so."

Either way, dating in any location has its nuances, and I'm extremely excited to test the waters here and really compare some notes and see what happens.

"Let me take you on an ex-capade" (Let's go!)

Those should have been the real lyrics to Janet Jackson's "Escapade" by the way. I claim copyright now.

I think we're all guilty of making horribly elementary mistakes when it comes to dating, but isn't it truly the cardinal rule on dates, especially first dates that you try to avoid bringing up the dreaded ex's convo?

There are many faux pas conversation topics that can arise when you first meet someone. To me, discussing religion or politics on a first date is actually not a bad idea, though I'm sure Martha Stewart's etiquette would say otherwise. I mean how else will you find out if the person you are with is a closeted bigot or the Antichrist? Or maybe that's your type...

I'm not sure where these sort of unwritten dating codes came about, particularly regarding conversation. When you think about it, why not bring up brash and irreverent conversation pieces simply so you can figure out who you're dealing sooner... rather than later. It may save you some awkwardness later down the line right? I mean why go through the trouble of really getting to know someone if there's a giant moral roadblock in your line of vision?

Maybe bringing up ex's in conversation has it's place in first date conversation. Possibly it gives us some sort of weird commiserating ally in the battle of dating wounds. Or, in some cases it will send up red flags of what a douchebag of a man is sitting right across from you. Either way though, I have found that the people who drag on and on and on about their ex's during date conversation have either 1) been scorned so harshly by their ex's that they therapeutically need to divulge all of their ex history simply so someone can rationalize to them that they were the ones that were wronged (though there's always two sides to those stories) or 2) they still aren't over it.

All right, we're all guilty of saying snide things when it comes to our ex's in conversation with someone new we're dating. I believe we all do this, or at least I know I do this intentionally as to say "Hey, listen up buddy, if you do what this asshole of an ex did to me, I'm cutting your nuts off." Ok, not that drastic, but there's a veiled threat of castration emotionally if we let someone wrong us the same exact way an ex previously did.

But as my date the other night blabbed through not one, not two, not three, but four hours of his ex-capades I could not believe I was still sitting there. Granted, I was thinking "Hey this is a great blog topic. I hope he keeps saying more dumb shit that won't get him a second date" but, that's besides the point. This was a different breed of dude. Most men will maybe wallow over their last love that wrong them, but no joke here, this guy ran through alllll of his ex's, their detailed love story and subsequent breakup and now I know all of them on a first name basis. Yes, talk about a TMI conversation if there ever was one.

I mean I was even one upped in this conversation. It's been awhile since I've had one of those one-upper dates. You know what I'm talking about, it's like that that Pharrell and Clipse song "Mr. Me Too" when you tell a really horrible story about your dating past, or even just a story in general and then he looks at you with a twinkle in his eye and goes "Oh yeah? I got an even BETTER story than that." Really? Is this the bad dating Olympics? What's the WR split time on the amount of time one must listen to these stories?

In reality most ex stories are at its barebones basically the same. Boy meets girl, girl meets boy, they fall in love, they get together, one does the other wrong, other one copes with situation with their arsenal of defense mechanisms while the other rebounds like a champ. Right? So why do we all think that our history, our past, our ex history is more pertinent or relevant than someone else's?

A lot of us cling to excuses to avoid situations in life (me included!). It's like a human pathology to blame circumstance, environment, other people, global warming or fate for the reason things happen to us. Instead though, maybe its a karmic cycle, whereas if you put positive energy out there, positive people and things will come back to you. The opposite occurs as well. I mean how many times have you had one crappy thing happen to you and you let it affect your day and all of a sudden a mountain of other crappy things come tumbling down on top of the one crappy thing? Negativity is like a reverse magnet where instead of a negative charge pulling in a positive charge, the negative push only sends in more negative situations.

So, let's all STOP talking about our negative ex-periences and instead focus on the positives...which of course is yourself. I mean who's more awesome than you? Well, besides me of course.

Red Light, Yellow Light, Green Light... GO!

As I was driving through my 3 stoplight hometown I remembered reading about Stoplight parties in college. I will admit, I had never attended one of these events, but as I was driving I couldn't help but think, "Why can't real dating be like that?"

Now, if you are not familiar with stoplight parties, the basic premise is that you wear a bracelet around your wrist basically telling people at the party what you were looking for. Now I believe it was up to the discretion of the party thrower on what those designations were but the general gist was red=not looking, yellow=maybe after a few drinks you could convince me, and green=yes I'm ready to be laid tonight. I believe some intelligent junior highers developed a more sophisticated code with these parties and wore other coded type bracelets that indicated what sort of sexual acts they were willing to. Bravo public schools, bravo!

So yes, stoplight parties are all fun and wonderful, but what if dating was similar? I mean what if you could wear a certain color bracelet at the grocery store, bar, library, train, wherever you meet people and it indicated what you were looking for, whether it was a long term relationship, a fuck buddy, a one night stand, a sugar daddy, or nothing at all. My life would be so much simpler I swear.

I am a firm believer that men are usually pretty clear on what their intentions are with a woman, but us women being the overcomplicators that we are, inherently add complexity to their intentions to the point where it all becomes giant relationship mush in our heads and the next thing we know we have ourselves full convinced that the guy we slept with the night before after too many trips to the bar is definitely the man we should be marrying. Yeah, we're THAT f'd up.

So, if we all wore little bracelets that denoted what we wanted then there would be less confusion. I'm sure some of you naysayers in the background (yeah I see you), are saying "Whatever, everyone would just lie about what they want just to get what they want". Well, smart ass, I have my Master's more than one thing, sooooo... my brilliant plan is to make these bracelets like mood rings. GENIUS! Thank me later. This way, your mood will dictate what you're looking for that evening. So, next time you roll to the bar post-breakup and your bracelet lights up like a Christmas tree and says "Looking to hook up!" then just blame your hormones, not your bad choices. Problemo solved.

Anyways, I know this is an absolutely ludicrous idea, but it still begs the point that communicating is one of the biggest barriers at the beginning of getting to know someone. So often we feel that we need to tip toe around the big stuff such as the "Where is this going?" talk, or "what do you want from me?" which is ridiculous. I cannot even count the amount of times I've gotten to the point of being around someone thinking "I really like this person, and want to date them" and all of a sudden I bring up that conversation (of course after I'm emotionally attached) and I get totally burned when that person is like "Oh, I was just looking for friends." Thanks asshole. Could have shared that 4 weeks ago. So, don't be afraid to ask those questions that many people think will kill a good thing. It will save you more than your fair share of heartache. Being open, honest and upfront will only bring you back open, honest and upfront feelings in return. I mean why waste your time on another guy just looking for a hookup when you deserve much more?

Bob Villa's Got Nothin' on a Handywoman

With the recent indefinite vacation that God decided I needed to take on my life path, I had the opportunity to wander down to Kentucky to relive my college days. Granted there probably wasn't as much Bourbon or booty dancing as I did in college, but instead I replaced it with too much vodka/redbull and making fun of drunk college girls dancing on stages with too short dresses. Oh how I've matured.

While I'm in the good ol' Bluegrass, I usually end up staying with my friend Kate, who I adore and love. She's two years younger than me, and she's definitely the lady I attribute to my wilder days/side of my life. Regardless of the shenanigans we find ourselves in, we always have a great laugh about it and will have plenty of hysterical stories to share our future daughters... when they're of age of course.

So, it's been awhile since I've had some serious girl time. About 99% of my friends up on the East coast happen to be men, and most of my girlfriends live in the city, so seeing them is few and far happy hours in between. Therefore, I had the chance to catch up with many of my ladies, and the topic of "fixing" men came up.

Women, why do we do this? Invariably all of us have at least at some point in our dating and relationship lives attempted to fix a man. Notice I said "attempted". Guaranteed most of you haven't succeeded. And if you did succeed, ladies the man was probably not worth a damn if he let a woman "fix" him.

Men and women do have certain similarities in that deep down we're all "fixers". The difference though is that men have enough common sense to know that they can fix inanimate objects that are moldable and pliable. Whereas women, we apparently enjoy the challenge of fixing something live and fluid in nature. Maybe it's our competitive spirit. Either way, women receive some sort of devilish pleasure of saying "Yes, he was a bad boy until he met me. He's a changed man." No. He's a dumb man. Or a smart one if he fooled you enough to think you had anything to do with changing him.

Now ladies, I'm sure you are raising your hand like a kid in kindergarten who finally knows the answer to the teacher's question saying "But... but... I truly did change him!" or better yet, "I KNOW a friend who changed her man." Both are mythological creatures much like unicorns, mermaids and chupacabras. You think you saw them, they did a documentary about them, websites are dedicated to them and you even have a Disney movie in the works about it. All do not make them many more realer. (Yeah I'm pretty sure "realer" isn't a word, but the double emphasis was required).

My theory is that a habit of fixing comes from sheer laziness. Because let's be honest, it doesn't take any skill whatsoever to find a loser of a man. In fact, I guarantee that you could walk out to a bar, announce you are female and single and loser dudes will just line up for the taking. It's like a Chinese buffet. There's always plenty to eat, and you're always hungry for more about 30 minutes later.

It takes EFFORT to find a good man. True and genuine effort. Now I'm not saying effort as in you need to scour all the bars, libraries, grocery stores and internet sites forcing yourself to find the right man. (God I need to follow my own advice...dammit, I hate when that happens). The real effort comes in knowing that finding a good man requires you to put in the effort to be patient and wait for him to come to you. Because ladies...men are the same.

With men, their laziness far surpasses yours. It did not take a rocket scientist to inform those loser dudes to line up at your doorstep, nor did it take them any effort to do so. You came out and said "I'm ready, I'm willing and I'll try anything." Loser men can smell desperation like sharks smell blood in the water. They got ya, hook, line and sinker. Bad set up, I know.

To know someone is truly interested in you, let them do the work. Men are simple hunters in the truest sense in that they enjoy the pursuit (and I don't want ANY men saying otherwise, because if it was easy to catch you would never ever want it). I know this is a line that your mother and grandmother have told for years. Normally it comes in the wrapped up box of "Don't give it up too soon", but what mama is trying to tell you is, "Make him work for it!".

So, if you want a non-lazy, hard working, ambitious, and smart man you need to get rid of your lazy habits as well. Throw out your dating tool belt filled with loser-attracting arsenal. Instead, invest in something worth your time, every time. You.

The Friendly Inquisition

Have you ever stopped to count how many times people speak in cliches in any given conversation? Recently I've been going through some transitions, namely I was laid off from my regular full time gig (so expect to see lots more from me!) and I moved to a new apartment shortly before previously mentioned incident. Love the timing of my life right? I apparently am a clusterfunk of ill timing and missed opportunities. However, I think I'd prefer to believe that all of these awkward missteps are leading up to one giantly awesome leap into a world much cooler than the one I think revolves around me.

I learned through this transition though that being laid off has many parallels and often similar advice given from others as dating does. There are three key questions that people ask both those of us who are laid off and those of us who have been put on an indefinite relationship sabbatical. I guess if you really think about it, dating could be considered my part time job, so I should halfway expect the advice and concern to be similar.

Question #1: What happened?

Usually when you drop a bomb on someone about your personal life whether its work or relationship oriented their feigned curiosity kicks in. Half the time I believe this need for satiation comes from a deep desire of 1) voyeurism and 2) people pray that shit like this never happens to them, so they desperately search for a solid reason other than "I don't know" to reassure them that it could never possibly happen to them. Regardless, when you'd like your comeback answer to be something really cool like and slightly understandable "Oh yeah, Joe Schmo who I was dating ditched me for Angelina Jolie. Bummer. But he did what he had to do." Instead though you're usually caught between a rock and a hard place on this question. Why? Because one, you either have absolutely no clue what in the world happened and you've been asking this same nonsensical question over and over again to yourself with no avail so how in the world could you answer it for someone else? Or two, the real answer is probably something that will lead to even more probing and nosy questions from even your most compassionate of friends. (I learned this one the hard way after telling people "Oh yeah, well I was cheated on for 4 years." That's like lobbing up a high ball to a .500 batter.)

Question #2: What are you going to do?

WTF? Yeah that's normally my response. People, especially men always want to know what your immediate plan of action is after any catastrophic event. Us women on the other hand, well we need some to process before we push through. Because if you ask me immediately afterwards I may give you an awkward, unexpected response like "Oh, I dunno maybe cry all night over a bowl of ice cream and then down a whole bottle of red wine and pray there's no puke on my sheets come morning." Let's avoid that one hmm shall we?

Question #3: What can I do?

Ok, so this one is a bit trickier. This is the point in the conversation where people are attempting to "be there" for you. Cut them some slack, I know, I know. But really the honest answer is "Nothing" or something insane like "Find me an NFL husband." Bottomline is, don't ask what you can do, just try and do cool things like bring them junk food, or get them drunk. Those are usually fail safes.

Either way, questions in crisis more or less border on redundancy after you talk to the first person. If you are like me, the smart-assery of the responses exponentially increase with each additional person asking the question. Therefore, if you're bottom on the friend chain and are one of the last to find out, then prepare for the wrath... I suppose this only further ensures that you'll never move up the friend ladder. Maybe I should rotate that more... nah.

Oh No, the Stars are Not Aligned, Sorry

I would like to believe in all things destiny in fate, but every once in awhile my logical brain as well as the ingrained Western values of free will slowly kick in and remind me that I have the ability to control my life and the path it follows. However, in times of uncertainty or when I feel like my life is wholly off-kilter, blaming things like cosmic forces and fatalistic destinies are much easier to absorb than thinking that I effed up my life, consciously. Now, as a curious follower, I do read my horoscope on a daily basis and I always find them so fascinating and utterly amusing. I will even admit when I’m with someone and I find out their birthday I google those crazy horoscope compatibility charts to see if our star signs align. Apparently Leos are good for me haha.

So as I read my daily horoscope and come across days where it tells me I will meet a mysterious stranger who sweeps me off my feet or I will follow my horrible Aries ways and come on too strong too early and kill the poor soul of a weak man, I couldn’t help but wonder what my love life would be like if I examined it as if it was pre-destined and horoscopes were my daily hints of what’s to come.

In sociology there is this great concept of self-fulfilling prophecies. Basically when someone tells you that you’re going to be a certain way enough, you begin to believe them. Case in point I tell myself how awesome I am and I totally believe it. So, therefore, if I convince myself that whatever my horoscope hints at is going to happen, it should happen right? That’s what the “Secret” is about right? Visualizing things coming into your life. It could work.

Maybe I should screw trying to control everything in my life and take some advice from the cosmos and think “no worries, someone else is taking care of it”. Some people may think that’s too constraining or that it extinguishes any sort of purpose to their lives if they know that someone else is in charge. However, to me knowing that someone or something else is taking care of it, well it’s kind of comforting. Because well, if I don’t find love, then I know it’s not me to blame, it was only just my purpose.