I’ve been fairly lucky in love in that even in my relatively short time dating, I have experienced some great love. The love of cheesy movies and letters passed down to grandchildren (literally, my college ex wrote me letters from overseas every day for four months). I remember how we met: on a cruise ship somewhere between Italy and Spain. I remember how our courtship started: he wrote me an email and called me the Jewel of the sea (our cruise ship’s namesake as well) and so began nearly 4 years of one of the most beautiful, passionate romances I have ever been witness to, never mind experienced. I remember our breakup too: a tearful embrace in the foyer of my apartment building, an uncertainty of when we’d see each other again (It’ll be two years this March).

In a perfect world, this great story would have led to our great love and our great love to a great relationship and subsequent marriage. But we weren’t right for each other and we knew it probably from very early on in the relationship. So what made us stick it out, aside from our young-twenties inexperience? What makes so many people try to fix something broken? The beauty of the story.

We loved telling our story. We loved when people told us how brave we were to try and work things out with an ocean between us. Every trip to see each other was the next hit of a powerful drug, reaffirmed by the praise and admiration we received from friends, acquaintances, and family. But behind closed doors, when no one was telling us how cute we looked together, we knew it wasn’t working.

You know what makes for a better story than how you met? How you stayed together. How you stayed happy together. My admiration is not for those who are lucky enough to meet in a wonderfully poetic way, my admiration is for those who met in a completely ordinary fashion and worked together to turn their relationship into something extraordinary.

Happy dating!

-Mel

Over the past few months, I have been in communications of a romantic nature with a gentleman from my past. We have derived no implications from this contact and have imposed no terms on one another. Considering our present geography, which would make a functional relationship untenable, this is for the best. It feels nice though to experience mutual positive feelings again for a male person, with no scorn or apathy present. So positive and mutual are these feelings, I have gone so far as to inform my mother of the existence of this renewed contact.

Discussing any previous boyfriend figure with my mom in a present-tense manner, though, can be touchy. Not only is the assumption that if something ended once, there was likely good reason for it, she also has a terrific detailed memory of every displeasing action every person I have dated took against me. Her memory did not spare the gentleman in question. Luckily, I am a media professional, with the skill to highlight the humanity of the most brutal of neighborhood cat killers.  This male more-than-friend of mine is not exactly a cat killer, so the conversation was simple and easy, and the conclusion from my mother was that he sounds “very nice.”

I am a strategic business counsel for a corporation. Oftentimes, my days are filled with client meetings and implementing initiatives. As you can imagine, the end result doesn’t always favor our clients’ preferences.  As a result, we often have briefings and even client exit interviews, which got me thinking… what if dates had exit interviews?  I think we would be blown away if honest feedback and data were collected from our dates. I find it truly fascinating when two people view the same situation (ie date)/conversation two different ways.  It makes you wonder, were we on the same date??? So my idea: An exit interview, or better yet, a trip advisor for dating.  You may receive interesting feedback that you wouldn’t have normally considered.  Granted, sometimes a date can be great even if it lacks chemistry.   However, if there are some major gender faux pas, false steps, that your ex never had the heart to articulate, wouldn’t you want to know?  Don’t we all want to be the best singles? And isn’t dating a huge component of connecting with people and building relationships, just with some added romance?
Exit interviews, something to think about..

This weekend I am attending the wedding of two of my closest friends. It is hard to predict what the exact nature of my emotional response to the proceedings will be. I am not the type of girl to act like a girl, but occasions of this magnitude are capable of breaking down whatever barriers normally prevent me from squealing with delight and from exercising my tear ducts out of happiness. With no explanations or apologies, I plan to gush during this demonstration of genuine love. When it’s over, I will be forced to acknowledge that romance is not a dead medium for human expression like I often insist. It is very much alive. The fact that my hand is not being held as I walk through New York City parks is not a product of a disenchanted zeitgeist, but rather a product of my own choices. Speaking of walks, my friends will do so down an aisle and then profess their love for one another before the eyes of their friends and family. As they do so, I will reconsider my staunch policies on commitment phobia.