Stepping Away from the Search

I actually wrote this post last week, but I didn't post it lest it be seen as a "single woman ranting due to Valentine's Day" post. This ain't that.

Last week I started working on a post called "Sexually Liberated and Looking for Love." It was spurred by several things, one being a post on another blog about love being harder to find since sex is easier to get. I started thinking about it and it made sense. Maybe it didn't pay to be a woman who is open & honest about her sexuality. After all, I was living in a fantasy world, thinking adults could be real with each other about what they wanted and expected. Turns out that's not the case. Just because I can say "Look, this is just going to be sex" or "I want a relationship with you but I'm ready to fuck you now" doesn't mean that everyone is on that level. Folks still feel the need to lie and scheme their way into some pussy. Who knew?! Apparently, everyone else.

So I said, "These prudes must be on to something. Imma put the goodies on lockdown and make a man earn it." Nevermind the self-deprivation involved, or the fact that I know happy couples that got down to business relatively quickly. Not getting it in was gonna get me loved!

But the more I thought about it, the less appealing the whole thing was. Not just the idea of not having sex, but the prospect of looking for love in general. Honestly the whole process is quite tiresome. Yes the initial flirtation is fun, but I'm tired of learning about new people, trying to remember info about who they are and what they like and yadda yadda yadda. Getting used to their idiosyncracies and learning what makes them tick, which is never what makes me or any of the guys from the past tick. Trying to decipher when their silence is out of anger, shyness, sleepiness, boredom... I guess I'm just lazy now, but I'm not trying to do all that.

And I am also willing to admit that after some bad breaks, I'm a little gun-shy. I don't want to be one of those women who drags past hurts into new relationships & assumes that every guy is going to lie, cheat, etc. But I don't want to be naive and suffer the same pain over and over again. I've done that enough. In the words of Amir Sulaiman, I'd "prefer a broken neck to another broken heart."

So the online dating profiles have been removed. The offers from friends to hook me up with someone have been declined. The expectation of love, marriage and a family aren't completely gone, but they've cooled significantly. My time, energy and passion are going into my work and myself. I'd rather invest in a future with the one and only person I can count on to be there for me--myself--than waste time on a temporary feeling with a man who may be gone the next time the wind blows.