the crazy stops here…every fifteen minutes

When not inspired by one story or experience, my writing is usually prompted by a recurring pattern or subject that appears in unrelated places. In this case, I stalled quite a bit and had to be heavily provoked by the universe. Somewhere between the bazillionth unsolicited suggestion that I play hard to get, and an article firmly declaring Meg Ryan movies responsible for the corrosion of family culture, this post was born.

While I excel at feigning coyness, I’m completely incapable of playing hard to get, and furthermore, it seems an awfully unstable foundation to begin anything. At what point does one stop attempting to engender behavior and begin to evaluate behavior? I don’t want to know what I can trick a man into, I’m trying to find out what he’s inspired to. The latter is sustainable, and the former is an exhausting way to live.

A better plan: actually being hard to get. Ideally, just hard to keep, but that’s akin to walking a tightrope. This is the point where one suggests having a full, rich life- accurate but worthless advice to the overly eager. The only cure for desperation is an abundant dose of one’s own medicine. When another human being slowly tightens the noose of pressure and expectation around your windpipe just because you were nearby, had the appropriate organs and an assortment of vague redeeming qualities? That will do it.

Strategy is all about power plays and control games, and if I’ve learned a thing about love relationships, it is that one ought not search for a worthy opponent. In exchange for being straightforward and direct, I expect my boundaries to be honored, and breaches or passive-aggression are red flags of disrespect.

Ideally, I’d like to share my life with someone who actually wants to work together towards a shared vision. I still have mountains to climb in my creative and professional life, my moderate chronic wanderlust occasionally flares to ragingly acute. Being expected to concede my interests to someone else’s agenda fills me with a woozy panic that makes my chest tight and my tongue sharp. Better that he has goals and interests and friends and things too, so that he doesn’t feel betrayed by my need for solitude and the frequent impromptu adventure. This leaves a very nice space for everyone to breathe and grow.

It also makes me sound very strong and independent, which I absolutely am, for a girl…

I require a certain standard of care before I’ll invest trust. Because I’m a delicious little piece of psycho pie, the loving gets in front of the trusting sometimes, and I respond very poorly to the risk exposure. It makes me hyper-vigilant; just like the corporate executives that called every hour on the hour for income statement estimates after a particularly fruitful or trying month. Except that I know (usually) that the hyper-vigilance hurts the cause, so I withdraw to keep my fruity filling hidden. I want to see what happens without my interference, which is likely to be heavy-handed from that mindset, anyway.

So when Harry races through the streets of New York to tell Sally he loves her, when Big finds Carrie in Paris and whispers “you’re the one, you were always the one”, I’m both disgusted and delighted.

Furthering the fantasy that an emotionally unavailable man is going to suddenly open like a lotus flower and pull your sweet ass into the blinding white light of eternal happiness is just pointless and cruel. I’m of the school of thought that no man is emotionally unavailable, really, they are just not emotionally available to you. Watch the right woman come along- they drop like flies. I’ve seen the mightiest bachelors melt like warm molasses before my very eyes.

Still, what gives me sillygirlheart about the dramatic reunion isn’t new year’s eve tuxedoes or romantic speeches, it isn’t the pink fluffy skirt or the streets of Paris. It’s that unequivocal surrender, the admission that even though love is messy and challenging, they can’t imagine a life without the other person in it.

Those moments don’t usually come in dramatic fashion. They slip in under the door, or through an open window, and settle gently over the bed like an extra blanket. You don’t notice it as much as you notice yourself stretching out in the newfound warmth, and suddenly that twinge of stiffness in your leg puts a smile on your face as you remember why you’re so cozy.

The world is so big now; the economic model that kept men, women and marriages small is so much dust. Chris Ryan speaks of “facing the sky” in Sex at Dawn, that phase in a relationship when you find yourself halfway around the ferris wheel, recommending that couples negotiate boundaries and rules through honest discussion and mutual respect. His context is monogamy and traditional marriage, but its usefulness far exceeds that single aspect of relationships.

The most imperative quality in a partner and a relationship is the willingness to live and grow together, to carve out a bond that gives two people security and freedom. Someone who sees life and love as a constant process of facing the sky, over and over again, who senses commitment as a beginning instead of an ending.

Happy endings make lovely fairy tales for little girls, but I want a happy beginning.

Christmas, for me, has always been about the best of human nature. As a Catholic child, it meant loving others in Christ’s likeness; forgiving those who trespass against us, sharing my blessings with those in need, and treating my neighbor as myself. Oh, and staying on Santa’s “nice” list, of course, but in my house, that meant having a Christian attitude anyway.

Certainly, my mother ensured that the Christmas tree burst forth with mountains of gifts on Christmas morning, all painstakingly wrapped in pretty paper and mile upon mile of pigtailed ribbon. My childhood Christmases were nothing short of magical, even after I recognized her familiar script on Santa’s gift tags.

The weeks leading up to Christmas morning, however, were entirely about love, kindness and charity. We baked endless cookies, to be delivered to neighbors and damn near every staff member at school by yours truly, a personal thank you from Mama to any soul that ever looked out for her kids.

We bought the softest, warmest gloves and hats for my elementary school’s “mitten tree”, and she made sure that I understood the heartbreaking connection between its purpose and my classmates who were carefully sent to the library for recess: their parents couldn’t even afford proper clothing for the Michigan winters. I hoped that my contribution to that tree would have them sledding and slinging snowballs with the rest of us in the new year.

It wasn’t until high school, when I got involved with Junior Civitan that I really understood the desperation and sorrow behind the mitten tree, the canned food drives, and the wish lists from social services. I met an angry single mother that hissed insults at us as we unloaded a full Thanksgiving dinner onto her kitchen counters, and an elderly couple living in a tin shack with dirt-packed floors. It frightened and saddened me indeliably to truly understand the depth and breadth of my blessings.

A few short years later, I was finishing some last-minute shopping on Christmas Eve when the oil light lit up my dashboard. Panicked, I pulled into an oil change place and prayed that someone would at least be around to sell me a few quarts of oil for my old, dying car. There was a guy in the garage, he’d come by to pick something up he’d forgotten the night before. He filled my engine and put a case of oil in my trunk, with strict instructions to add a quart every time I put gas in it, and refused to take even the money for the two or so quarts I could afford.

Just a few years ago, a coworker was distraught over a mistake in her checkbook register that meant she couldn’t afford the big gift she planned on for her son. B and I hardly even had to exchange looks; we both put a few twenties in an envelope and slipped it into her inbox, unnoticed. We were eventually discovered, unwittingly, and I found myself staring into a pair of big brown eyes full of guilt, shame and disbelief. She wanted to know why we were compelled to fix her “stupid” mistake, and she wanted to “make it right” when she could.

“Because we’ve all made that mistake in our checkbooks. Because your kid deserves that wide-eyed gasp I always had. Because I have it to spare. Because that’s how my Mama raised me. Because it made my heart light and happy. Because I love you. Because this is what Christmas is really about, and don’t you dare give a penny of it back.”

We wept in each other’s arms.

She offered it to me later, driven by the hopelessness behind my eyes, and probably the knowledge that B was helping me sneak the space heater out of the lobby at night and out of the trunk of my car in the morning. I still refused, because forty dollars wasn’t even close to solving my problems and because I’m so damn prideful sometimes.

This year, I haven’t had an opportunity to perform a significant act of kindness, so I’ve decided to settle for sending tidings of comfort and joy to people that have made my life so much sweeter. I’d like to start with you, whoever you are. If you’re reading these words, you’ve encouraged me to keep writing, and in so doing, you’ve compelled me to live and love better. Your silent witness casts a soft, moon-lit glow on the path that leads me home. Thank you.

Merry Christmas, y’all.