When I was a little girl, I used to play with Barbie Dolls. I'd make them get together, go out on dates, get married, have kids. My sexually abused little warped mind would even let them "make the baby" but it was interesting. I had no idea what it took to make a relationship work but I knew it involved all of that. These days, I think of relationships more in the Doomsday sense. No matter what you do, no matter how hard you try, eventually things are going to fall to pieces. A relationship is an amazing concept. You take 2 people who were slightly interested in each other. . . sometimes highly (for whatever reasons, intellect (bah!), sex appeal, security and what have you) and you throw them together and see what happens. It's almost like a high school chemistry experiment, I suppose that's where the whole chemistry thing comes from anyway. The problem is, every once in a while you'll hit, but you miss more often.
In my time I have been with a few guys. I don't have the extensive collection of exes like the girls from Sex in the City, but most of them I wouldn't even consider an ex. I was telling a friend about how any little thing can jepardize your relationship. The first boyfriend I ever had was a guy in the second grade. Oh I was inlove. . . well as inlove as an 8 year old can be. This little boy was the first to really break my heart (not counting abusive situations). But even as a second grader I knew, he was too good for me, too good in the sense that he was a stunning looking 8 year old and I was a round and awkward girl. Long story short, I caught him kissing another girl and I gave him a swift kick between the legs and ran off before he could hit me (second grade boys hit back).
My one question is, why was I mad. Sure you may say, well, he was cheating on you. But then, my question would be, how did I know he was cheating? My mother had never talked to me about only having one man in my life and me being his only woman. I mean I was a second grader, she wasn't supposed to. My mother wasn't married to my father so I knew that it was okay to do that (I hadn't learned the ins and outs of Christian living yet). How did I know that what he did to me was wrong? I would say it's instinctual. With humans, there is a instant jealousy that comes when something you thought was yours is suddenly being used by someone else, it is the law of Kindergarten playtime. Even at our smallest we are inherently evil creatures. All that aside, I find it interesting that at 8 years old, I instinctually knew that this guy was "fooling around" and that it was bad.
My future relationships would be no better. As I learned more about what real relationships looked like, my view was still jaded. After third grade, the only man I had at home was my Great Grandfather and I arrived to late on the planet to meet his wife, come to think of it, Papa, that's what we called him, was married twice! I often forget that fact. Anyway, my mother had separated from my stepfather, good riddance as far as I was concerned. He treated my mom horribly and my mother convinced us that he was cheating on her. . . at third grade, I knew for certain that cheating was wrong because I watched my mom cry about it. Was that a real realtionship? Filled with hurt and mistrust? So far as I knew.
Needless to say, the more you learn the more interesting your Barbie dramas become. Enter the love triangle. Barbie was dating Ken but now, the lovely Sasha comes on the scene dressed to impress. While Barbie is not home, Ken does the wild monkey dance with Sasha. This type of relationship became typical among my dolls. I didn't know it but I was training myself. If Ken loved Barbie, why would he do such things? Of course Ken always got back together with Barbie, but that was after a real violent drama sometimes ending with the death of Sasha at the hands of a seething (while still maintaining her smile) Barbie. Again training myself. Not only was I setting myself up to have a lack of trust when it came to men, I also was training myself to be needy. Barbie always went back to Ken. No matter how bad he treated her, she went back to him. I was training myself to say that a woman's worth is in her man. I didn't have many Kens so she always went back to the same one. Everytime.
While I do think that Barbie is the bane of a little girl's existence, don't take this as a shot at Mattel. No, this was play imitating life. Eventually play ended. Barbies were put away and not seen again, and real relationships began to arise. In junior high, I was inlove. Madly with two different guys. How does this happen? I don't know. I guess I was just keeping my options open. The second guy wasn't an interest until after the first guy graduated, but I still had the hots for the first guy anyway. . . if you follow me. Blaine was a white male with that sort of chain smoking aoura. He wore black most of the time and his skin was pale. For a black girl to be interested in anything that looked like that didn't line up with the circle of life, but alas, I was inlove. Blaine knew I existed but I think I was more like background for him. I tried to get him to notice me. The more he ignored me, the deeper I fell. I was obsessed with him by the end of it. I wasn't able to even get over him until the second guy came along and then this guy actually was black. I saw him in a different part of my life. I think mentally I don't even connect the two. They seem like two different times in my life but they weren't. This guy was also older and rode the bus with me. Having been sexually abused in the past, I let him take advantage of me. I think I only ever felt shame when I was with him, yet I let him do it. I wisened up to the fact that I was just a toy to him. He would never deal with me in public. He had his beautiful girls. But when he couldn't get anything from them he would throw himself on me sometimes violently all under the ignorant eyes of our bus driver, may she rest in peace.
So what I had learned up until this point is that, if a man is interested in you, you have to give him what he wants (which is usually sex) to stay interested, but eventually he will go to someone else anyway. From a seventh grader's perspective, this seemed logical. As I grew, went on to high school, there were more relationships like the one with Blaine. I loved them, they didn't notice me. My self image was worsened if that was possible, by the constant rejections. My attempts to connect with smart, nice guys was foiled at every turn. Obsessions were a constant thing, especially with Torrance, a very intelligent, very sweet, saxaphone player. Torrance stole my heart in high school and I obsessed over him for most of those years. Even when there were just as smart, just as nice guys actually wanting to be with me, I obsessed over someone who paid no attention to me. This was serious business and I'm sure I developed an ulcer or two over it. My junior year (he was a senior) I finally got up the nerve to ask him to the Band Dance (we both were in band - hey band was cool in the south!). He said yes! I was amazed, shocked and excited all at the same time. I was also amazed, shocked, and sad when he stood me up. Yet I didn't give up on this guy. Ironically, I even hesitate to call him a jerk now.
I kept up hope in situations where hopelessness was obvious, I ignored other good possibilities. I'm on a roll here with this. That wasn't the end of my high school career. During my obsession with Torrance, I did let my guard down because one special guy who was as cute as all get out (country talk here) was interested in me. By the time I was in high school I was obviously over weight, my hair was bad and my behavior was awkward, yet this very handsome guy was interested in me. He were together for a while and he actually cared for me! I stand in disbelief to this day. My low self-esteem wouldn't have it, I just knew like Barbie should have known, that there is some gorgeous girl waiting to take him from me. So, for fear of losing him, I let him go. I wasn't even sad about it. He was a great guy and I wasn't sad I lost him. He was too good for me and somehow, society had taught me that. Even my peers said it so it was obvious to everyone that someone this great looking was wrong for me. Though no one disagreed that Torrance and I should be together, even though he was cute, on the basis that we were both nerds.
After high school, a negative thing happened. I continued my obsessions over various people but it was less attachment. I moved out to California where it was much easier to be "in the world." I could walk up the street without and catch a bus to meet people. The internet made this much easier. So at 18, I began to live that way. Meet people on the net, and occasionally meet them in person. But a major negativity was the internet. Older guys loved the fact that I was 18. They wanted to call me up and talk dirty or 'cyber'. I won't focus too much on the internet except that it let shy girls like me crack out of their shells.
My first internet meeting was with a guy that was 33. At the time I was still 18 I think. Had to be. I talked to him on "The Palace," this cool virtual reality program. You could actually see the things in the room like the bed and the flashing hotel lights. It's actually kinda fun. I met him on there and he wanted to meet me. I caught a bus one night all dressed up in the best things I could find and I met him at a coffee shop. We were there for all of 10 minutes before he suggested we go down to Hollywood and hang out. I was 18, and I got into a car with a man I did not know who took me far away from my home. They wonder how these girls get chopped up and left on the side of the road. I was naieve. He took me down to near where they have that famous walk of fame. We parked. He had a truck with a camper over the back. He started kissing me and etc. Then he said the words I will never forget, "Let's just get this over with," and he urged me into a tight fit into the back of his truck. I was not sure about it but I let it happen. He was touching me and I told him I actually had my monthly visitor. He didn't care about that. He was touching me anyway. When I asked him at least did he have protection, he looked around his truck and found a candy wrapper. I have never thought I was worth so little. When I was like, "uh, no." He said, well at least you can do this. He lowered my head and I did the thing that I'd seen pictures of women doing but never thought it would be so gross. Afterwards we walked around and he bought me a key chain. I had just given him oral sex and he gave me a key chain. When he took me home he decided to take a detour. He pulled off on the side of the road and wanted it again. I did it all the while feeling disgusted and as he lay there in contentment I began to talk about how I wonder what my guardian angel was doing at the time. . . probably starring at me in anger or turning away in shame. I never saw him again. We talked on the phone and he told me his mother was a racist so it wouldn't work out. The bastard.
As if I hadn't done enough, I had my first long distance, long damaging relationship. When I went to college in Iowa, I started using UseNet groups. Just posting and saying 'hi'. I was looking for someone foreign and I met a German physics teacher. We wrote each other a few times and then he said something which made me want to bring him into my dirty little world. Mind you, he was using a language translator and barely spoke english. He said something about my letters "twanged erotically." I laugh at this now. So we started calling each other and having phone sex. Ah the joys. I didn't care that we were both running up such expensive phone bills. We were serious about each other. We talked about marriage. He bought me tickets to Germany. I never got to go because of issues getting a passport, but we were pretty damn serious. He was all I thought about. I was supposed to see him on my birthday but instead I settled for a call. He'd baked me a cake and everything. I was inlove.
I came back to California and finally got to meet him. We were together for almost 2 weeks before I managed to completely sabatoge the relationship. After almost a year of long distance, it took less that two weeks in person to ruin it. Why was that? He said I was too obsessed with sex! IRONY at it's finest. I spent 5 months in a deep depression, often speaking of suicide. I ask myself why. Because Barbie always went back to Ken. Without Ken what was she? Just another girl. I had lost my Ken. Ken was hope, Ken was rescue. Now I had to make it on my own and I didn't know how. When my step mom asked me about my future, all I could tell her was that I saw black, nothingness. I droned in everything I did. Finally everyone had an intervention with me to snap me out of it and I was better. I don't even know what I had lost. . .attention? Did this spawn from not having mail attention as a child?
How did I snap out of it? Did that really do it? People telling me to stop moping? Wow. Well I moved on, I got a good job that I loved. I carried on other non-significant relationships that were long distance. Infact I was looking for it! Why was I looking for someone far away? I couldn't answer that. I'll leave it up to the Freuds out there.
Still as I grew older, I saw relationships played out from friends and family. I saw the difficulty. I hardly ever saw the good. But for some reason I wanted it. I saw that a woman's worth increased tenfold if she had a man. I still beg the question, why is this? My whole nature, my whole existence was based on finding a man and starting a family even though most of those people I saw were unhappy. I bounced all over the place trying to find a man who would love me. I even had a thing for my best friend for a while. When I finally gave up hope, I landed on an old man who wanted to sell me vitamins. The skepticism in me shunned him for his age, but the lover in me was drawn to it.
When I see an older white male, for some reason he just exhudes stability and that is what I wanted in my life. Perhaps that's why marriage is so great, you get to be stable. Perhaps that is all anyone is ever looking for. I felt I had found it in a man that lived 400 miles away. This was closer than Germany so I thought I was doing good. He and I got into each other deeply and passionately. I couldn't see the instability in him because I was always wearing what he said was 'Rose Colored Glasses.' He didn't see the instability in himself. I read a great book during our relationship called "Things Fall Apart" by Dr. Chinua Achebe and while I should have understood this book in one way, I saw it as an answer for him. We were passionate and cold. It was a cycle. I was always passionate, but he went through his cycles. A few times I did things just to shake him up but like Barbie I always came back to him. I needed him to validate my existence. When he finally came crashing down with a life crisis, I thought my love for him would make us prevail. I couldn't see he was more unstable than even I had been. I fought for our relationship and eventually he asked me to marry him. We were two sides of the same coin. He asked me because it's what I wanted. From that day forward, I never saw him again. That was nearly a year ago. Long distance makes it easy to forget people. So forget about me he did. I called him constantly, I said hopeful things sometimes, I said mean things sometimes, anything I could do to get a response out of him. I reminded him of how much he liked sleeping with me, I reminded him of how exciting I made his life but still he was able to let me go. My life ceased to make sense. Who wants Barbie without Ken? What can she do for herself? Sure you can go out in the world and be successful but if you don't have love, what is it worth?
I saw success for myself a lost cause. I didn't need to be happy if I couldn't make someone else happy. And like the book said, things did fall apart. No matter how hard Okonkwo tried, his world came crashing down before him. He couldn't make himself change but the world continued to change and he became like a dinosaur, extinct, past his time. He couldn't change so he got left behind. Perhaps that is the key to success in this life. You have to change to fit your environment. Don't hate me Christians but Darwin was on to something. Survival of the fittest, if you don't have the right tools to survive, you will die.
The real question is what change is needed. That depends entirely on the situation. Decisions have to be made, self-worth has to be established. If you don't love yourself, you actually can love someone else, but you can't love them properly. In the end if you don't love yourself, you will begin to hate yourself. If you look at a pair of binary stars, they are both feeding off each other so one never gets weak while the other thrives. Whereas, if a star (me) is next to a blackhole, i.e. my ex, they suck everything you have and leave nothing behind. It's not his fault entirely, the fault was in my perception of things.
No one has to shut themselves off entirely like I did, but there is something to be said for having time to love yourself. A woman is worth something alone. Sometimes she can be worth even more but she'll be worth nothing if she loses herself in a relationship.
Here are some things a woman can do to find herself again:
Actually there is only one thing. . . SPEND TIME ALONE! Not even with friends because if you are the type I am, you want to say and do what pleases them. Go to a movie alone. Then you are forced to make the decision, which movie do 'I' actually want to see. Where do 'I' actually want to sit. Go driving alone! As yourself, where do 'I' want to go. Before you know it, you'll be able to actually ask yourself, "Which man do I actually want to be with?" Then you will find that you don't have to go through so many frogs to get a prince or you might find, you actually like your life and you don't need a prince because you're already a queen.
