BLOG » i used to be so scared…
I used to be so grateful when a guy liked me. So thankful he had put his attention on me. Until one day, I grew up and became a bit more discerning. I realized that I have a say in who I let into my life. That they should be so lucky to be inside me and a part of my world. Just because they were skinny or stylish or just, well, a dude- didn’t mean they were the be all, end all. just because they were men, and spending time with me, didn’t mean they were gods and that i had to be appreciative of the fact that they chose me. me! i don’t know exactly WHEN i realized that I’m just as important as i thought they were, but I’m so happy that day came! it’s changed me forever and for that i am grateful! Unfortunately, I really love make outs- so I still made out a ton after i had this epiphany! But at least it was much more thought out and i was the one doing the choosing.
Ugh I wish I could have this realization…
To come to this realization is very empowering.
We, guys, also have a similar tendency. Actually, it was much more prevalent in the past.
Hemingway captured the tendency for a man to cling on to the first women who shows him interest in his book, “The Sun Also Rises.” I always have to caution people before I recommend this book to them because it does have some culturally offensive material in it. However, if you read the book in the spirit in which Hemingway intended it to be read than you can ignore the ignorance of the time to get the real message.
Also, Hemingway is not given enough credit for the amount of work he wrote specifically about relationships between men and women.
A perfect example that you can read online is his famous very, very short, short story, “Hill Like White Elephants.”
I think our generation is fortunate in that more of us are able to learn the above perspective because we are not expected to be married with a family in our early twenties. In the past, women would learn this lesson too late into a marriage and be trapped the same for men.
Good job. This fact is so crucial for girls to understand it sucks that they don’t come to it sooner. And I agree with “that guy”…Guys also have a similar tendency. I think it’s the whole “I don’t want to die alone” complex. Two words: You won’t. <3
thank you! i’m gonna read “Hill Like White Elephants” now.
It’s great to come to this realization, but I have not although I’m already 27, and I fear that if I don’t come to it soon I will be stuck forever. I guess one needs to be confident, happy with their lives, with considerate romantic credential, getting sufficient attention to feel this way. First thing I need to do is to lose some weight.
Hmm… is this a repeat post?
Actually, if you don’t mind I’ll post the story here. I searched it and did not realize some dicey sites are featuring the story. It’s short enough that it can fit in a reply:
Hint about the story: At that time, abortions were illegal in America. The whole chaotic dynamic of the story is actually very, very realistic. Even today. In the end, it is a very sad story and says a lot about expectations, love, and self-interest.
Hills Like White Elephants Complete Story
By Ernest Hemingway
The hills across the valley of the Ebro were long and white. On this side there was no shade and no trees and the station was between two lines of rails in the sun. Close against the side of the station there was the warm shadow of the building and a curtain, made of strings of bamboo beads, hung across the open door into the bar, to keep out flies. The American and the girl with him sat at a table in the shade, outside the building. It was very hot and the express from Barcelona would come in forty minutes. It stopped at this junction for two minutes and went to Madrid.
‘What should we drink?’ the girl asked. She had taken off her hat and put it on the table.
‘It’s pretty hot,’ the man said.
‘Let’s drink beer.’
‘Dos cervezas,’ the man said into the curtain.
‘Big ones?’ a woman asked from the doorway.
‘Yes. Two big ones.’
The woman brought two glasses of beer and two felt pads. She put the felt pads and the beer glass on the table and looked at the man and the girl. The girl was looking off at the line of hills. They were white in the sun and the country was brown and dry.
‘They look like white elephants,’ she said.
‘I’ve never seen one,’ the man drank his beer.
‘No, you wouldn’t have.’
‘I might have,’ the man said. ‘Just because you say I wouldn’t have doesn’t prove anything.’
The girl looked at the bead curtain. ‘They’ve painted something on it,’ she said. ‘What does it say?’
‘Anis del Toro. It’s a drink.’
‘Could we try it?’
The man called ‘Listen’ through the curtain. The woman came out from the bar.
‘Four reales.’ ‘We want two Anis del Toro.’
‘With water?’
‘Do you want it with water?’
‘I don’t know,’ the girl said. ‘Is it good with water?’
‘It’s all right.’
‘You want them with water?’ asked the woman.
‘Yes, with water.’
‘It tastes like liquorice,’ the girl said and put the glass down.
‘That’s the way with everything.’
‘Yes,’ said the girl. ‘Everything tastes of liquorice. Especially all the things you’ve waited so long for, like absinthe.’
‘Oh, cut it out.’
‘You started it,’ the girl said. ‘I was being amused. I was having a fine time.’
‘Well, let’s try and have a fine time.’
‘All right. I was trying. I said the mountains looked like white elephants. Wasn’t that bright?’
‘That was bright.’
‘I wanted to try this new drink. That’s all we do, isn’t it – look at things and try new drinks?’
‘I guess so.’
The girl looked across at the hills.
‘They’re lovely hills,’ she said. ‘They don’t really look like white elephants. I just meant the colouring of their skin through the trees.’
‘Should we have another drink?’
‘All right.’
The warm wind blew the bead curtain against the table.
‘The beer’s nice and cool,’ the man said.
‘It’s lovely,’ the girl said.
‘It’s really an awfully simple operation, Jig,’ the man said. ‘It’s not really an operation at all.’
The girl looked at the ground the table legs rested on.
‘I know you wouldn’t mind it, Jig. It’s really not anything. It’s just to let the air in.’
The girl did not say anything.
‘I’ll go with you and I’ll stay with you all the time. They just let the air in and then it’s all perfectly natural.’
‘Then what will we do afterwards?’
‘We’ll be fine afterwards. Just like we were before.’
‘What makes you think so?’
‘That’s the only thing that bothers us. It’s the only thing that’s made us unhappy.’
The girl looked at the bead curtain, put her hand out and took hold of two of the strings of beads.
‘And you think then we’ll be all right and be happy.’
‘I know we will. Yon don’t have to be afraid. I’ve known lots of people that have done it.’
‘So have I,’ said the girl. ‘And afterwards they were all so happy.’
‘Well,’ the man said, ‘if you don’t want to you don’t have to. I wouldn’t have you do it if you didn’t want to. But I know it’s perfectly simple.’
‘And you really want to?’
‘I think it’s the best thing to do. But I don’t want you to do it if you don’t really want to.’
‘And if I do it you’ll be happy and things will be like they were and you’ll love me?’
‘I love you now. You know I love you.’
‘I know. But if I do it, then it will be nice again if I say things are like white elephants, and you’ll like it?’
‘I’ll love it. I love it now but I just can’t think about it. You know how I get when I worry.’
‘If I do it you won’t ever worry?’
‘I won’t worry about that because it’s perfectly simple.’
‘Then I’ll do it. Because I don’t care about me.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I don’t care about me.’
‘Well, I care about you.’
‘Oh, yes. But I don’t care about me. And I’ll do it and then everything will be fine.’
‘I don’t want you to do it if you feel that way.’
The girl stood up and walked to the end of the station. Across, on the other side, were fields of grain and trees along the banks of the Ebro. Far away, beyond the river, were mountains. The shadow of a cloud moved across the field of grain and she saw the river through the trees.
‘And we could have all this,’ she said. ‘And we could have everything and every day we make it more impossible.’
‘What did you say?’
‘I said we could have everything.’
‘We can have everything.’
‘No, we can’t.’
‘We can have the whole world.’
‘No, we can’t.’
‘We can go everywhere.’
‘No, we can’t. It isn’t ours any more.’
‘It’s ours.’
‘No, it isn’t. And once they take it away, you never get it back.’
‘But they haven’t taken it away.’
‘We’ll wait and see.’
‘Come on back in the shade,’ he said. ‘You mustn’t feel that way.’
‘I don’t feel any way,’ the girl said. ‘I just know things.’
‘I don’t want you to do anything that you don’t want to do -’
‘Nor that isn’t good for me,’ she said. ‘I know. Could we have another beer?’
‘All right. But you’ve got to realize – ‘
‘I realize,’ the girl said. ‘Can’t we maybe stop talking?’
They sat down at the table and the girl looked across at the hills on the dry side of the valley and the man looked at her and at the table.
‘You’ve got to realize,’ he said, ‘ that I don’t want you to do it if you don’t want to. I’m perfectly willing to go through with it if it means anything to you.’
‘Doesn’t it mean anything to you? We could get along.’
‘Of course it does. But I don’t want anybody but you. I don’t want anyone else. And I know it’s perfectly simple.’
‘Yes, you know it’s perfectly simple.’
‘It’s all right for you to say that, but I do know it.’
‘Would you do something for me now?’
‘I’d do anything for you.’
‘Would you please please please please please please please stop talking?’
He did not say anything but looked at the bags against the wall of the station. There were labels on them from all the hotels where they had spent nights.
‘But I don’t want you to,’ he said, ‘I don’t care anything about it.’
‘I’ll scream,’ the girl siad.
The woman came out through the curtains with two glasses of beer and put them down on the damp felt pads. ‘The train comes in five minutes,’ she said.
‘What did she say?’ asked the girl.
‘That the train is coming in five minutes.’
The girl smiled brightly at the woman, to thank her.
‘I’d better take the bags over to the other side of the station,’ the man said. She smiled at him.
‘All right. Then come back and we’ll finish the beer.’
He picked up the two heavy bags and carried them around the station to the other tracks. He looked up the tracks but could not see the train. Coming back, he walked through the bar-room, where people waiting for the train were drinking. He drank an Anis at the bar and looked at the people. They were all waiting reasonably for the train. He went out through the bead curtain. She was sitting at the table and smiled at him.
‘Do you feel better?’ he asked.
‘I feel fine,’ she said. ‘There’s nothing wrong with me. I feel fine.’
Your posts are so in sync with my life that its scary. I neede this! Thank you one again Alexi =)
you already posted this.. ?
I’m now in the position you were. I use to be fatter and ungly, but now I’m really trying to love myself more. I just fall in love so quickly with the people who likes me, like I just because they like me I am so greateful becuase nobody like me. One day I’ll that man when I could choose between the persons who like me, or not choose at all.
Whoooooooooooooooooaaaaaaa!
Alexi, don’t take this the wrong way…actually, I don’t believe there is a right way to take this comment…..
I’m creeped out by the short-video; you look like a combination between my mom and my sister…No one wants to hear that…sorry, takes away the fantasy for me…Now reading your blog and listening to your podcast is going to be like listening to my sister and mom talk dirty…not a visual I would like to entertain…meh?
Also, Life Time must be developing better programming because my dad’s main complaint in life is that Life Time is one of my mom’s favorite channels.
According to my dad, “all the movies are the same. The husband is a major a-hole, cheats on his wife with a younger woman, and either the wife kills the husband or the wife and mistress kill the husband.”
Oh, ummmm, I’m wondering if I can ask a personal question?
The link lead to your IMDB page, which I did not know that you had. Last week on the radio/podcast show you mentioned tangentially you were in a five year relationship.
I read on the IMDB page that five year relationship was with a musician of a band I believe is doing rather well–I only listen to Classic Rock and Blues so I know little about contemporary bands.
Have you ever written about that relationship on your blog? Have you ever shared why it ended? If so, if either you or other readers can link me to that post.
I might be wrong–I am no psychologist. However, a five year relationship is intense. I mean to a certain extent even though you did not get married, given the length of the relationship you could kind have been considered married.
May this experience be a factor why you are reluctant to marry?
I know it is none of my business. However, my brother was married right out of college–23–until his late twenties-around 29.
We all knew he was dating the wrong woman and while we disapproved of the marriage, we could not stop him. My sister did not go to his ceremony. My parents and I did and I remember I was totally, completely bummed out because I knew my brother was making a bad decision.
My sister had gotten married before my brother–she is still married. While the guy was more working class than we anticipated my sister to marry, we recognized he was a decent guy who was really in love with my sister. So, I remember feeling joy at her wedding. As I indicated, they are still married and now we don’t view her husband as just, “decent,” but more like, “exemplary.”
My brother’s marriage did end and it ended in a way in which he got monumentally hurt. Since then, he has had major relationship but they have basically ended the same way. About two years into the relationship the woman he is dating will give him an ultimatum, “we get married or it is over.” My brother has chosen to the, “it is over,” option and he still vows never to marry again.
I’m not a major advocate of, “marriage.” And I guess the part that may be troubling is it sounds from your radio/podcast that you are king of doing the casual thing at the moment. I don’t know if you had a relationship since that experience or if you have been on the casual track since then.
Don’t take this the wrong way, which means I know you are going to take this the wrong way, but my perception of you is that you have this happy, fun personality.
But that happy, fun personality is there not as a reflection of how you feel but as a way to hide what you are feeling; afraid if people, especially men, ever see your personal torments you will not be lovable. So, keeping everything brief and relatively distant with the men in your life you feel safe because they are not around long enough to see the part of you, you find is not lovable.
I am not at all suggesting it is, “wrong,” to have a happy,fun personality. Your happy, fun personality is as much a part of you as are other aspects of your personality–those other aspects you may not easily share. You are a happy, fun person and I think that is why so many of us read your blog. You ARE a happy, fun person anybody would love to have as a friend.
However, what I am suggesting is that maybe–with the permission of your therapist if you are seeing one–you might want to step out of your comfort zone in your personal life–again, which I only know about with what you share here on Blog Talk.
Maybe, you might want to give it a go to develop trust with close friends or a man you are seeing to feel safe enough to comfortably share those moments you find difficult just as you feel safe to share those moments you feel happy and fun.
Jesus, that was long and probably ended up being rambling…ugh, yah…I hope what I wrote makes sense…
I’m so SICK of bangs. They’re not cute. Girl in the photo’s my flave though. 80′s hot…
yes, this is a repeat… but i felt it needed to be said again.
Hello Ms. Wasser:
It is me, Mr. Nosy. I think there is a problem with the comment section of the latest submission.
No one has commented and I was unable to comment.
I wanted to write the woman, among other things, she is not doing anything wrong; she is just not screening out men properly.
Also, I was going to debunk the myth of, “scaring a man away.” There is no way to scare a man away who wants to be in a relationship with you. Men who do not want a relationship are not, “scared away;” regardless of what you do, they would have left anyway.
Also, the time frame of sex–first, second, third…100th, date– is not part of the calculus of most men who are interested in a relationship. A guy who wants a relationship can sleep with you on the first date and it makes no difference. However, a guy who is just looking for something casual can wait for months to sleep with you but will exit the moment you mention a relationship.
I realised this today at work when I was talking to a guy I was dating (and still here and there) and thought how I used to think he was some kind of untouchable and I was invisable to him which now makes me laugh because he’s another male with similar qualities and insecurites to most of the males I’ve encountered in my small but sweet time and I really really highly doubt I can feel any intimidation from a guy who thinks he’s super cool from his material qualities, he’s really not. It’s important to be picky but never harm in fun but as long as we know it doesn’t mean we should feel so lucky or special…he should!