the girlfriend gene

i probably don't say it enough, but i'm so thankful for my family.

my parents are amazing people who have been able to handle me both at my best and at my worst with unconditional love. they give me hope when i feel like i have none. i can say the same thing about my brother who, as of the past few years, has been a major influence in my life. watching us grow up from disliking each other entirely to becoming as close as we are now has essentially shaped the girl i am over the last five years.

i've talked about how my brother and i are very similar in both personality and stature, but we also deal with romantic endeavors the same way. now, you might think it's weird that we do, but you have to understand that although my parents have been happily married for 32 (!!!) years now, i can't say that anyone else in my family or extended family has been that lucky. my half sister was only recently married a few years ago and things aren't great for her. my one half brother doesn't seem like the kind of dude that can even talk to girls. my other half brother married a, for lack of a better term, a slut, way too early and divorced. his kid (my nephew) is only growing up totally fucked because of it, but i love the kid. my brother's relationships have a tendency to end shitty, if you can call some of them relationships. and then there's me.

yesterday, while at the bar watching the jays game, i asked about my brother's.. kind of.. sort of.. not really girlfriend. things were not well. he went on to tell me about some other girl problems in his life and the only conclusion we could make of it was that the both of us only seem to be attracted to people with problems. while that's probably true for him, i don't believe it is for me.

since i moved to toronto, i've engaged in only one form of relationship: polyamory. and i've said it before: gone are the days when one person can give me everything i need. it's not a race to see how many dudes i can fuck (contrary to the film nymphomaniac) in that my desire to be with different dudes is not always sexual. but even if you take away all of the issues i have with commitment and intimacy, i bet i still wouldn't have the girlfriend gene, or be girlfriend material.

this is just the way it has always been. despite multiple times in my life where i know i've only wanted to be with one dude, that's not how it works. i can never express how i want things to be because it scares me too much. but, let's face it, the few times when i was forced into girlfriendism, or girlfrienditis, if you will, i was not in favour of either. in these situations, i didn't have a choice. and the right choice was to not go that route. however, with forced girlfriendism, it's always the wrong choice and part of the reason why i continue to engage in polyamory.

i've discussed this issue in great detail with several friends over the past couple weeks. one of who told me that the girl he's been dating for awhile now seems like total girlfriend material, but his words to me were that he's "just not feeling it." another, who continues to keep in contact with an ex and occasionally fuck, even though the two of them (and the entire world) knows that they shouldn't. and yet another, who has switched gears entirely and no longer wants to just fuck around with anyone, but rather, date. and i mean, maybe we're just getting to that age when relationships change to, what i can only hope, is for the better.

but when you lack a girlfriend gene, it's difficult to know when something will come along. as things started off quite slow with a dude i was starting to really enjoy spending time with, eventually, he told me he wasn't having any of it. this can also be said for a dude i had hung out with a couple of times who, upon the next time, decided to tell me he wasn't looking for a relationship. that's all well and good, but when did i ever express an interest in starting a relationship with you? it's almost like a slap in the face. "hey, i know we're hanging out and having a good time but i'm not interested in doing stuff... even though i'm not sure if that's what you want to do or not yet"  yeah? well, that's nice.

what i don't think i'll ever know is what about me screams these things to dudes. when did i ever send you a vibe that i wanted to date you? that time i said  you were attractive? that time i flirted with you? don't flatter yourself. not to ruin nymphomaniac for anyone, but there's a scene i definitely identified with that needs to be talked about here.

in the scene, it shows the leading lady in various cut scenes having sex, 1 on 1, with a dude, and achieving an orgasm. in the cut scenes that follow the sex, she pillow talks and gives the exact same line to every dude she just had an orgasm with: "i don't know if it means anything, but i've never had an orgasm before; you're my first."

no, i haven't said anything quite like this before, but the fact that she says it to every dude is something i know i've done before. not about achieving an orgasm (because yes, i've had more than one) but just in general, my damn flirty nature. i don't use the same lines but i feel as though it can confuse the dudes i'm with, especially if i'm flirty and don't want anything sexual.

maybe as i continue to grow up, i'll somehow fall into this girlfriend gene. if not for me, but for at least my parents' sake of seeing their daughter settle down with the right dude someday.

the cheating curve

i wanted to write about how the cystoscopy went this week but i'm actually tired about writing about how terrible my health is and how there aren't any answers for me. the good news is that everything came back normal and they took another urine sample. they put me on 3 days of a new antibiotic to prevent any new infection from occurring and to kill off whatever infection remained.

in the meantime, i'm still waiting for complete feeling and mobility of my left leg and foot to come back entirely and not feel like constant pins and needles. i don't know why it ended up happening this way, but i am not impressed.

great. now let's go on to what is currently keeping me awake:

infidelity.

no, i'm not in a relationship. but i remember when i was. i remember when i was some dude's girlfriend, and i almost want to use that term loosely, since there was never a distinct indication of the time we seemed to go from coworkers to friends to out one night to walking me home to in my bed to seeing each other to wait, what, i'm now your girlfriend to uhhh i don't know how i feel about this to god only knows what.

and 3 months later, that's what it was. i was officially a girlfriend because i was told. i didn't have an opinion in the matter. and i guess you can say that's likely when it all started to go downhill and i realized we were totally wrong for each other. i started wandering off. i started hanging out with dudes where i knew something would happen, because it always did.

and right around this time, this dude, who i was the apparent girlfriend of, and we had been together for four months, decided to tell me that he was in love with me.

me. 
he was in love with me.

you want a sure way to ruin everything? tell a commitaphobe 4 months into barely dating that you're in love with her. yeah, see how that goes.

i always had a sneaking suspicion that he was beginning to know what i was up to some nights when i went out. i was young. i wanted to go out and see my friends. he was a homebody. he wanted to see his friends. i hated his friends. i hated his family. i hated being with him. i hated how every other dude in my life made me feel better about myself - even if there wasn't anything between us at the time. i hated knowing that he told me he loved me and i didn't say anything back. and never did. i hated knowing that i was going to have to break up with him. but i couldn't. i was stubborn and he was in love. i knew he was the one that would have to break up with me in order for this to work out in my favour.

so, i started hanging out more with my friends. and he started hanging out more with some of his new friends. one of his classmates. a girl. a girl who was married and old and "ugly" - his words. he told me she was not his type. but i'm not even sure he knew who his type was. they would do lots of things together. and when time came for us to do the long distance thing, she brought him to see a jays game once and then i met up with them. it just seemed odd that this married woman was hanging out with this 22 year old dude. but as i was looking for a way out, i didn't care.

more months passed and then i got a text from him saying that some girl at a party kissed him. well, hey! here's my way out! except, fuck that. i knew i was better than breaking up with him over text. so, i let it slide. and kept doing what i was doing. i wasn't sleeping around but just keeping my options open. a few weeks later, i came home and was making every excuse not to see him. eventually, he was fed up and broke up with me through a text message. really, dude? uh, okay. you do that then. he obviously took it a lot harder than me (as they.. always tend to do.. i'm just heartless or something) and had to unfriend me on facebook and all that.

and from time to time, i'd lurk a profile or two. guess who he's dating now? that married girl. she might even still be married. i don't fucking know or care. it's just bizarre. and well, at least i know now that i had a right to be suspicious of them in the first place.

i say all of this because in the last year or so, i've been propositioned on more than one occasion to get with married/committed dudes. all with psycho wives/girlfriends. talking to them is one thing. sexting is another. but i don't see what i'm doing or what they're doing as wrong or cheating. it was only when i physically kissed other dudes - that was my line drawn on the cheating curve. yes, i talked. yes, i flirted. yes, i wanted it all. but until there was something physical, i was convinced i was never in the wrong. and currently. this is sort of how i continue to feel about the opportunities i'm presented with.

some have been going on for a year. some come and go in monthly intervals or when i'm mostly just feeling down. some i've even turned down because i don't want to get involved. i'm all for open marriages and open relationships. i'm all for primary partners and polygamy. i've been there. i've done that. and actually, it's kind of nice. gone are the days when one person can give the other what they need. but any of the ones i've been involved with have yet to become physical. in fact, it gets a little hard to believe when a much older, married man, tries to explain to me how much he cares for me. that isn't what i signed up for. and it doesn't necessarily make me feel better about myself when a sketchy, old, married man with kids is saying these things to me.

i'm not a naive girl. and it's because i tend to get myself into these situations over and over again that i know when and how to get out of them. participating in someone else's infidelity is not my fault.

i only wish i knew that earlier.

2 years of toronto livin'

today's the day that i've officially lived in toronto for 2 years. 2 years!

where did the time go?

i finished two post-grads. i finished 3 unpaid internships. i worked a conference. i met lots of new and interesting people. i hooked up with dudes. i dated dudes. i broke off things with dudes. dudes broke off things with me. i lost some people. i grew closer with others. i found places in the city that i enjoy and places in the city that i can't stand. i watched as friends everywhere started new chapters of their lives or stayed completely the same. i got a job break: 1 year & 11 months into living in toronto.

and i really couldn't be happier with the choices and decisions i've made in the last 2 years because they've all shaped me into a better person, one way or another.

this is also the first time since kindergarten where it's september and i'm not going back to school. that's a strange feeling. but it's about time, i guess.

i'm celebrating a lot of things tonight. my 2 years in toronto. a good friend visiting for the weekend. another friend who got married today. and one more who's leaving for france to start his masters. these are all exciting times for everyone involved. we're all getting older and moving into new phases of our lives. it's hard to believe that in a month from now, i'll be 25. i know that i've accomplished a lot in my short little life and i'm looking forward to the next 25 years!

here's to many more exciting toronto years to come!