Plenty of Fish?

So, I am on a dating site... have been for a little less than a week.  Let me begin by saying how skeptical I am about the whole thing - I am very skeptical about the whole thing.  My best friend convinced me to create a profile though and so I did.  Thus, I am out there.  On a dating site.  It always seemed to me that these things were sort of a last resort... and am I at my last resort already after almost and only three months of being single?  God I hope not...

And, the short time I have spent on this web-site has gotten me to muse and ponder over the great mysteries of this dating world that I have entered.  First, are there really plenty of fish in the sea as the site so blatantly claims?  So far, it seems like there are plenty of potential losers in the sea... but what can you really know of a person from a profile created for a dating site?

Second, what are the rules and guidelines one must follow when what you are seeing and reading is completely divorced from a tangible reality?  Ok, yes, do not worry - I know that you do not invite a man to your house... I am blond but not THAT intellectually challenged!  What I mean though is, do you email first and how many before you meet?  What message or vibe are you sending a guy if you instant message each other?  Do you call that person if given a telephone number?  In this scary technological world of ours, what is a single gal to do?

How can you follow your heart if all you are doing is looking at a pic and then emailing each other or creating a space with words on a fictional platform?  Have I mentioned how skeptical I am of all this?

In this muddle of chatting, texting, emailing,instant messaging, googling, Facebooking... where is that energy created by two physical bodies meeting each other?  And let me tell you something, you have to be pretty damn good with words in order to convey what a charming, witty and sexy woman you are.  Because really, in the end, all anyone is getting from this whole experience are just that, words.  Words that are prettied and gussied up in order to entice and lure...

And what of the expectations that are lined up and set sky high as a result?  Phew, do not even get me STARTED on that!

On the other hand, is this cyber dating world any different from the at times even scarier actual and physical one?  Not really.  Except when you meet someone for the first time, you sort of see what you are getting right away instead of building up such anticipation.

With all of that having been said, there are a few potential not-so-loser-ish men who have contacted me and I might go on my first date next week... he likes Yeh! yogurt, so he might be a keeper!

At the very least, some very interesting and funny blogs might come out of this whole experience!

What Size Ring is my Girlfriend?

I have been working at a jewelry kiosk for the past two weeks and I have been enjoying being back in the retail world - except when people mistaken me for an information station, which I stress, I am not, but I will not get into that right at the moment!  I love rings and I am selling them, so it is a win-win situation for me!  My new pitch should be, "Simon's is that way - do you want to buy a ring or two from me now?"

So, a very tall and imposing gentleman walked up to me today and came a little too close for my liking while I was on the other side of the viewing cases.  I was mindlessly placing the rings back into the semblance of order and his coming up from behind me had surprised me - I, as a result, backed up.  He then tried again, but this time he whispered, glancing in the direction of a woman's retreating back, "You see that girl?  I'm gonna marry her."  He then grinned at me as wide as his lips would allow him to and his deep, soil-colored eyes twinkled like stars.  "Could you tell me her ring size?"

I, as a woman I can only presume, became super excited and very giddy at this prospect;  of course, it does not help that I am also a hopeless romantic, which means that I am a complete sucker and I am miserably foolish in matters of love and romance.  At this point, I was also wondering what sort of ring size magical voodoo he wanted me to perform, seeing as his girlfriend was walking away from us and, I am pretty good, but without my glasses and without her being close enough to even see her hands, how could I possibly tell him her ring size?

I bit my tongue in order to restrain the sarcastic remark that wished to escape the confines of my mouth and told him simply that I needed her to try on at least one display ring in order to help him.

So, he called her over and I began my sales pitch, as a matter of appearance, to this young woman who seemed more interested in walking away than listening to me describe the fantastic rings right in front of her nose.  I made up some excuse about how her boyfriend wanted to surprise her for Christmas, but that he needed my help to find out the size of the rings that should go on her finger - and she did not give two cents about anything I was saying, she was just humoring me and her boyfriend, who was letting me do my thing.

However, when I casually asked her how long the two of them had been dating, her eyes had lit up in the same manner his had become alive when he had revealed to me his New Year's plan to ask her to be his wife.  A contented smile also played on her plump lips as she continued to look at the ring that she had picked out to try on - conveniently enough, on her ring finger.

She walked away soon after while her man sidled up to me and asked me, as quietly and as discreetly as he could, what size would fit his beloved's significant finger.  I told him, wished him luck and he winked at me as he walked away to join his potentially future wife.

Ahhh... love!  Such a joy to participate in when it is happening in front of you and to other people, yet so complicated when you're the one smack in the middle of it.

Quebec City, Episode One (November 12th, 2010): Keep Your Eyes on the Road and NOT on the Cute Guy!!!

A group of us are walking towards the Hilton Hotel, pumped to start this day of seminars and presentations all about the wonderful profession we are entering.  The sky is clear, the air is fresh and I am walking arm in arm with my soul sister Manisha, the enigmatic geek that I love so dearly.  We are talking and giggling, as we usually do when we are together, and we are so excited to be in this city.  When we look down the street, all of Quebec City is spread out before us and it feels as though we can conquer the world - or at least this small part of the immense planet we live on.

As we begin to cross the street, I make a stupid joke because the electrical banner above a doorway of the building in front of us is advertising a Science conference of some kind - and Manisha and I both have a thing for nerds it seems.  So, I am saying how there will be lots of sexy geeks and nerds milling around right next to where we will be attending our own conference;  I look at Manisha, giddy at the possibility of all those potentially hot geeks just down the street from our location, and I just have to laugh.  I tell her that we should skip our conference altogether and attend the Science one instead - think of the possibilities! 

As I look at the sign again, my eyes are drawn to two figures across the street from where we are.  Two dark haired gentlemen in suits - oh my!  I elbow Manisha gently in the ribs, nod my head in their direction and continue to size up one of them in particular.  The sexier of the two finally looks up and our eyes meet - I continue walking without looking in the direction of the traffic.  I am, at this point, smiling like a fool and walking right into oncoming traffic!

I feel my arm being yanked back at the same time that the fine young man puts up his hands in the "Whoa, back up" or "Slow down" hand gesture while grinning gorgeously.  I hear Manisha giggling at me as she begins to pull me across the street so that we can in fact cross safely - I come back down to earth and smile foolishly at my stupidity.  The four of us pass by each other - I chance to look back at the guy and he actually looks back at me at the same time;  another smile is exchanged between the two of us and then the moment is gone.
Just another silly instant shared with my girl and I thank the stars every day that she has been placed in my life.  Now, if those same stars could just place a fine-looking man in a business suit in my life as well, then all will be good with the universe!

Mini-Putt with Laurent in the Snow

Soft snow is slowly falling to the ground, covering the center of the city with a down blanket and muting the sound of traffic where I am playing mini-golf with a charming fellow named Laurent.  We are both bundled up against the elements: he is wearing a long blue down jacket with the hood pulled over his purple-tuque covered head while I am wearing black from head to toe except for my salmon tinted hat and scarf.  I have come to the disturbing realization that my bomber jacket makes me look like a cuter version of the Michellin Man and my ego has been only slightly affected by this.  My uncovered hands are freezing and I am not sure why I have not brought gloves or mittens.

There is a buzz of activity around us;  various people are walking by, some partaking in the activities, others merely passing through.  Security is discretely milling around, making sure nothing gets out of hand, and some of the participants are huddled around the two metallic camp-fires that are making the air smell as though we are in the middle of a campground rather than in the heart of Montreal.

Laurent and I take turns passing each other the putter so as to hit the ball - a lot is at stake and it has become quite a serious game.  Laurent, his green eyes sparkling, has told me that if I lose he will take me out on the weekend.  Of course,  I have responded that he will be seeing me all of this weekend no matter what the outcome of our game might be because I am volunteering for this event organized to help individuals like Laurent who have no homes.  So, I play along, not seeing the harm because we both know that this is a joke.
I have thus far won both holes and Laurent seems to be feeling less confident than when we had started the game.

We get to the last hole and I am holding Laurent's coffee while he plays - it is a very tricky hole because there is a wooden block that you must hit dead center in order to get the ball anywhere close to the objective.  As I approach it, I am thinking that there is no way  I am going to get this under four strokes.  Laurent, the gentleman that he is, allows me to go first.  I drop my ball in the center, wiggle my hips theatrically and take a swing, closing my eyes so as not to witness my horrible shot - I hear a distinct TOCK - my eyes snap open to see that the ball did in fact hit the block right in the middle where it was supposed to and it is spinning towards the hole... but it misses by a fraction of an inch.  I easily tap the ball in and then dance around screaming and hooting as though I have just won a million dollars and not a simple golf game.

Laurent looks worried now as he places his ball square in the middle of the field.  He swings, hits the ball and it goes flying behind the block... so he has lost.

He turns towards me with a sheepish grin on his bearded face and informs me that I have won.  I congratulate him on his valiant effort as he takes my ungloved hand in his covered one and brings it to his mouth.  His gray and white whiskers tickle and scratch the top of  my freezing hand  as he plants a gentlemanly kiss.  He tells me while still holding my extended hand that he is disappointed that he has lost, but that he can still take me out this weekend.  I gently decline, take my hand back and smile at him while thinking that in his situation, a date is perhaps one of the last things he might need after the basic necessities of food, shelter and clothing.  But are we not, all of us, whether we are living in mansions or living on the streets, looking for love and acceptance anywhere we can?  And though I cannot give him that kind of love, what I do have to offer him, which I do with all of my heart, is basic human love and contact.

A short but pleasant time spent playing mini-golf on a snowy day in the middle of downtown is what I was able to offer this man and his smile, laughter and gallantry was more than enough to repay the little effort it took from me.

A Battle of Three

In this game called life, which team captain do you choose to follow?  Which part of yourself do you let take the reins of your fragile and vulnerable chariot?  Which aspect of your being do you succumb to and allow to steer you towards the endless possibilities of paths that all open up and branch off into diverging directions?

For many people, their heads are the natural leaders of their fates.  This rational and logical aspect of yourself looks at all of the facts and judges any given situation from an analytical distance.  This intellectual part nudges its horn-rimmed glasses sliding down its aquiline nose, rolls up the sleeves of its paisley shirt, ruffles its mousy-colored hair in a nervous yet pensive manner and declares, "Ok, let's look at this."  All of the details are set out, laid bare and examined thoroughly.  "This is how it is and you should do such and such because of this reason," you might hear your mind proudly whispering to you after it has gone through its thought process.  It will then rub its hands together briskly as though the matter has been settled and retreat until the next dilemma arises.

However, your heart, like the drama queen it proudly is, arrives on the scene and immediately scatters all of the neatly piled flow charts, diagrams, graphs and dissertations your mind has convincingly and painstakingly put together to form its argument.  Your flaky heart looks at all the supposed physical evidence against it and sneers menacingly, thinking rudely out loud that all of this bullshit logic does not make the slightest sense.

"What about how you feeeellllll," it haltingly and pleadingly whimpers, making you instantly feel the gambit of emotions it magically unleashes into your system like a poison.  A mixture of happiness, elation, excitement, nervousness, sadness, anger and countless other cousins of this treacherous and mischievous trickster inhabiting your chest parade around displaying their pret-a-porter collection suited for this particular occasion.  Your long, shaggy haired and disheveled heart stands back and crosses its arms petulantly, pouting and looking down at the ground because you are taking, for the moment, your head's side.

Your heart is like a child playing on a teeter-totter - one minute you are completely over the moon and the next you are left wondering what the hell it is that you are doing exactly.  Sometimes though, your heart has a rare but lucid moment when it is completely convinced of how it is making you feel and you would subsequently put your hand in fire, so sure you are of you and your heart's shared emotions.  During such moments of truth, when your heart is not under the influence of any emotional narcotic or stimulant, you know what it is you want and need and your heart does its victory dance as though it has scored a touch down.
On the other hand, because your heart is so fickle, unstable and yet so loyal to the passions and emotions it harbors, your mind at this point interjects and tells you to consider the rationality of it all. 

But are you really listening to that stiff and stern voice of reasoning at this point when your heart has spoken?

And, if this battle wasn't complicated enough, there is a third player that enters into the arena and muddles up any of the moves you were considering.  The butterflies, the nausea not connected to indigestion, that sinking in the pit of your stomach, those pins and needles, these are all the work of your primordial physical aspect, namely your body.  It is the keeper of those pesky butterflies it decides to let loose out of their jewel-encrusted and golden enclosure to pester your stomach at the most inopportune instances.  It is the one who drops the anvil in the middle of your belly right before you go into an exam that you have not studied for.  Your body is the one who lets you know something is wrong that you are not seeing by making your chest muscles constrict around your galloping heart as though to protect it by getting closer.  Those sweaty palms, that heat rising from your toes, those tingles and waves of desire, the quivering, trembling and shivering that has nothing to do with the temperature of the room your are in, the millions of delicious goosebumps - also all the incredible prowess of your physical shell that is more often than not taken for granted.  Your body is not controlled by your mind or your heart and reveals things neither other aspect of yourself knows or can even fathom.

So, what do you listen to in the end?  Is there ever a magical moment when all three coincide and you are able to make the best decision, or does it have to be a constant choice between the three?  Perhaps the only way to follow your path is to listen to all three and make a judgment based on what feels the most right and to not regret, no matter what, the choices you make or the paths you follow.  If everything can be viewed as being a learning experience, then no decision, whether taken with the help of your head, heart or body, can ever be seen as being inherently wrong.

Dancing to Nat King Cole's "Unforgettable"

The chairs are all taken and the mostly male crowd is hungrily eating the meal being served to them cafeteria-style.  They are all still wearing their winter coats and boots, the huge tent only providing a certain amount of warmth from the cold outside seeing as both makeshift doors keep opening and closing, allowing an icy draft in every time someone enters or leaves.

The GO Team have set up their karaoke machine on the right side of the tent and the regulars are already there, waiting for the music to start.  Stephane, a young black-haired man who had told me last night that he had wanted to slit his own throat but had decided to slash his wrist instead, is there, waiting with the microphone in his hand.  He had sang with us the day before, belting out tunes like Marjo's "Illegal" and Bon Jovi's "Dry County";  he cannot carry a tune to save his life, but he sings with all of his heart and he seems to enjoy it, so there is no harm being done.  I sing a couple of songs with him again today, my arm around him, his bandaged arm around me, just singing our lungs out like the cold outside does not matter and his attempted suicide has not occurred.

An older woman with pulled-back gray hair, a yellow coat and glasses held around her neck with a colored cord has just requested Nat King Cole's "Unforgettable".  She stands in front of the small television monitor, takes the microphone and begins to charm the restless crowd with her incredible talent.

Meanwhile, I see a man sitting down by himself, grinning toothlessly at me while I am singing along and making a fool of myself.  I decide to extend my hand towards him as though I am a very gallant man asking a pretty woman to dance;  he looks at me with an even broader and even more toothless smile and a twinkle in his milky eyes.  He takes my hand in his own weather beaten and papery soft one, stands up and puts his other hand on the small of my back.  We make small circles together, his snow hat is perched on top of his head as though waiting for the right moment to fall off and his over-large jacket is covering a very small and frail frame.

At the corner of my eye, I see another older woman standing near us and so I gently turn my dance partner around so that he can now dance with her.  They join together and enjoy the rest of the song, perhaps forgetting for a moment that they might not have a warm place to sleep later on tonight.

An Inspiring Love Story

I met the most wonderful and beautiful young woman on Monday at my new job and it is just so silly how alike we are - it must be our shared astrological sign or something.   Her greenish-gray eyes sparkle with life and they reflect her inner beauty which in turn matches her stunning exterior;  she is tall and slim with thick dirty blond hair and she possesses the most catching and contagious smile you can imagine, her grin coming straight from her heart that is precariously pinned to her sleeve in the same manner that this fellow Pisces wears her own.  She is an absolute joy to be around because every word bubbling out of her mouth is full of enthusiasm and happiness and she exudes this amazing positivity that warms up my insides like only a cup of vanilla oolong tea used to;  perhaps being in love and having found her soul mate has something to do with her exuberance along with the journey she has been on for the past two years in order to find herself;  the intensely soul-tingling and gratifying love she has now found is the culmination of this quest and I wish to share her story with you.

When she was twelve years old, she met an eighteen year old in a bowling alley she was playing at with her family;  the two of them had as much fun together as their age difference allowed them to and she remembers that she had felt what any typical twelve-year-old girl might feel when faced with a cute boy.  It turns out though that their paths were to merge once again because a couple of months later, he actually moved into her house!  You see, her family played host to young hockey players wishing to play in that area and he so happened to fit that description.  Thus, they lived under the same roof together for a long period and became very close friends who would have very challenging and meaningful life conversations, though she was still only twelve.

Of course at this point, any good love story needs a separation period when the two main characters are forced apart by an act of fate, family or other, while we, the audience, think that the two lovers will never reunite - and that is exactly what happened to our two young lovers - he had finished his hockey term and went back to his own family and they lost touch as a result.  Divided by physical distance, they both lived their own lives, respectively falling in and out of love with different individuals that one can only imagine never seemed to be the right fit for either of them without their knowing why that was exactly so.  Evidently, we, again that pesky audience, know that it is because they were not with EACH OTHER that it never felt right with every person they attempted to share their lives with.

Yet somehow she did know because his image was always lurking at the back of her mind and she would often find herself wondering what he was doing and where he was.  Fed up one day of not knowing, she finally decided that she needed to find him - and she actually did, out of the blue, courtesy of a modern technological tool called Facebook.  She wrote him a message, his message to her got lost, but they did finally and quickly settle that he would come and see her in Montreal.

The amazing part of this story is that she knew, without even having seen him after all of those years, that he was the man she would marry.  She even told him her ring-size in a funny and flirty email to which he replied that he would never forget that number for the rest of his life.  They spent an incredible weekend together during which they both kept staring at each other and exclaiming that they had found each other - not in the obvious way that they were now standing face to face after not having known what either were doing for so many years, but in a way that goes much farther and way beyond every day life.  What they felt and meant was that they had spent all of their lives finding each other and that they had now just completed the cycle yet again in their present lives.

Once they had reunited for the weekend, we can empathize how heart-wrenching it must have been for the both of them when Sunday evening came around and he had to go back to his home and business in Ontario.  By Tuesday afternoon though, she knew that she had to be with him no matter what and that what would be crazy would be to stay in Montreal away from him rather than her going to join him in Ontario.  On Friday, she left everything to go and be with her love so as to start a new life with the man she feels as though was the missing piece of her own life's jigsaw puzzle.

When I listened to her and watched her eyes express the certainty of every word she was saying, I got tingles up and down my spine and goosebumps all along my arms.  I could not help but share in her happiness and to smile as widely as she was while feeling all of the excitement coursing through her body and giving off an undeniable energy that electrified the air around her.  You cannot help but question your own reservations about supposed soul mates after you have heard my new friend's tale.

After hearing her story, I was myself reminded of my favorite portion of Plato's "Symposium" in which he explains through the character of Aristophanes why it is that people feel the need to find their other halves.  You see, at one time in ancient history, human beings were actually made up of two individuals fused together into giant creatures with four legs and four arms;  the three possible combinations were that of two females, two males or a male and a female.  In our unions we were very strong creatures and we were causing a lot of havoc and problems for the gods;  as a result, Zeus logically decided to divide each giant into their respective human forms so that we were no longer the gigantic creatures made up of two humans as we had been - in this manner we were both weaker and yet more useful to the gods because we were more numerous.  However, we were now also single selves longing and searching for that other self to complete us.  And so that explains, at least for Aristophanes and perhaps Plato himself, why it is that some males long for other males, some females desire other females while others want members of the opposite sex because we are each looking for the other half of ourselves from which we were split.  This story also explains how "love is the name of the desire and pursuit of wholeness."  I only have one bone to pick with this story now that I am a bit older and hopefully slightly wiser: a person needs to be whole in and of themselves before he or she can achieve another sort of completeness with that other person who is meant to share, not overtake or penetrate and merge, their life.  

So after hearing my friend's love story, at the very least you will hopefully be happy that such a fabulous woman is following her heart and has found someone she feels she can share her life with while becoming an even better person because of his involvement.  I am not quite sure what I believe, but I know that what has happened to my new friend is real and I can only hope and pray that the same sort of love will enter into my life.  Meanwhile, I will continue my solitary journey of loving myself and becoming my own, whole person - perhaps one day I will find my giant half and I will be even happier than I already am with just being myself rather than a twinned entity.