So I realize I haven't quite been as vigilant as I should have been regarding my blogging, but I figure I can blame the holidays and my most recent trip to Las Vegas on my lack of posting. That is not to say that I have been completely idle as far as my writing goes.
One of my favorite TV shows as of late is How I Met Your Mother. I started watching it about a year and a half ago, and have since watched the entire series at least three times. One of the things I love about the show is how the main character's (Ted's) quest for The One is eerily similar to my own. And while watching it this past Thanksgiving, I began to write about different episodes and their correlations to events in my life. Each essay includes a summary of the episode, my experience that relates to it, and the moral that can be learned. It's far too long a project to include every single episode I've been writing about, and it is in no way complete. But this is just to give you a small taste of my work in progress. Please note that a lot of the people I talk about are very dear to me, and I have changed their names to respect their privacy. So in that vein, here is the first public exposure of The How I Met Your Mother Anthology.
Return of the Shirt (Season 1: Episode 4)
Summary: In going
through his closet, Ted comes across this old shirt that he hasn’t worn in
years. He tries it out on the gang who
immediately compliment him on it. He
starts thinking that the shirt may be a metaphor for his dating life, and
begins thinking of his past girlfriends and which one may have been the one,
but he just didn’t see it at the time. He
narrows it down to Natalie, a girl he broke up with over the answering
machine. On her birthday. Where there was a surprise party waiting for
her. In her apartment. Do these writers know how to set up the most
awkward situations possible, or what? So
he gets a hold of her, convinces her to start dating again, and they have an
enjoyable three weeks together. And
that’s when Ted realizes again that she’s not ‘the one’. He confronts her and saying that while she’s
great, the reason for breaking up is ineffable.
Natalie is quite upset that she isn’t ‘effable’ enough (don’t you just
love word play?) and proceeds to beat the crap out of Ted.
Backstory: In the
three years that I’ve been single since my ex-fiancé and I broke up (that story
is coming later), I’ve spent my life doing what every single guy enjoys:
hanging out with friends, going to bars, and forming relationships with
numerous girls. Some of them lasting,
some of them dropping out of my life, and some of them a mixture of the
two. Being the hopeless romantic I am,
I’ve always wondered if any of them could have been ‘the one’ but the time and
place just wasn’t right for it. If you
look at my track record with girls I have been involved with, you’ll notice a
distinct pattern. Most of them have had
family issues. Divorced parents, single
mom, attachment issues, the usual stuff people like one of my influences
(Tucker Max; don’t be hating) would pounce on.
Now I’m not trying to slander any of these women for the situation they
grew up in. I was blessed with a
household where my parents are still together after 25 plus years. All these women are amazing in their own
right. It’s just that this is the type
of person I fall for. But looking back,
there were a handful of girls who I was with who didn’t fit that mold. They were the right balance of intelligence,
beauty, and stability: LadyA, IrishRed, and GamerGirl.
LadyA
LadyA was a girl I had met at karaoke a few years ago. I would see her out every once in a while,
loved beer, had a killer singing voice, and was the kind of person you could
just talk to in a completely platonic manner.
About a year after meeting her for the first time, I was going to be
having a karaoke party at my place and invited her to come. She was cute, and for a single guy to be
hosting a karaoke party at his house, the more hot and single girls there are,
the better. My first tip off that she
was into me was when she accidentally sent the following text to me on accident:
‘It’s the hot surfer guy from karaoke’
Why not paint a bull’s-eye on this one, and say 'Go'? She wasn’t able to make it that night, but we
made plans to get together the next Wednesday at karaoke. We ended up hanging out for a few months
while she was finishing up college, talking about our respective career paths,
family, movies, politics, etc. She was
one of the most well informed people I had ever met. I am pretty good at holding my own in a
meaningful conversation, but this girl challenged my intellect to the
max. Sadly, this spring fling we had
ended in May when she graduated and started her job the following week in
Chicago. But I was left with this:
‘When you move to Chicago, and if we’re both single, maybe we can try it
again”
Patience may be a virtue to some, but for me, it’s just
another roadblock that’s kept me from pursuing something special. It sucks.
IrishRed
IrishRed was a completely chance encounter. It was my friends birthday, and he was
having a get together at a restaurant where some of his close friends and
fantasy football buddies were going to enjoy dinner and drinks. I showed up a little late because of a
rehearsal, but I made it there all the same.
I introduced myself to those who I didn’t know, one of them being IrishRed. She worked with the birthday boy's girlfriend,
and was cool enough to hang out with. We
chatted for a while before she had to leave, as she was running a marathon the
next day. I managed to get her number
before she left, wished her luck at the race the next day, and went on to drink
with everyone else.
I texted her every once in a while, just to see where it
might go. I invited her to a reading
that my theatre company was holding, and to my honest surprise, she showed
up. You know those moments where you
impulsively invite someone to an event, but with the expectation that they
won’t really show up? Well she shattered
that notion. For the next couple of
weeks, we would hang out every once in a while, I picked her brain about what
she wanted to do, what her family was like, where she got the knack for baking
(she is phenomenal at it by the way), she came to a
play I was in where she met my mom and sister.
That is a rarity for the girls I’m into, so ladies, if you meet any of
my family, things are going well.
Unfortunately, we never panned out, mostly because as great as she was,
there was that spark and spontaneity that was missing. Sadly, just because things are right on so
many levels, sometimes those levels aren’t deep enough to sustain a
relationship.
GamerGirl
Oh GG. Where do I
begin with you? Like LadyA, I met her
at karaoke one night. And similarly, I
would see her out every once in a while, had a great voice, and is about as
genuine a human being as you can find.
My first foray with her was for the karaoke party that LadyA wasn’t
able to attend. She was into me, and I
was into her. But one my friends was
also pretty enamored with GG at the time.
Being the good guy that I am, I had to turn her down, so as not to lose
a friend in the process.
After that party, we kind of went on hiatus from each other,
as I was starting to get into LadyA, and by the time the summer came around, I
had another girl I was starting something with.
It wasn’t until almost a year after that party that me and GG really hung out
again. We started small, doing karaoke
and other shenanigans, and then progressing towards the point where it became
the whole John Travolta-Olivia Newton John summer romance from Grease. And this girl is cool. Aside from her mild obsession with
mythological fan fiction, she is totally into movies, is a video game
aficionado, came from an unbroken and loving household, swore like a sailor,
and could talk to you about anything.
She is hands down one of the most genuine and truly good individuals I
know.
But like Grease, when it turned colder, that’s where it
would end. So I told her, we’d still be
friends. Sorry, there was no true love
vow. And I’m honestly surprised we’re
still friends now. It wasn’t because the
distance made us grow apart. It was the
way I left Iowa City without saying goodbye.
I took the cowardly route and simply up and left. I didn’t want to face my friends and tell
them goodbye, especially after five great years of living in Iowa City. It was this action that almost caused me to
lose her forever. It’s not something I’m
proud of. In fact, that may have been
the most cowardly thing I have ever done in my 27 years of existence. But time worked it’s magic, and we are still
close friends after everything. This
relationship and its fallout proved to me that miracles do happen…or that I am
the biggest kiss-ass and apologetic bullshitter of all time.
Moral: Each of these
girls brought something similar and something new to the table, yet I never
fully pursued any lasting relationship with them. Maybe it’s because I wasn’t truly ready for a
long-term commitment, knowing full well I was moving to a city of six million
people. Maybe it’s because I was looking
for their flaws. Maybe it’s because
there’s something about finding a damaged girl and wanting to be the white
knight. Regardless, like Ted’s shirt,
when I look back at these three, I see something that although might not have
looked right at the time, sure seems like a good fit now. Way to go Past Rick, you botched the easy
lay-up. No wonder coach never put you in
4th quarter.
