Transient Friends

I try to keep my circle tight,
That way I avoid squares.
An introvert by nature,
People think they know me.
Quiet. Reserved. Happy.

Then they get to know me.
And what do you know?
Surprise!
I’ve changed.
Loud. Talkative. Cocky.

I’m too old for small talk.
Please, don’t waste my time.
Surrounding myself with intellects.
Discussing ideas – thoughts – opinions.
Not people.

It’s grounding.
Sometimes it makes me feel small.
Sometimes I want to be small.
Sometimes I need to be small.
Unseen. Hidden. Lost.

“We’re friends – you have to agree with me.”
I think, “Because we’re friends is why I don’t.”
But, now I revert.
The noiseless introvert that made you want me.
I want to be wanted.

So if you’re wrong I won’t vocalize it.
That’s how this happens,
I just nod.
There’s no need to speak.
Why bother? It falls onto deaf ears.

The tension remains.
“The air feels heavy now.”
I say it’s the humidity.
I leave.
Distant. Lonely. Empty.

Held at arms length – where I prefer to be.
Don’t cuddle me with your body.
Strangle me with your hands.
That’s where I belong.
Pain. Broken. Worthless.

“Don’t get to know me. You won’t like me.”
“That’s not true!”
But it is.
I don’t like me.
So why would you?

The closer we get.
The harder it is.
Vulnerability.
I hate it.
I just don’t want to be forgotten.

Take me forever or leave me for now.
Because once I give you me,
You’ll  eventually get all of me.
Because I don’t give myself to just anyone.
And I don’t want just anyone to give themselves to me.

Special. Unique. Friendship.

Dating Apps are the Worst.

Here comes a rant y’all! I’m also half a bottle deep in some white zinfandel, so cut mama some slack.

So I’m a young, single, lady on the prowl trying to meet people.  I’m also a big old homo, who’s very new to the gay scene as I’ve only come out within the last year. My gaydar is what the kids might call… horrific. So here I am, relying on dating apps.

Now to understand me, you gotta know, I’m very happy being single. I actually love it. I love not having to explain to anyone where I am, what I’m doing, and essentially being able to do what I want when I want. I masturbate a lot and I am so damn good at it that I’m not sure anyone can even compare. Just stating facts. I hold my hand game high.

However, I’m also a human fucking being. I’ve never been in a truly serious relationship, which I get is kind of weird for a 27 year old, but I just really like to do what I want without repercussions. Don’t get me wrong, their are a TON of things I like about dating. I like having someone to text, someone to talk to about shit that’s somewhat obligated to listen, I like cuddling. GOD DO I FUCKING LOVE CUDDLING. Human contact in general. I love that shit. (I’m such a fucking girl).

 

 

That being said, I’m getting kind of old. I don’t want to be single or short term dating people forever, although I’d rather do that than be in an unhappy unfulfilling marriage for the rest of my life.

You also have to understand that when it comes to dating, I’m kind of old school and frankly, a little conservative. I also fall hard, fast, and veryyyy easily. I’m not necessarily the heart on my sleeve kind of gal either, I’m actually very guarded (I’M WORKING ON IT OKAY). When I start to see someone I usually commit to only talking to only that person because I also just don’t have the time or energy to do more than that. I’d rather waste 1 month attempting to give someone my all and it not work, than to date 3 people for three months with added confusion and pressures for myself.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m also all for a good ol’ fashion one night stand, but even in that, I’d prefer it to be someone I know. I don’t necessarily have to want to date you to want to have sex with you.  In fact, I am 100% for the friends with benefits movement!

So back to the dating apps. I can tell you with 100% confidence I have literally never met a single person in my life that I’ve had a crush on or wanted more than friendship with right off the bat. I mean obviously I’ve been sexually attracted to people when I just met them, but that’s different.  Right off the bat literally no one has given me butterflies – at least not in my heart, nah mean? I think because even though I don’t show it and I’m incredibly guarded, I’m an extremely emotionally driven person.

I fall for peoples quirks, their confidence, their sense of humor and how it’s tailored into mine.  I fall for peoples passions, their dreams, their work ethic, their drive. I fall for how people see the world, how they see themselves in the world, how they see others in the world. These are all things you don’t get from a first date with a stranger, a dating app, someone you only just met.

I like to start as friends. I know this sounds like it’s a “choice” which I know it isn’t because there are feelings and emotions which are out of our control. That’s just always how I’ve been. Wired that way I guess.

The dating apps can’t give me any of that. If anything I get a minor glimpse into someones personality from the 2 sentence description they give, if they give one at all. A majority of the time I feel like I’m just flipping through a magazine. Comparing perfumes, when a perfume that might not smell as good as another, but it’ll last longer gets overlooked because I can’t smell the fucking perfume. I hate it.

Then comes my next hatred toward it, if not my biggest hatred.  The expectations. I’d say a majority of people are there for 1 of 2 reasons. 1 being a hookup/one night stand/whatever you want to call it or 2 dating, usually relatively serious.  I can’t really pitch to people “I don’t want to hook up on the first date, but if we only make it to 3 and that’s when I want to do it, so be it” or “I’m not opposed to long term dating, but I don’t want it to be expected just because I’m on this app.” No one really swipes right to someone saying, “Looking for friends!”

But that’s what I am doing. Not to sound like a loser, but I really want to be your friend. I don’t want to sleep with you and flirt and buy you shit if I don’t know you (unless we’re just tryna get handsy for a night).

I’ve gone on my fair share of dates from these apps. The way people come into to them is a little different, but mostly end the same. I’ve had one girl who I talk to on the app, that is so funny and witty and alllllll I want to do is meet up with her because she seems like a person I could eventually fall for, and if not that, she’s cool as fuck and I wouldn’t hate a friend, but she always dodges the meet up question. I’ve had one girl send me legit 5 page papers for 3 days making me feel like I was applying for my dream job and then giving me her number to meet up. I’ve had one girl have a lot in common with, talk on the app normal for a week we exchange numbers after a week and then it’s all flirty (which is fine I like playfulness, but like it was 0-60 real quick). I’ve had girls give me their numbers to meet up and never actually follow through. I’ve asked people to meet up and the conversation end completely. I’ve had people tell me their life stories in the first two messages, I’ve had people where talking to them felt like pulling teeth. I’ve had so. many. tongue. emojis. and to that I figure, roll with it. I work on my sexting skills. Get riled up, flick the bean, and call it a convo.

Point being that when I meet up with them, a majority of the time, the date could go well, but I’m just not 100% into dating the lady. I have a 3 date rule, where I’ll see anyone at least 3 times and then decide to continue or cut it because I don’t think you can get to know a person well enough in less than that, but anything more than that is getting too serious to not be sure and I’m not down with fucking with peoples emotions. Unless of course they’re a total dick or have questionable morals on the first date than it ends after the 1.

I just have this problem where, why is it expected to be a date. I’ve rarely talked to someone in a class and then hung out with them outside of class under the context that it’s a presumed date. I mean I’m also scarily oblivious so maybe they did think it was a date, but at least I’ve seen this person, talked to this person, laughed with this person. I’ve literally never done any of that with these bumble bitches.

Then comes the issue of when we meet and I’ll be honest, I’m a pretty good freakin date. I’m always willing to pay, if I don’t offer first. I always try to split if they insist. And finally, here is where my arrogance comes in, I’m good at making people feel good. I laugh a lot, I smile a lot, I talk a lot. I ask questions, I’m invested, I listen. I can see why anyone would think it went well. (As long as I don’t have to call them out for being a dick). Yet, sometimes, there isn’t even that spark in the sense that I know we won’t work. We don’t have similar goals, we don’t have similar life plans, we don’t have similar ideas of what’s fun.

Prime example. One of my most recent dating app dates was with a lawyer who had the same name as me, spelled the same and everything. The narcissist in me had to meet her because I thought it’d be hot to date someone with the same name as me. I’m not going to deny getting off to the thought of me. I think I’m a catch. (I sound like such an ass right now, blame the wine). Anyway, we talked on the apps and she was so fucking smart. Such a turn on. Averagely attractive, not in a negative way, but in the kind of way that she didn’t really try to hard with her appearance and still was good looking, but most important to me, she was kind. With everything she told me, she was kind.

So we meet up for coffee, I get there first, grab a table, tell her where I am. She gets there, I’m a gentlemen and bought her her soy green tea latte, I had a black coffee. We hung out for like maybe 90 minutes. I can tell within the first 20 minutes that I don’t think we’ll work out, but we can definitely go out again. I say this because I am literally driving the conversation to an unbaringly rough point. Every silence, I filled. Every question I asked, gets a short answer, so I fill it in with my own answer and a story on top of it. I chalk it up to her having nerves.

As this “date” continues I know for a 100% fact this girl and I will never work. Our goals are different, our ideas of fun are different, our pasts are just too different. Then at about 10 o’clock she says something like, “Well I think we should head out it’s getting late.” In that moment I know we won’t line up romantically.

Maybe that’s selfish of me. My best dates that I’ve been on are the ones where I literally lost track of time. It’s happened on first dates, second dates, all sorts of dates. My best times spent with someone are when I don’t want to go to sleep because I don’t want to stop listening to the sound of their voice. When I don’t care if I go into work exhausted the next day, running on 2 hours of sleep because I was laughing way too hard with the person I was with the night before. That’s not even to contradict myself in the sense of friends first, but that’s what I mean. Up until recently, when all my friends decided to grow up, we’d do exactly that, obviously with no romance involved, but that’s what I’m looking for in a person. I want to be your friend before I want anything from you. That can play into why I’m guarded or why most of my best friends are from childhood. It takes so much for me to give myself and my life story to someone. There are only 2 people I’ve dated that are still in my life, so if I told every person I dated my life, that makes my stomach turn. It’s no longer personal, its no longer me giving someone a piece of me. My friends know my shit because they are in my life for the long haul.

That’s why I want someone to be my friend first. Maybe that’s another insecurity I carry. If someone knows who I am, what I’ve done, good and bad, all of me, and still wants to date me, than I’m ready for that person.

I drifted.

Aside from a lot of other things she said on that date, I just knew. But at the same time, I did like some of the shit she was saying. I wasn’t opposed to hanging out again, but it had to be known that it wasn’t a date.

So when she texted me the next day, I was told by literally everyone, I had to ignore it. Anything else would be leading her on. Teasing her. Playing with her emotions. And that’s where my problem lies. She could’ve been a friend. Not one I’d hang out with very often, but maybe if I wanted to do a book club or go to a paint class, I’d hit her up. (I’m very well rounded). Just not if I wanted to do karaoke till 2 am, PR my deadlift, play pool with strangers, dance like an idiot to Journey, do the “Dougie” in the middle of a busy street, make a music video, go on adventures.

That’s what she wanted though – a person to date. Friendship isn’t something that was thought of. That’s why I hate the apps. I have soooooo much more to offer people than being their girlfriend or sex. I’m kind, I stand up for people, I’m funny, I want to bring out the best in people. If you only want that when it comes with a label, than frankly, it’s your loss.

In closing, the apps serve their purpose, and I get that. I just kind of wish as an adult, we had the interactions with people that we did in our younger years. Or before technology, when it wasn’t weird to talk to someone at the grocery store and try to meet up in the future. I just hate, hate, did I say hate? – the expectation that we have to date, have sex, or be nothing.

The Call.

I’m just going to start this off by letting anyone who reads this know – this isn’t going to be funny. It’s going to be very serious, probably a little “rambly”, and coming from a strong emotional state so bear with me.

There are few calls we expect in our lives that we know we’re going to eventually get. Those calls that no one wants to ever receive. The loss of a parent, an emergency hospital trip for a child, a random health issue for a spouse.

Today, I received a call.  A call that no one wants to get. A call that happens, but I never expected would happen to me.

You see, this weekend was the weekend for a friend of mines bachelorette party. I’m not in the wedding, but my two absolute best friends on the planet – matching tattoos – never find another like them, friends are in it. Along with other long term, close friends, including the bride. I was invited to the bachelorette weekend, but had to decline because I had already planned a family trip to California this week.

My friends and I made jokes about how they were stuck in the cold, it was going to snow on the East Coast, I should be forced to be there, but noooo I chose sunny, 70 degree, snowless, California.

It seemed normal, aside from my confusion with the time change. I would watch their snap stories, check their instagrams, see all the fun they were having. Truthfully feeling a little jealous of the memories they were making without me.

I saw on many of their stories how the snow caused their party limo to be stuck on the side of a road because the road was shut down.  Knowing my friends though, they made the best of that situation too. I told my family and other friends who weren’t there about the limo. We were cracking jokes about their situation.

I’d noticed no one snapped in a while.  My texts weren’t being responded to. Again, I thought nothing of it.  I mean, my texts weren’t anything spectacular. Maybe they were living in the moment instead of snapping, there was a significant time change, and they were all likely hungover I assumed.

Then it happened.  The Call.

I want to preface that everything could be much much worse. I’ve actually seen it be much worse, but I’ll get to that.

The Call.

It was about 4:30 in sunny California.  My emotions were all over the place as they’ve been lately. I was driving with my family to meet my cousins to go take out a Duffy Boat. It was going to be a great night. Then I get a call from one of my two best friends. I almost send it to voicemail because I’m in a car and thought that it’d be weird to answer. But, this friend and I never really talk on the phone so I say F it and answer.

She gets right to the chase.

Emily: “Cait, before I say anything I want you to know everyone is fine.  “Sally” doesn’t feel comfortable talking about it so don’t mention it, “Jen” doesn’t want anyone to know yet, and “Alice” doesn’t want anyone to know what she did”

Me: “ok…”

Emily: “Last night, our party limo was stuck on a road and the driver decided to do a 3 point turn to get out of it.  There was a car coming, he was going really fast, especially in the snow, and he plowed into the limo, he t-boned us. Everyone is alive Cait, but it’s really bad.”

This is a call I never thought I’d get. This isn’t a call I should get. My friends are all great people, they contribute to society, they have well paying jobs, they work hard and party very infrequently.

Me: “Jesus Christ, how is everyone, what happened?!”

Emily: “Well I kind of blacked out, most of us have concussions. “Sally” saw the whole thing, she wasn’t drinking. She’s really scarred, she banged her head so hard on the windshield. “Jen” was screaming the whole time at the guy that hit us. She kept screaming “you killed her!” because “Alice” couldn’t find a pulse on “Mary.” She started doing CPR until the ambulance arrived. “Mary” broke her back in like 3 places. “Karen” was really messed up. She lost a bunch of teeth. Her face was covered in blood. I had to take off my clothes to apply pressure to the wound. There was just so much blood. Everyone is banged up, those two are still in the hospital, but the rest of us are going to be ok. It was scary though Cait, horrific.”

That’s the call I got. Here I am. Pining over minuscule things in my day to day life. Thinking about the girl on Bumble who won’t message me back when all I want to do is meet her. Taking in beautiful California. Not wanting to go back to work this week. Questioning why this post didn’t get that many likes on Facebook.  All the while, unbeknownst to me, I could’ve lost every friend that means the world to me, friends I could not live without, friends that are more than friends to me, all in one clean sweep.

I could’ve been in that limo. I should’ve been in that limo. Timing was the problem. I could’ve been sitting where Mary and Karen were sitting. I could’ve been where Jen was, causing her to be closer to Mary and Karen, causing her to get hurt as well.

My friends all saw something, experienced something, that I’ll never know.  All I have is this call.

This call is enough for me to put my life in perspective. To stop worrying about the social media, to take life less seriously, to truly experience things.

When my cousin was in college, ironically the one I came to visit in California, he went out with some friends on a snowy night in New Haven. He was supposed to go back to the dorms in the first car, but chose to go in the second. The first car got into a horrific accident. Some of his friends died, some have lifelong injuries. He made a call – to my mom. My mom had to go to Yale Hospital at 4 am to help my cousin because his friends were dead and dying, he could’ve been dead or dying, but he ended up going in the second car.

I don’t know how to feel.  I just know I needed to type this out.

I know I feel fragile. I know I feel helpless. I’m the mother to my friends. I’m the one they call when they need a ride, when their car broke down, (before Uber) when they had too much to drink. I’m the one they look to when they need someone to be strong. I’m the one who will lend money out whenever times are tough. I’m their protector. I feel like I wasn’t there to protect them.

I feel small.