{cohabitation update}

I totally have SO much to update you guys on -- seriously, I do.  But today I thought I would  donate some time to new relationshipy-stuff.  Before I continue, please forgive my sudafed-nose spray-overdosing brain today.  I have some sort of gigantic sinus flare up that I am trying to kill before my trip.  I haven't had a lot of sleep, my stomach is wrecked and I just feel plain gross.

Ok.  Back to relationshipy-stuff.  (Hopefully 3 Putt won't take the ring back after he reads this. I kid.  I hope...) 3 Putt and I both knew that we would definitely move in together once we got engaged.  Although he is not technically moved in he has really been at my house ever since.  In my defense I have lived with a boy before...but holycowitwasa reallylongtimeago. It's actually been really nice -- mainly because he is so helpful and its super nice to just open the pantry and see that the garbage has been taken out or seeing him walking in the door with a pile of mail for me (I never really check the mailbox unless I'm expecting a package.).  But wow y'all -- I just kind of assumed that we already spent a lot of time together.  But I guess we really were not all up in each other like I thought. Really and truly this isn't a bad thing -- its just REALLY different.  You just get used to having shit your way all the time when you live alone.  So, yes it's a good different; however having said that I was kind of losing my mind on our snow days/me working from home days.  I'll just give a few examples of adjustment:

a) I normally go days without ever turning on the TV.   With 3 Putt I'm pretty sure that thing is always on in the background.  I had to walk out and shovel the driveway Thursday.  And tell 3 Putt it was driving me super nuts.  Because OH MY GOD ALL THE TV.

b) I'm still trying to make myself realize that we have not combined household items yet.   His clothes are here.  That's it.  It's a big adjustment to make the space.  To even think of it really.

c) I know dudes think bitches be cray but we HAVE to work on pre-bedtime straightening.  Poor guy is coming into a really anal and particular (yet not hostile) location.  But in all seriousness we cannot come downstairs in the mornings with all the pillows still on the floor that were moved off the couch during evening TV time.  

d) All good times can be spoiled by The Great Wedding Ceremony Debate.  This may be a recurring 2014 theme.

Having given these examples,  I kind of want to interview 3 Putt for a pseudo-guest post about all of the adjustments that poor guy is going through.  I really kind of pity him for having to live with me. I am not the easiest roomie.  I am sure that even though he really may be the most relaxed, gentle, kind, thoughtful guy I have ever met he has had several moments of great frustration and reminders that I can be straight batshit crazy over things like vacuum lines, the exact position of a chair in a room, and any spot that ever got on my new bedding or that may be on it in the future due to humans not being observant and preventing the dogs from doing stupid shit around said bedding.  Or the fact that I try to give a grown ass man specific linen washing instructions down to the number of times the large king size blanket should be dried.  

There are good lessons to be learned here.  I need to make a special place I can go while 3 Putt watches the TV.  He is a great roomie.   He folds laundry that I leave in the dryer.  He makes a real effort at making the bed and putting the pillows the way I like them.  He thinks every dinner I make is good or at least he doesn't say otherwise.  He always makes breakfast on the weekends and doesn't turn on the TV during this time.  If anything, this should be a lesson in what I can do for 3 Putt and help make his transition better and more comfortable.

Still,  it's not always easy to live with someone.   If anything, this relationship has taught me about deep breaths and priorities.  And I want to appreciate adjustments more -- this is the first time we will move in together.   I want to live in that moment. We won't have it again.   So remind me of that when I come downstairs tomorrow morning and the pillows are off kilter.



~the single gal~

Where I Try to Navigate the "Big Steps" of a Relationship

I worry that all this work lately has meant the death of The Single Gal.  I'm trying to hang in there folks.  Trying.  Worked late again tonight {shocker, I know}.  I tried to be a super hero and also go to the gym but I hit 27 minutes on the elliptical and called it quits.  Tuesday nights sleep was a bit rocky since 3 Putt helped me disassemble my current bed frame and take it to the garage so that all I have to do is shove around my mattress and box springs when my new mattress comes on Saturday.   I'm trying to keep my eyes on the fun stuff -- new mattresses, upcoming life news, dreams of spring {even though it's still freezing here}, starting new books, and taking big steps with 3 Putt.  

I was so frazzled with work a few weeks ago I forgot to tell y'all that we had dinner with my Big John and Pammie.  Like just me and 3 Putt.  And my parents.  I guess the good thing about being so busy and working so much was that I had almost zero time to get nervous and freak out about it.   I know it doesn't seem like a crazy big step to some of you but it is to me -- my fam will tell you I keep people in the closet.  Not because I am ashamed of them but because there is just no need for anyone that I'm just "dating" to meet them.  Also, this way when you break up there is just less explaining to do.  If 3 Putt was anything but calm and cool about it I didn't know.  Dinner went really well and since I had been working so much I actually just enjoyed being with everyone and having a night out rather than thinking of all the things on my "to do" list at work.   I texted Big John the next day and he said he enjoyed meeting 3 Putt and thought he was a "really nice guy".  Big words from Big John = happy Single Gal!

I bring up "The Dinner" because 3 Putt's mom is flying in from Scotland tomorrow.  And we are having dinner on Friday and Saturday.  SO nervous.  I have a zit brewing just underneath my left nostril -- you know, the kind that you can feel before they randomly well up into the size of an SJP beauty mark? I'm already pretty sad the weather still calls for sweaters because I would rather wear one of my pretty Lilly skirts but I know you can't have it all.  {blahblahblah} 3 Putt also swears that I'll not have trouble with her accent but I'm pretty sure I may spend part of dinner with the blank look I have on my face when I go to the nail salon.  Anyway -- wish me luck.  You girls know how it is meeting a man's mother.  It can be a tough arena.  

Also -- I really don't want this to become some "gush-about-your-boyfriend" platform but 3 Putt has been really great the last few weeks about putting up with my insanity.  First off -- he keeps saying he doesn't think I am acting insane {surely a fib} even when I am.  Second, he has been SO helpful in doing everything I ask or anything he can to make sure I'm not staying crazy stressed out all the time.  It's really nice.  Really, really nice actually.  

Is anyone else going through the crazy other than me and The Housewife? Drop a line. We are in the struggle, too. 

Love you. Mean it. 

~the single gal~

Dating Update {part two}

As many of you know I referenced the return of 3 Putt in my last dating blog.  I am returning for Part II. When we parted I had just completed my 3rd outing with Blind Date.  Also, after months and months of trying (fruitlessly) to forget 3 Putt (remember this post?) part of me still felt like I was standing in the same place after all this time. And I didn't want to get tangled up in the same mess again. So on a Monday afternoon when 3 Putt texted me and asked me to dinner later that week I declined. Also, I was seriously kind of in a panic because I just could not let myself get involved with him again in any sort of casual relationship. It couldn't happen.  So I send a second text. The one I felt sure would deter him from contacting me again.  I basically said I could not consider dinner ever because he only wanted to see me casually. That if he wanted to sit down and discuss our issues and discuss a monogamous, committed relationship I would be amenable. {I mean, this usually sends all males running to the hills, right?!}

I'd like you to try to truly imagine how far my jaw dropped when he replies that he has to see me that night and wants to "lay all his cards on the table".  But then he also said I still may want to punch him in the face.  I was pretty freaked.  But also insanely curious as to what in the hell had happened to him that would make him say that after all this time. I calmly replied that was OK, but seriously people I wasn't about to change my Monday plans at a moments notice.  So I said he could make his statements after I got back from the gym. And after that I promptly started frantically texting and emailing The Housewife. 

Really, I am shocked I actually made it to the gym that night.   All of the texting occurred earlier during a regular work day and I had almost talked myself out of the possibility that I could even think of quieting my mind enough to attend gym class.  

I was really surprised when 3 Putt came over.  First - we had a serious, grown up talk about conflicts, relationships, our prior issues, what the bottom line was for both of us, expectations, reality, etc.  Second -- I really thought that a man showing up on your doorstep making a grand gesture was something that really only happened in the movies.  As such, I told 3 Putt that I would be very willing to think about starting a real and serious relationship with him but that I needed a week to mull things over.  Mainly because when someone runs up to you and tells you things you waited over a year to hear that were never said it all seems too good to be true.   And you start to wonder what the catch is -- there has to be one, right? You don't just wake up on a Monday morning and suddenly become Carrie and Big from SATC. 

I truly thought long and hard about my decision.  I knew that some things would still be hard for us -- like telling all my friends and family about him being back in my life.  I knew that he might not get a warm reception from some.  He may not get a warm reception from my family.   I prayed a lot when we were apart the last half of 2012 and I prayed a lot more that following week.  I decided that if he was willing to give "us" a real try then I really wanted to do the same.  They say a lot of people think the path to success is a straight line.  But it's not -- it's full of ups and downs, risks that pay off and risks that don't pay off.  I think that relationships are the same.  Has our path been really squiggly? Yes.   But that's perfectly OK with me. And life is too short to worry about much else. 

It feels super weird to me to have a "boyfriend" after several years of nothing serious.  Really weird.  {Seriously someone email me tips on how to be a good girlfriend because I just do whatever I want.} It's also different to seem to be starting from square one of a serious relationship, but at the same time already having known the other person so long.  And I don't mean these things in a negative way -- like I said -- it's like I woke up one Monday and everything changed.   And some days I still want to know if it's really happening but 3 Putt is always leaving me friendly reminders and telling me that it really is happening.  

And, I don't want y'all to think I have abandoned you Single Gals.  I have already told 3 Putt as long as I am filing taxes as a single individual we will still have lots to write about here! 

Love you. Mean it. 

~the single gal~

I've been debating a lot about this post.  Tactically speaking I love to use humor to displace my sometimes uncomfortable Single Gal situations, conversations, and just plain awkwardly painful encounters with the general public.  But really, the last two months have kind of been shit.  And I know that when I write this post I'm not the only one who has been here.  I get it.  But at the urging of The Housewife you get a post that may very well bare a good portion of my soul.  But seriously if you read it don't accost me about the post in Target or at dinner for God's sake. Let's just keep it in the inter webs for now.  Between inter web friends.

One of the greatest things about being 29 and staring at another failed relationship that you spent almost two years on-- that same relationship that maybe was never really a relationship or it was which is still up for debate -- is that since you are no longer in high school where your life really did consist of long phone calls with your loved one, notes in lockers, and making out in move theaters the actual reality of it is this:  you've got a lot of other real life shit to do.  Go to work, clean the house, pay the bills, catch up on DVR, see your friends so they don't move you off their social calendar for being a real lame ass, etc., so you know life does go on and will go on.  You also usually have less evidence to destroy -- because hey, why take pictures together anyway when you just have to send them to the city dump? Live and learn. Save the environment.  Don't forget to embrace The Breakup Diet either -- nothing slaps the hungry out of you like cold, hard, rejection.  

Ok, so maybe there are about 2.5 great things about the situation and life isn't complete shit.  The hard parts? Well, those are a bit more numerous and complicated.  

It's hard to talk about it to people -- especially when you are aging 29.  You see, your friends that are getting married and having babies and buying minivans and thinking about their second babies and preschool and new houses -- they have the trump cards.  So know that your allotted time for talking about "just another breakup" is going to be pretty limited if you are in the minority of major life events. I don't think it's meant to be hurtful, its just the way of the age group.  Eventually conversations basically all fall into the standard responses -- but all in one text of course.  "He's an asshole. We hated him anyway. Just get back out there! You'll feel better." 

It's hard to end up at home after the umpteenth colossal argument. That final argument that was really dispirited to begin with because it was the moment you realized that while there are a million things you want and feel you need to say, you just give up and recognize the wasted breath and the deaf ears involved.  You will sit there in silence instead and feel the entrance of that Relationship Grimm Reaper.  You guys know what I'm talking about.  I really believe you can sit in a room and just feel a relationship die. 

You think that after you drag yourself home and get through those next three days that it has to get better because surely that was the worst sting of it all.  You think the hard part is over. You revel in that misplaced confidence that you will have more than two weeks to recover before a new girlfriend shows up {and don't we all know that in this wonderful age of technology she will show up everywhere. EVERYWHERE.}.  You really will think that because you have seen plenty of them,  you can ace Breakup School no problem.  But the fact of the matter is all breakups still suck.  A lot.  It sucks to feel used.  It sucks to feel discarded.  It sucks to have to find that place in your life where you lived without that person and make it happen again after the fact.  And then you feel like an idiot all over again, because you loved and supported that person.  Because you would have been just as happy at Waffle House with that person as you would have been at the nicest restaurant in town.  Because you adored how they kissed you every time you waited for the car to come back from the valet.  Because Christmas morning may never come without remembering that one breakfast.  Or the freckles on their shoulder.  Or exactly how their hands looked.

Love you. Mean it.
~the single gal~

Paradise

I hope they aren't running computer reports today at work, because I never blog at work but I am today. But if anyone asks, it took me less than 5 minutes, I'm on my lunchbreak, and it's nothing offensive.

I found this quote today and I think it may be the sweetest thing I've ever seen, and if I were ever to get married, I would be happy forever if my husband said this about me.

"This morning, with her, having coffee."

~Johnny Cash, when asked for his definition of paradise.~

Love you. Mean it.

~the single gal~