I am already on the record as saying I am not into the bar/club scene, and yet, somehow, I got talked into attending a social gathering at one last night.
It all started so innocently. I get emailed an invite from a member in my Singles site, and while my first instinct was to decline, I considered my own situation -no relationship, alone for the past four months, haven't dated in over 13 years- and consulted my family and friends for advice, which, overwhelmingly, went: "YES! You need to get out of the house! You'll have fun!"
And so I accepted the invitation. That's when my own internal conscience kicked in: "You're gonna be sooorrrryyy," it repeated, over and over, and the cold feet began. The closer to the event, the greater the temptation to back out made itself manifest. And then, I got an email from one of the people attending, saying, in effect, that she saw I planned to attend, read my ad, and was looking forward to meeting me at the social.
Dang. I was now committed to attend the event.
And so there I was, at a poorly-lit, disco-strobing club with the noise levels so loud as to shake the very walls, standing-room only, looking in vain for the lady that wanted to meet me. I bought myself a ginger ale -I don't drink alcoholic beverages unless attending weddings or celebrating Christmas or New Years'- and all I could think of was, "what the heck am I doing here?"
I finished my drink, stepped outside, thanked the event organizer for inviting me, apologized for leaving... and went home.
As soon as I got home I emailed the lady that had been interested in meeting me, apologizing for not having met her and leaving the event early. When I woke up this morning I got her reply. She said she had arrived at the social about fifteen minutes after I'd left, and didn't stay long either - like me, that type of venue was not her cup of tea. Hmmm. Maybe this could be the start of a good friendship after all...
So there it was, my first, last and ONLY club social I will ever attend. And if anyone even suggests for me to attend another of these high-decibel, poorly-lit elephant stampedes, I will personally dunk him or her head-first into the nearest garbage dumpster and slam the door shut.
Today I am going to do something a little different. If I get more requests, then perhaps I can make it a weekly feature, we'll see.
For those who don't know it, I am also a poet. Some of my poems have been published in anthologies, but the vast majority of my work is being saved for possible publication someday. Today I will share you one of my compositions, one I hope will express how finding true love completes both partners. Feel free to share it with your special someone, I won't mind; I'm waiving my copyright and making it public domain:
YOU COMPLETE ME
For as long as I remember, I felt a void within:
A never-sated hunger - life waiting to begin.
I was an empty vessel, a song without a beat;
Somehow I understood well I was still incomplete.
The searching took forever, my quest seemed without end;
On the verge of surrender, no hopes left to defend:
“Perhaps that part I’m missing was but a fallacy?”
But as I was conceding, you came and set me free.
I realized there and then you filled the void I had.
My soul had tasted Heaven; my friends thought I’d gone mad!
My heart was filled with laughter, and everyone could see
The love we share together says how you complete me.
Please remember that true love is the most precious and rare treasure of all. If you have found it, you are indeed blessed. And if you haven't then please don't be discouraged! Your ideal match could be just around the corner; you just have to be patient and open to the possibility.
Cheers!
Dear friends;
It is with great sadness that I will have to put my activities on the site on hold for about a month or so.
The reason is simple enough: Cataracts. My vision has been worsening for sometime now, and as much as I would love to continue blogging every week and answering all my emails, it has gotten to the point where I can barely make out the words on the screen these days. And since I am also a dedicated nature photographer, this has made it doubly difficult for me.
My surgery is scheduled for September 22, after which I will need to rest my eye a little. The other, the right one, also has a cataract, but since it is already blind, there's not much point worrying over it yet, although it, too will undergo lenticular replacement surgery eventually. Once my good seeing eye is done with surgery, I should be able to see everything well once again, and resume my blogging and commenting activities. Nope, you haven't heard the last of me, but that's in a good way!
Thanks for your understanding. I will continue to have my ad up on the site, but I might want to suspend visibility so that I don't get emails I can't answer just yet. I'll still be around, only not as active.
Thank you to all my readers and commenters. You're the real reason I enjoy coming to this site. As always, stay positive and don't give up hope on making that lifelong connection!
Sincerely,
Marc
I have been a member of this site for one month exactly as of August 20th, and since this is an anniversary of sorts, I thought I'd look back on those past weeks and evaluate the results. Since I try for the most part to focus on the positive, I'm happy to report that in the past month I posted seven blog posts and received over 796 views. To me this is great news, because it shows that people seem to enjoy reading my posts. Thank you for your interest and support, everybody. I am humbled and grateful.
On a slightly less positive side, I saw many people read my profile, and all seven emails I've received came from scam artists, and I cheerfully called them to task, each and every one. In fact, one particular emailer claimed to come from one of my old hometowns! Needless to say, she didn't know any of the town's main streets, and it didn't take me long to take apart her claims.
I just love these fake responders - they are great comic relief and an excellent way to vent out my frustrations! I enjoy sending them my very own "form letter" telling them why I know they are fakes, since they very clearly never bothered to read my ad. So thank you, scammers, for bringing me laughter and stress relief!
As much as I enjoy blogging, I also take the time to read blogs as well. Sometimes I offer a little comic relief -especially when the blog post is lighthearted and fun- or I try to give the most honest answe or insight I can. I know how much work goes into a blog, so the more thoughtful the post, the more thoughtful the reply I offer. And the best part of all this correspondence?
You guessed it. I made some really great friends.
Thank you for welcoming me into the CS community. I might not have found some local dates in my area, but I made some great friends from all over the world. For that reason alone, I will continue to post and comment, and with your kind words or encouragement, I'll always remain cheerful and optimistic.
Have yourselves a great weekend, and don't get discouraged in your search for your love connection! In the meanwhile, remember that today's friend could become tomorrow's soulmate!
Cheers!
Marc
The pitfalls of long-distance relationships.
Back in the days when I lived in a small Northern Ontario town, I had a girlfriend living in Cookeville, Tennessee named Carole (not her real name). She and I met online through a singles web site I won't name, and after countless letters, photoexchanges, phone calls and instant messages, we finally agreed to meet. My employers at the time were very good friends of mine, and loaned me their corporate credit card for the length of my trip to visit her. I flew from Timmins, Ontario to Toronto, then flew to O'Hare in Chicago and off to Nashville, Tennessee, where Carole met me with balloons and a really sexy dress. We spent a week together, drove to her parents' home in Florida, got to eat grits and gravy for the first time in my life, and we shared some wonderful intimate moments together. On my final night in Cookeville she made a very romantic candlelight dinner and we had a fantastic final night together.
A month later she flew all the way to my hometown to spend a week with me, and before leaving back to Tennessee, she confessed there was a coworker in her hometown that liked her, and she was interested in him as well. We broke up on a bittersweet note, and parted company amicably.
Welcome to the world of long-distance relationships.
This was my first long-distance relationship, and I would have thought one would have been enough, but since then, I have had two more. One was with a University student from Texas (six months, no meeting), and the most recent one was with a prychology graduate from Palm Springs, California (eleven years, two meetings). Nothing - and I mean nothing - can put more stress on a relationship than being separated by hundreds, if not thousands, of miles. Sure, since my Cookeville relationship (1988), Internet communications have evolved by leaps and bounds. Webcams and Voice Messenging have allowed for a more intimate and immediate communication, and with live feeds the potential for greater intimacy between two people separated by distance is better than ever. But there is always the very real absence of the physical presence, and once that computer or laptop is turned off, your bed is still cold and empty, and that virtual person that's so far in miles and so close emotionally is simply not there with you physically.
A number of long-distance relationships have led to successful romances. My sister met her present husband after months of online long-distance communications. A friend of mine also met her husband through a long-distance love affair. But speaking from experience, those are the exception rather than the norm.
Personally, I find long-distance relationships to be a terrible strain on me emotionally. I always ended up wondering what she was doing when she was offline, or whether she'd end up so lonely she'd seek out a more physical person that was closer to her. Absence in a long-distance relationship does NOT make the heart grow fonder. Absence only makes the ulcers grow bigger, and the loneliness greater.
Does that mean I won't have another such relationship in the future? Welllllll, let's just say that I'd rather avoid them if I can, but the heart works in mysterious ways, as they say. Personally, I think love is not just blind, but deaf as well as dumber than a sack of hammers. Love makes you agree to accept things no sane person would agree to. So I can't entirely close the door to that possibily, as long as I know the lady at the other end will eventually be by my side... to love AND to hold.
I have always enjoyed reading, that's no secret. I have a large collection of books -most of them non-fiction - which I enjoy reading again and again.
Most of them cover my interests -photography, theoretical physics, writing, history, computers- but one of them in particular has proven to be a great guide for us men: the book is called "Light Her Fire" by Ellen Kreidman.
Before I continue, please let me say that I am a devoted boyfriend and lover, and most of the material covered in the book deals with romantic gestures, little "igniters" for passion, and those trivial "little things" that mean so much in the long run.
I'm sure my female readers will agree that there is never anything trivial when it comes to relationships. We men tend to trivialize those small gestures, but in truth, these little gestures of affection make all the difference in a relationship. "Light Her Fire" discusses at length the differences in thinking between the two genders, and deals with a number of specific little things that help make or break relationships.
The edition I own dates back to 1991, and every once in awhile I like to read it over; and at every reading, I gain a little more insight on what makes a relationship tick.
My last relationship lasted eleven great years, and I can honestly give credit to some of the great ideas Ms. Kreidman provided in her book. Ideas such as:
- Sing To Her - Make an "I love you" call from the office. Call her and tell her you were just thinking about her and how much she means to you and you just wanted to say , "I love you." If you have a good voice, you could sing a few bars of Stevie Wonder's song, "I Just Called To Say I Love You." Go ahead and sing it even if you don't have a good voice.
- Create A Cereal Hideaway - Buy a very sexy nightgown, wrap it in a small package, and hide it in a cereal box or any other place she'd least expect to find such an item.
You get the idea.
I know that a great many men out there think they are perfect as-is, and wouldn't even consider keeping a book on relationships around. Well, I don't know about you, but I, for one, consider myself a work in progress, and I always seek to become the best possible mate for the woman I love. One of the ways I try to improve on myself is by keeping an open mind, and being open to new ideas, new outlooks, and *gasp* accepting the fact that I might NOT be perfect, no matter how great I look in the mirror! Ok, that last bit is totally not me. The point I'm trying to make is, a great ego has no room for anyone else, so it really helps to admit the fact that everybody -you, me, even the happiest married couples out there- isn't perfectly happy all the time. We are ALL works in progress, there is always room for improvement.
And for the sake of my future love, I'd want to be the BEST darn me that I can be.
I'm back, baby!
The other day I was so dejected by the two people who had contacted me (I won't drop names), that I decided to close out my accounts on all the singles sites I belonged to.
They were imposters, pure and simple. One was claiming to have been an American-British lady, but spoke such horrible English it defied credibility. The other claimed to have read my ad, but had no clue about my interests.
I am trying. Dear Lord, I am trying; but such moments really are a drain on the emotions, and that's why I gave up on Singles sites... for now.
About a week later I came to the realization that perhaps I was hasty. I mean, I'm not a loner or anything. My last relationship has lasted me eleven years, and to be perfectly honest, I've become a tad unaccustomed to the whole dating scene. Clubs? Bars? No thanks. If I'm going to meet someone, I'd like to hear what she has to say without asking her to yell over the music and the crowds.
And at heart, even though I have been living in Ottawa since 1998, I'm still a small-town guy.
And so, reluctantly, I had to concede that perhaps the Singles sites were not such a bad idea after all; and so here I am, reactivating my accounts.
Hoping, once again, to find my True Love.
Last night I found myself unable to fall asleep, and so I got dressed and went for a long walk.
The cool night air made my walk enjoyable. Ottawa has been under a sweltering heat wave for more than a week now, and made the daytime unpleasant for outdoor activities. As I made my way back to my building, I stopped in my tracks and that's when it hit me:
I am utterly alone.
I looked at the empty streets, listening to the silence, broken only by the odd bird's interjection.
Alone.
I never imagined I would end up this way. Up until a month ago I still believed my then-girlfriend of eleven years and I would get married and start a family. We had a great relationship, we were tremendously happy, we shared so much in common, both intellectually as well as spiritually. But it turned out she had a been deceiving me. Easy to do since she lived in California, and we spent maybe one week a month together. She was still married to her husband. Time to move on.
Last week, my sister suggested I try putting up an ad on some singles sites. She met her current husband that way, she said to me. And so, with some apprehension, I placed an ad on two sites.
As I returned home from my walk, every step -alone- seemed a little heavier than the last. My two cats were still asleep, thank goodness. Too early in the day for them to be awake and demanding to be fed; so I got undressed and took a shower as my computer booted. As I dried myself off I sat down at my desk, completed the login, checked my mail.
Nothing.
I turned off my computer, shut off my lamp, and went back to bed.
Alone. Again.
The Importance of Humor In A Relationship
You've seen it the ads, I'm sure: "must have a good sense of humor". It's often overlooked, because so many people tend to go for the "biggies" of honesty, trust, loyalty, devotion.
The simple fact is, the ability to see the funny aspects of a situation, to make your partner smile at your jokes and gestures -at the appropriate times, of course- cannot possibly be overstated.
Imagine how boring life would be if your partner didn't smile, stayed serious and intense all the time. Would anyone want that? Of course not. A couple is very much a team, and good morale in any team is important. If you or your partner has a bad day, it's up to the other partner to bring up the morale, and what better way to do this than to bring a smile?
Of course, humor is like strong medicine - it must be used only when needed, and only when it's appropriate. There are times when the only thing anyone can do, is to be the supportive partner. A sensitive partner knows when to be playful, when to be quiet, and when to be supportive. But for the most part, the ability to bring a smile to your partner's lips cannot be understated. Playfulness during those moments of intimacy can turn a night of romance into the most wonderful, powerful memories you can cherish. And let's face it, it's always -ALWAYS - all about the little things in life, those wonderful, sensitive little gestures that all add up to a great love affair. And that gift of laughter is right up there among the greatest attributes of a great and lasting relationship.
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