My Love Life…
I am not even sure what that is anymore…
As the dreaded holiday of Valentine’s Day looms closer, I can’t help but think about love and loving and relationships and all that goes with them.
Currently, I have no love life. I have been doing the online dating thing and now what I have is a random assortment of weird connections that I have no idea what to do with…none of us liking the other enough to do anything other than the weird dance we have discovered together.
I cancelled my account.
Not because I am giving up finding a partner. I cancelled my account because I really just have apathy where I used to have hope. What once was fun: meeting new people, possibility, interest and longing has now just become a grind that I am no longer invested in and just can’t seem to find any joy in anymore.
Less than four months and it all just sucks and I find myself scheduling dates and then spending all my time attempting to figure out how the fuck to get out of them. It isn’t fair to anyone so I just have to stop. I am not sure if I need a break or if I just have to stop thinking that online dating is ever going to give me anything other than a quick hit of dopamine and then it is going to be like anything else: the joy fades away right along with my willingness to participate.
Honestly, I have other things I want to do. What once was exciting and fun has become a drudgery and now makes me feel more than a little despondent. I am not present anymore, I am just going through the motions…
So I guess my love life is burning down in a new way. It used to be that I had some crazy situation going on with a man that was all wrong for me. Now it is like the universe is just like, “hey, stop it, just stop dating! It is a new and different dumpster fire, but a dumpster fire nevertheless!”
Sometimes I think I engage in dating just to tire myself out. Just to burn off the over abundance of energy and drive and zeal I have. And I will admit, as I age, I am coming to terms with this idea that my energy level along with my willingness to engage in bullshit is rapidly evaporating. Truth? I just don’t even know what the fuck I am doing anymore. I feel like I am at that jumping off place: no longer wanting to go as I have while having absolutely no idea what the fuck else I am going to do.
The online thing provides an immediate and ongoing rush of superficial bullshit and an endless stream of participants. It is exhausting. I have become inured to the mindless, “hi sexy, how are you?” Fuck I don’t even care anymore. My most honest answer? “I feel dead inside…and this engagement with you is making it worse.”
This is the sum of what appears to be available online currently:
“Hey sexy….” Never to be heard from again until maybe a few months later when you get the same thing again with the same result.
“Hey sexy, blah, blah, blah”. Then a bunch of weird emojis that lead one to conclude that sex is the only thing this person wants and is frustrated by the platforms refusal to allow them to send you dick pics.
“Hey beautiful, I live in LA but I originally from Italy…” Which I have learned is code for bot dating and now just immediately unmatch.
Then there are the rare ones that actually want to meet and go out and do something in person. But the logistics of that with my already overwhelmed schedule is like trying to orchestrate a kindergarten field trip with chaperones and multiple vehicles. There are about 700 text messages that result in a lot of information being communicated and no one still having any idea of what the fuck is going on.
And I have to say at the end of it all, I don’t even know what I want. I think, if I am honest, and I really do endeavor to be, I want to find someone so remarkable that alters my daily commitment to being single for the rest of my life. I want a combination of Holden Caulfield (minus the mental breakdown), Matthew McConaughey (self explanatory), Henry Rollins (self explanatory if you have ever listened to him), Laird Hamilton (also self explanatory) and Dave Nihill (Irish Comedian). And trust me, there is no one on a dating site that resembles any of the above. Myself included.
So do I just have unrealistic expectations? Yes. I think I do. And this whole process has inured me to the whole dating endeavor. I am just tired and vacant and just a cog in the online dating machine at this point.
For me, I feel the need to return to my previous method of dating which is a combination of not leaving my house and just trusting the universe that if and when I am supposed to meet someone, I will. I can tell you that I cannot say I have had worse results with this method than online dating.
What I think I have realized most is that I am not the right version of me yet. I have some rather glaring character defects that are only exacerbated by the whole online dating process. The endless stream of candidates which initially is exciting and fun, leaves me feeling completely hollowed out and quite despondent.
I do not know where I go from here, I just know that for now, online isn’t it. I keep giving it a go and keep finding myself back in the same place as I always am. It is just like drinking:
It is a lot of fun in the beginning with only good consequences.
Then it is less fun with some not so fun consequences.
Then it is not fun at all with consequences that cause me to doubt all of mankind and where we are headed as a species.
The juice is not worth the squeeze…
I really do want depth and meaning and trust and fidelity. And I know that will never be achieved by swimming only in the shallow end of the pool. And to be honest, I have no idea what a deep end swim even looks like at this point.
So once again, for different reasons, my love life is burning down and I am wholly disinterested. Instead of putting out the conflagration, I am at the gym working out wholly unconcerned about the latest spot fire.
Which leads me to the ultimate and undeniable conclusion that I just need to work on me and trust that if and when I should date again, the universe will let me know…until then, I am just going to be over here with my cats, working out, hiking and living my best life…
What am I trying to do anyway? Life is pretty good just like it is. Perhaps it is time I just accept the amazing life I have and stop worrying about my partnerability or love life. If I am paying attention the answer appears to be pretty fucking clear: No.
Again…still.
