Oh, For The Love Of… Making Love!

Serious Serial Relationship Gal (SSRG): A feminine goddess who flits from one “This is forever!” union to the next with nary a breather in betwixt.

Some might mistakenly think SSRGs are lucky “in-love(rs)”, always finding the next Hopeful Potential partner on the heels of their last break-up.

Hopeful and Potential are the key descriptors here. We are hopeful that they have potential. We can change them. Improve them. Fix them! And then live happily ever after…

Only it’s us that needs the fixing with that kind of stinkin’ thinkin’. But it’s nobody’s job to fix anybody.

In the rearview mirror of our past practice relationships, we may realize we were also their Hopeful Potential. We were equally emotionally messed up at the time—or just plain ol’ incompatible.

I laughed with one ex awhile back. He’s found his perfect match (for now, since forever is never guaranteed—never, never, never, never).

He thanked me for nagging him to quit smoking. He’s been “cigarette-free since we’d been together”.

I laughed. Of course he has been. Isn’t that the way it works?

Don’t you just love it when a relationship expires with that “wrong person right now” only to watch them go (grow) on to be that better person for someone else?

Yes, I do love it.

Time goes by and we mature, sometimes by a nudge, other times by leaps and bounds and canyons. Either way, we’re different people who have unlocked more of our own true potential.

We can love it because now we’re (hopefully) that more evolved person, too. Our time together served its purpose and if we learned something about ourselves from it, we’re able to offer someone else an emotionally matured “better” version of ourselves. As we ground ourselves, we free ourselves from neediness.

Not being needy packs a whole lot of sexy.

At the same time, we’ve changed in other ways (or not) that also make it incompatible for us to be that perfect match for our previous partners.

How often do you buy back your old car? Bike? Scooter? Skateboard? Granted, occasionally this does happen. But usually only after many years of having experienced other cars/bikes/boards.

We can also love seeing our exes mature because we know that some poor suffering soul is out in the world working on becoming our right-for-now match—or they’re waiting for us to work on ourselves—so when fate/destiny/synchronicity/karma/randomchance/godalmighty puts us in each others’ path, we will both be ready.

Or at least readier.

With several serious relationships and a casual coital fling under my belt, so to speak, I’m ready to “ride it” out alone. I’ve learned enough about myself practicing relationships for awhile, thank you very much.

No more missing red flags or skipping the flags altogether for immediate pseudo-intimate gratification.

No more hopefulness confused with attraction, no more ego yearning to “fix” someone, no more oxytocin surging through an aching body sending feels-so-damn-good sensuations. (New word: sexual+sensual+sensations.)

These days with online communications and dating sites and hook-up apps there’s a lot of leeway in dating and not enough old-fashioned respect for the romantic process—our dating endeavors are matched by our throw-away attitudes and quick to click, check ‘em out and check out if the slightest wrong answer or gesture is received (/perceived).

I get it. Weed through them, get to the sweet smelling buds, why waste time in the garden, right?

Remember when our parents met (or for some, our grandparents)? Those traditional times when people got to know each other, at least a little, before baring all—physically and emotionally. There’s a specialness to that.

And, yeah, there are those who met and knew right away, even back then. But they often still let that newness linger. They allowed discovery, the natural unrushed unfolding. Hearts unfurling. Butterflies even!

If one simply wants some quick turn around sheet tussle time then sure, go for it. But for those of us who’ve been through the gamut and would rather wait it out for making love—the kind that only time getting to know someone can do—then why hurry? Why not savour the novelty, the tummy flops, the glimmering eyes, the silly hope?

If s/he’s on the same page, s/he’ll stick around.

Ask anyone who’s been together a long time, like 30, 40, 50+ years long, who is still in love—in love—they’ll tell you they are with each others’ best friend.

Is it so awful to start as plain old regular “friends first” nowadays?

Maybe it doesn’t grow and doesn’t go anywhere or is one-sided—or no-sided and the relationship fades away like autumn’s early mist. Or there’s no chance of romance, no real potential of a physical relationship, but there’s enough to sustain a friendship.

Is that such a terrible consolation prize? In lieu of straight up casual sex we get a real, non-coital connection. Sometimes that even leads to real romance. True love, as they call it.

Sex clouds judgement. Not for all, but for many. Certainly, for me.

Times have changed with some women wanting wanton encounters (or at least, now openly admitting to it) just as some men have for ages, but for those of us wanting the full-meal deal, the best-friend-and-lover dinner special, not the casual sex appetizer, it’s okay to wait it out.

We can, of course, continue to “learn and grow” within another relationship—monogamous or not, committed or not—as opposed to hitting the sheets solo, but we can also choose singlehood, with or without celibacy.

I’ve learned more about my self, my needs, my desires and my “complicated characteristics”, and have matured without having had to endure the pain and/or guilt of another break-up with someone who isn’t the right fit.

And the sex part? To me, sex without in-to-me-see, true intimacy that I choose not to “give away” on the first go, is shallow and wan. I’ve loved and I’ve been in love and there’s a ginormous difference. I’ve chosen to retire my Serious Serial Relationship Gal hat and wait it out for someone who has no “potential”, as in he’s not perfect—just perfectly flawed for me.

Whatever our journey, we are right where we’re meant to be. We are okay. Here. Now.

With or without whoever.

With or without sex.

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