The Dating Scene Scares Me

So yesterday I had a bit of a sulk. Photographer changed his fb profile pic to one with The Girl in it, just in case there was any doubt.  It's not so much that I was interested in him as that I'm mad that I was wrong, that I let myself get carried away.  And maybe a little bit, some sorta 'that was your only chance' thoughts ran through my head.  The fact that he liked this dorky movie tipped the scales just enough in his favour that if, hypothetically, he had shown more interest I would probably have gone along with it, because I'm bored out of my skull and sick sick sick of waiting for whatever it is I'm waiting for.

To relieve the sulk, I did some OK Cupid browsing.  I made an account a few weeks ago after reading the New Yorker article previously posted.  At least OKC cuts out all the guys who post pictures of themselves posing shirtless in the bathroom mirror and whose profiles are just random keyboard mashings.  I haven't filled out my profile completely nor posted a picture.  I recognized someone I used to work with.  What's the etiquette for that?

I opened the account to be a looky-loo while I decide if I wanted to really invest time in it or not.  Last night I tried answering more of the OK Cupid questions that are supposed to help you find your matches.  I was really uncomfortable with some of the questions:  "Do you have sex after date 1-2, 3-5, 6+, or after the wedding?"   People have sex on the first date with people they met online?  Waiting till the 6th date is apparently really prudish.  Even on Big Bang Theory, Bernadette told Howard the third date meant sex. 

These are not expectations I'm comfortable with. 

One profile was a high match for me and I liked everything he had written until I reached the bottom and it said he was looking for short term dating and casual sex, with younger women.  That's when I logged off.

It makes me feel like I'm a kid playing in the grown-up sandbox.  (Does that even make sense?  It's almost 1am...)  Or possibly I was born 100 years too late, because my notions are considerably out-dated and old fashioned.
I don't drink, I don't go to clubs, and my typical Friday night is spent at home watching "What Not To Wear" and working on some ridiculous art project alone. 
I didn't even swear until I started driving.  Seriously, for 25 years I could remember every time I let a curse word slip and could count them on my fingers.  Now I swear much more than necessary.
Anyways.

Lately in Canada there's been a lot of match.com commercials running and I am fascinated by them.  They claim to show real first dates from the site.  They are the typical nice restaurant first date.  The people are dressed up.  They hug or get a peck on the cheek when they first meet.  They show some small talk.  It all seems completely fake-o and surreal.  One woman throws her head back and laughs at everything her date says, and her date seems really boring and unnatural.

I don't want to do that.  I don't like restaurants.  I don't like small talk.  I don't know how to flirt.  I don't know how to do this whole mating dance that doesn't seem to have much to do with who we really are as individuals. 

I'm kinda feeling like I'm screwed.  Too weird for mainstream, too normal for alternative groups, don't know the rules of the game and too scared to try.

As you can probably tell, I'm frustrated and negative right now.  I want something to happen so badly but have no idea what to do next.  And there's two pieces of advice that are always offered to the lovelorn- just live your life to make you happy and it will happen on its own, and go out and make something happen.

Mixed Signals Misread

Oops.

So I got that one wrong. 
Here's what happened after the festival with the geeky photographer:
Yesterday I found out they were showing one of my very favourite movies at an outdoor screening this week and I shared the event on Facebook.  Photographer said he might go.  I was a little excited that he liked this dorky movie.  Later that day he emailed me photos he'd taken of the art display.  I wrote back a quick thank you and asked how he enjoyed the festival.
This morning I got an email from him, a few paragraphs long, about the photos and the festival.  It ended with him saying he and 'The Girl' had left early on the last night, and 'see you around'.
So there's a girl.
When I saw him at the festival he had said something about looking for a girl and pointed across the audience.  I didn't hear him clearly.
 "The girl?"
 "No, not the girl, a girl."
 [Blank look on my face.] 
"I'm here with some people."

I was confused by that exchange but the conversation moved on. 
Am I just hopeless at interpreting signals?  Am I desperatately seeing things that aren't there?  Then why is he talking to me?

Bah. 

Picky or Panicked?

I spent a lovely but wet weekend at a music festival that I love and look forward to every year.  I volunteer for the art crew that puts on a display.  I  often spend a good part of the weekend in crazy costumes as part of this.  Last year a photographer at the festival really loved our display and took lots of photos and talked to us for a long time.  I happened to be wearing a Princess Leia costume at the time.  Weeks later I was searching through photos on flickr and came across a nice image of one of my art pieces.  I wrote to the photographer for permission to use it and it turned out to be the same guy.  Somewhere in this email exchange I must have shared a link to where I was using the photo because he looked at my online portfolio and praised it.
Sometime later he emailed me and said he just had nice prints made of the festival photos and would I like one?  I offered to trade one of my postcards for it.  I thought we would just mail them or do a drop-off thing but he wanted to meet at a bookstore (that I happen to love.) 
So I agreed to that, and off I went.  I didn't recognize him at first, and there was that awkward moment similar to the online dating first moment of 'Are you waiting for me?'  We browsed the shelves for a while and talked.  I got a bit shy I suppose.  He walked with me to the bus stop.  He talked about this movie he was just about to go see, and asked if I had seen it...I'm not sure but I think it was almost an invite to go with him.
I just went home.  At the bus stop he said something about him being old and depending on young people like me to keep him up on what's hip.  Okay, I don't think he used those words.  Is the word 'hip' hip again or not?  Anyways....
We added each other as flickr contacts so I do keep up with his photos.  I saw him briefly at another art event but I was again in silly costume and he didn't recognize me.
A year later, I saw his name on a friend's facebook page and added him as a friend.  I'm not sure what my motivation was.  On the surface I just thought it was useful to know a talented photographer.
This weekend I saw him at the festival and he came and talked to me for a while.  He said he was going to send me his number on facebook and I said ok.  The rest of the festival I spent with my stomach in knots.  I was always on the lookout for him, but the one time I did see him I didn't wave and he didn't see me in the crowd.  I didn't even spot him the next day at all.
What does it mean- "I'll send you my phone number on facebook so we can chat"?  He didn't do it yet, so perhaps I'm anxious over nothing...

I'm not even sure what I want to happen.  I imagine he's 8 to 10 years older than me.  I don't find him particularily attractive, but he's not ugly or repulsive in any way.  He seems to be smart and as far as I can tell a nice person, if a little geeky.

It's not even so much about who he is as it is about me freaking out about considering the possibility of what I so rarely consider as a possibility.  (Although it is interesting to see what 'league' I'm in...to use a vulgar expression.)  I am absolutely panicked at the thought of doing the dating thing and having to decide how far I want it to go and how to tell him I'm not interested.  Yes, I'm hypothetically breaking things off before I've even been asked out.  But that's just part of dating and everybody does it and somehow people deal with the rejection and the rejecting and the world goes on. 

Even more terrifying to me is the thought of someone kissing me, and then they would know that I don't know how to kiss because I've never done it before and then I'd have to tell them that was my first kiss and that I never dated and then I would be undesirable in their eyes because nobody else wanted me so they wouldn't either.  
That moment is coming for me.  At some point I will have to tell somebody I never kissed anybody.  I dread that moment, and I dread not having that moment.

That pretty much sums it up.  That's what I think about everyday and what makes me flighty on the rare occasions I do get some male interest.  Bit of a catch-22.  Maybe some 40-year old guy will relish having an untouched, malleable, and grateful younger girlfriend.  Creepy!

The other part of the inner turmoil is 'Am I being too picky if I decide not to go out with this fellow?'  Do I have to take what I can get at this point?  Am I willing to use someone just so I can say I've kissed someone and feel somewhat normal?  Or is it the opposite, that I'm shutting down a possible relationship because I'm scared?  Should I give this person a chance if I have no really reason to reject them other than the age difference?  It really feels awful to think you have no choice but to take any offer and be grateful.

I really can't imagine having a boyfriend.  I can't imagine the type of man that would be interested in me and I him.  A person who picks me over every other girl out there.  I can't even imagine someone's head being close enough to mine to kiss, let alone all the stuff that comes after that.  I can't imagine trusting someone that much.

So confused and tired right now. 

Tidbits

I'm down five pounds.  Small cheer.
Lots to do and I'm a bit stressed.
Had to do a family dinner tonight, organized last minute by my mother since the aunts and uncles hadn't met my brother's new wife yet.  (My brother was studying abroad,  I hardly know her myself.)
There was some drama since I assumed it wasn't happening and started to make other plans....
We all went to a pizza place since our house is too messy to host a party.  I felt overwhelmed when we walked in late to a table of a dozen relatives.  I get shy.  No matter, everyone wanted to hold the baby, not talk to me.
I might as well not exist at a family dinner, since I am not married or producing children nor am I likely to any time soon.  Not that my relatives ever really knew what to say to me anyways.  I have some jealousy of the baby.  Not really, but a sort of a joke jealousy I can look at and laugh at, and probably is a little bit real jealousy in there somewhere.  I mean, there's already been some art things I've been involved in that my family hasn't come to because it was overshadowed by something baby-related.
This is exaggerated.  Even I can see that.  Still, these things cross my mind.
My nine year old cousin tried to hit me up to buy her something at the corner store and when I declined she said 'Don't you get an allowance?'

Afterwards the relatives came back to the too-messy house for tea and cookies.  My dog is obsessed with the baby and just goes nuts...He's got to be kept on leash, or in his cage.  In fact, I spent the first 15 minutes sitting in his cage with him, petting him, and trying to keep him quiet so the people in the other room can visit.  I took my dog out for a short walk as well.  I spent the rest of the evening holding on to his leash and trying to keep him quiet and wishing all the people would leave since  I was having no fun and I wanted to watch my movie.  The image of me and the dog sitting in a cage while everyone else visits in another room pretty much sums up my role in family gatherings.
I've got 'I Know Where I'm Going' out from the library.  1945, Powell and Pressburger film about a young woman marrying for money who gets stranded on a Scottish Isle by bad weather and finds true love.  So very obsessed with it.  Only one kiss, but it's a good one.  Her handsome naval officer is played by Roger Livesey, who seems to be spoken of as a truly nice fellow who was happily married to one woman his whole life.  He's not all that handsome, but I quite like him, and I like all the Scottish folklore and dancing.

Self-Help and Transformations

At 6 o'clock I was planning to post something really positive....At 10 it's turned a little more cynical.

I had a good day today.  I've almost stopped coughing, for one thing, I finished my sewing yay! and I got to go make some art at a camp for sick kids, which was pretty fun.

It was a long drive out and I had a chance to chat with this woman I just started working with, Amy.
She has a lovely manner, and greets everyone with real warmth.  I am already watching her to see if I can mimic even a small percentage of that energy. 
On the drive out we talked about life in the arts.  On the way back, we talked about more personal things...I talked a bit about my family...did I say too much?  Ack.  She's quite open about her life and told me about a few hard times she's been through, in a rather matter-of-fact way.  As positive and friendly a person as she appears, she said she suspected she is currently mildly depressed.  Huh.
She spoke about a 'personal growth course' she took that led her to creating a community project.
I showed her a book I was reading, 'Community' by Peter Block.  I'm only on Chapter Two, but I'm really excited that I found something I'm passionate about (building community, although my definition is still a bit hazy.)  Amy looked at the book jacket and noticed one of the endorsements was from Landmark Education.  "That's the course I took!"  I said I'd look it up.  She said, "Yeah, just be prepared that some people call it a cult."  She explained that she resisted taking the course for years even though a friend recommended it, because she didn't approve of the marketing and style of delivery, but that she had a positive experience from it and so did everyone else she knew who had taken it.

So I went home and looked it up, and yeah some people really hate it.  You spend three long days in a room with 150 people sharing your life problems and getting questioned until you have a breakthrough and realize it was all your fault.  Then your homework is to call someone and apologize, and to invite your friends to come to next week's session.

There are a series of articles by journalists who take the course, are skeptical, have some small epiphanies but remain critical of some of the methods used.

I just spent an hour reading about this stuff.
People love the idea of transformations.  If I thought a three day course was a magic bullet, I'd probably sign up in a heartbeat. 
The basic lessons of the Landmark forum seem to be the same as most self-help stuff- think positively, live in the moment not the past, get over fear, practice forgiveness and self-reflection.  Amy said there's a lot of Buddhism in the mix, and maybe some philosophy and pyschology.

I don't think I'll take the class.  It has got me thinking about the phonecalls I would assigned for homework- the broken relationships in my life.  My dad.  A few friends, one in particular.  Maybe my sister. 
Can they be repaired, or is there a reason those people aren't key to my life?

And the most tantalizing possibility of a complete transformation simply by declaring it to be so and living in a new way.  (Landmark teaches that modifying behavior from the past in a long slow process of change doesn't work.  I think I disagree.  Apparently some people who take the course get very caught up in feelings of euphoria and then crash and burn later.)

Now the 'Community' book is tainted by this endorsement from the Landmark guy, and by the fact that the author draws slightly on the teachings of Werner Erhard (his est workshops are the foundation of the Landmark teachings, and he's a controversial figure). 

Sigh.

Un-touched

Since I have been sick for a week, I have been feeling a bit shunned by all.  Sick people are germy and should be avoided. 
(I am much better, but still coughing dramatically.)

I'm so tired.  I've been go-go-go all summer, doing a bunch of smaller gigs.  Today I am feeling that I am perhaps getting ripped off or giving more than I should.  I'm an artist, and if I get more than $20 bucks an hour I get excited, but that's really peanuts, considering I've been a working artist for 8 years (theoretically.)
I'm trying to work with this arts organization that has a noble mandate, but is really hard to work for.  Several people I know have been burned.  Had a long chat with someone who was telling me to protect myself and maybe even to back out of some teaching gigs I said I'd do for them....
Anyways, that's not the topic of this blog, but trying to make a living as an artist is tough.  Probably plays a big part in why other things aren't happening in my life as well.  So there, completely relevant.

But back to the point.  Touch.
I heard a few weeks ago, someone dropped an interesting little factoid into conversation: ideally you should be touched 30 times a day.  Of course I have no source to back this up.  Also I'm assuming she meant touched in a welcome, positive manner, not being groped or punched or anything. (Yes, quality of writing in this blog is held to high standards at eleven o'clock at night.)  And not necessarily touched in a sexual way- but  a handshake, a high fives, a pat on the back, a hug.  There are lots of people out there not making any kind of physical contact with other people for long stretches of time.  It's pretty sad.
Needless to say, this has been a particularly barren week for me.  *Cough Cough Sneeze*

When I'm walking by myself, sometimes my hand folds around an imaginary boyfriend's hand.
When I'm watching a movie, I wish I had my head on someone's shoulder.
I want more than anything to try 'spooning.'

It's a weird frustrating feeling.  Who knew a hand could crave another hand so desperately? There's not really a substitute for the touch of another person. 
(Although having a pet around is supposed to help I believe.)

No wonder they had to invent these:
http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2011-06/video-japanese-sense-roid-robot-torso-hugs-you-back

PS:  After watching the video, those are weirder than I thought they were going to be!

Living With Mom

I've got bronchitis or something and am miserable.  I haven't left the house in three days which usually makes me broody (Is that the right word?  I just looked it up- it means oppressive, contemplative, and wanting to hatch eggs or have a baby.  I'm leaving it.) 
I'm also doing a lot of sewing and I have a deadline, so that's not helping, as it is repetitive, labour intensive and frustrating.
My brother came over tonight and the conversation touched on a lot of 'issues' in my life.  I think throughout the visit I was at times negative or withdrawn.  I could probably write two or three posts about the topic of 'negativity'....  It's one of those vicious cycle thingies:  feel down, say negative things, damage relationships, feel worse....I just want a hug and a good cry and I've got nobody to talk to except whoever is reading this anonymous online blog.
Alright, that's enough of a lead-up. 
Since my brother and his girlfriend are expecting, there was naturally discussion about babies.  He said they were planning to have another one at some point.  (It is totally weird to see my brother all domestic, and wearing nice office clothes too.  Gah, everyone gets so boring.)  My mother said he could have more, since I wasn't going to have any.   Then she told the story she always tells about David Suzuki (Canadian environmentalist) being criticized for having 5 children when the earth is overpopulated, and his reply being that smart people better have children because stupid people sure as hell are going to. 
Later, my mother said if she won the lottery, she and I could move to a certain neighbourhood we like.  I rather hope I won't be living with her beyond next year, lottery or no lottery.  Maybe some of my siblings and their progeny would take up the offer.

I should also explain that, at the moment at least, I am very worried about the environment and consumerism and want to give up all my worldly possessions except for my computer, books and art supplies (so in essence, nothing.)  I think winning the lottery is gross.

Anyways, 'stuff' seemed to be the theme of the evening.  I think we started talking about my sister's cats, which is a whole 'nother rant, and about all the stuff in the basement.  Mom and I share a 2000 square foot house and use about half of it, now that my sister's moved out.  We never really moved in, still have boxes and boxes.  My mom is perhaps a borderline hoarder...she's said things like 'organization is just an excuse to sell you rubbermaid totes and baskets' and 'if I want to keep stuff in a box and look at it every five years, well that's up to me.'  She's also taken the complete opposite viewpoint and calculated how much of the value of the house is being used to store junk. 

I don't know if she was always this way, but for the past ten years, it's been an issue we tiptoe around.  I'm always accused of throwing out her stuff when she's not around.  I actually rarely rarely do that- it's always been a house rule that you don't touch other people's stuff.  But just from the way she talks about my role to her friends, it's almost like she wants me to get rid of stuff for her because she knows she can't. 

I once tried to give away an old Fisher Price airport playset and she would't let me.  I got angry and said she could find a place to keep it and left it in the hallway.  (I should explain it was a large object and we had decided to keep the matching house, farm and garage playsets.  At that time there were no young children in the family)  That airport toy stayed in the hallway for a year and a half. 

It's very stressful to me to try and organize things so that I can live my life, and so we won't get drowned, and guessing how much change she can handle.  We've lived in this house four years and she hasn't painted anything, changed the curtains, bought new furniture, even hung a single painting to make it her own.  She's done this for years.  It took her five years to buy a new couch. 

My dad and my mom divorced a few years ago. My dad just up and left one Saturday.  I was at work and my sister was away camping.  (My brother was studying abroad.)  I came home and had to deal with my mom by myself.   On Sunday I left her alone for a while and she told me she had blacked out.  My sister and I had to take shifts for two weeks keeping an eye on her.  My dad had been planning it for a while.  I think he had a girlfriend, actually.  I didn't speak to him for a year.  My mom went to counselling.  I remember she came home just furious one day because the therapist had told her she was making herself a victim.  Mom did have enough energy to get a lawyer and fight for Dad's money, which I supported.  Eventually she quit her horrible horrible job that we'd all been telling her to quit for years and for several years she just did nothing.  She joined some clubs, dated a bunch of men that all seemed to be named David, and bought a new house.  That seemed to take up all of her energy.   All the junk from the old house got moved with us.

Now she's gone back to school, and is almost done a second bachelors degree.  (She's in sciences, and needed to update.)  She's thinking about doing a masters.  She's still dawdling, although I know she works hard in school and as hard as it is to believe, is organized and efficient.  Apparently that's how she was at work too.  It's just household stuff she has no interest in.  She has an active social life, but when she's not doing those things, she just gets so passive.  She spends a lot of time reading murder mysteries (always set in medieval times, who knew there were so many), doing crosswords, and playing computer solitaire on the easiest settings.  She spoils my dog, and doesn't see how fat he's getting.  She's on delayed reaction to emergencies...
There's so much work to be done in the house that I'm overwhelmed.  She found a leak under the kitchen sink and didn't even tell me for days.  It turned out to be the dishwasher, and it still hasn't been fixed.
I worry about her.  She's lost so much weight.  Sometimes she eats nothing but crackers and cheese.  To the outside world, I think she seems a lot more put together....
I feel like my brother and sister are both starting new families and have their own problems, and I'll be left looking after mom.  All the stuff in the house seems to be symbolic- my dad, brother and sister all started new lives and dumped a pile of crap (and two cats) in mom's basement.  My mother has never lived alone her whole life....How will she do on her own?  And who's going to keep the dog?  I just want to get the house in order so I can leave with a clear conscience.
I've probaby made myself out to be this dutiful daughter, but I'm always leaning on Mom for help.  I clean, but I don't usually grocery shop, and seldom cook.  I don't pay rent and lately I've been using her car more than she does.  I've been so sick lately, and able to do less and less....
Argh.