Being that my cat has figured out what the door buzzer sounds like, it makes package delivery days very dangerous times in my house to have any “lap time”. That being said, I am standing in the shower this morning looking over my latest battle wound covering half my upper abdominal area, and still thinking to myself,
“Man do I FEEL LIKE A BADASS! I AM A PIRATE OR FIGHT DRAGONS!”…
Now I consider myself to have situation awareness, yet I still look at this cut, caused by what can only be described as an act of cowardice from my wuss cat, running from the evil packages, filled with my monthly subscription to some sort of herbal tea, of the FedEx man, while I was probably sitting at the computer having snuggle time with said beast, watching YouTube re-runs of Ellen, and yet I still beat my chest as the shower water explodes outward, grunting as validation.
I like to skip the bullshit of trying to make the perfect first impression because then you end up getting to know someone else other than yourself. You spend so much time trying to perfect a moment that hasn’t even happened you forget to enjoy it and be yourself ultimately.
If you are open to yourself and can be open with me, I want to get to know you not based on finding the perfect outfit for a first date, and then canceling because you can’t, but on the person you are every day, which leads to better conversation and a more relaxed meeting.
I mean when you are old and I am sitting by you in a rocking chair yelling at the kids across the street or the fish in the ocean (depends on where we retire) do you think I give a shit what you wore the first time I met you? 🙂
Although, I will remember haha. I am weird like that.
You still get that “chase” feeling.
I actually find the allure of a chase boring but I do find allure in infatuation. Those first moments of meeting someone, waiting for the phone to ring, replaying the night in your head to every song you hear. I haven’t experienced that in a bit. There is a thoughtless highschool nights feeling to it, but not in that naive way, more in a hopeful way, and looking forward to each meet. Knowing there is something interesting to go to, see, meet, finding the person more and more attractive as time passes, seeing new parts of their insecurity or hearing new inflections and being able to be there with them.
Being able to share that really thick first layer of who I am very quickly, no stigmas meaning time or constraints. I can tell you everything in a conversation on a first meeting or over 3 dates, and you won’t think I want to marry you or I have nothing else to say. You will think, this is normal. This is how you talk to someone else. This is REAL.
So to share this way, you don’t lose that “chase feel” but you lose the “fake game” feel to it. You get anxious for the meet because of the idea that you are starting to burst from the inside out to spill those words “I love you” not in a perfect way or a hallmark moment, but in a messy, tear induced, vomit. Where your entire body will no longer let you keep it inside and knowing that now, NOW the real fun begins, because “love is not enough”.
P.S. Did you ever think the perfect you, is just that… you?
The culture of girls being raised on Disney’s ideal Prince Charming and guys the perfect internet porn star, it is no wonder the wires are so crossed half the time.
So there is the definition, yet somehow I feel as though most people use this word in a completely broken way when it comes to relationships.
“Acceptable to Both”
“Each side making concessions”
“Mutual concession”
But, what do I hear more often than the above?
YOU need to…
YOU have to….
YOU are going to have to compromise so they are comfortable/happy/ready.
This doesn’t sound like compromise. It could be, if the other person was also getting the above and each of you decide to come to a decision together so you both are comfortable. But we most often hear “You need to compromise” from friends and family, because that is who we turn to to ask when we feel the need for help and we can’t understand what is going on with our significant other. The problem is, our family and friends are not seeing the entire picture. This knee jerk reaction to say “well compromise” comes from a place of good intent, but can often be ill informed and cause an instant feeling of guilt or insecurity in your own relationship. The minute you ask your friends and family what to do in a half baked picture, the minute you muddy the water with socially acceptable “make you feel better” chatter. It is the SIGNIFICANT other that needs to be having this conversation with you, due to compromise being such a personal and intimate need for two people who share life together.. If you are ever in a situation where there is a balance of power shift where you feel as though you have to compromise on who YOU are, it is no longer a compromise at all but you submitting to a bad situation or one that needs work. When you compromise with a loved one obviously you have to be humble and give a bit, but it is mutual. You don’t leave it feeling as though it isn’t better for the whole. You don’t feel as though it is hindering you from being you because it is allowing you to love stronger, harder, and with more understanding.
There is negative compromise and positive. At the end of the day you need to be ready to accept when it is negative and either stand your ground to keep who YOU are intact, or you must be able to come to the hard conclusion that the “MUTUAL” compromises needed to make the relationship work are not actually mutual from your end of the spectrum. I am saying “you” a lot because it is a selfish side of being that needs to be kept intact. That sense of self can often be lost for many people in and through other people’s needs and wants. So you feel like you are “compromising” so they are happy, but slowly you are breaking down all your own joy, creating a shell of who you could, can, and want to be. And eventually you get beaten puppy syndrome, brought on by your own inability to know when it was no longer a compromise but a, for lack of a better term, deal breaker.
Dating is scary, I get it. Especially in the beginning and even scarier as time goes on and more is invested. But we as a specifies need to get over our shit when it comes to the idea that a relationship may or may not be working. I know I have been stuck in many in the past because I was too prideful, comfortable, naive, to just tell the other person I was no longer happy and why. So me thinking I am giving it my all is actually bringing down two people, my significant other and myself.
Dating gets tiring, I get it. Loud and clear. The fatigue that sets in from telling your “intro story” over and over, getting excited because they said something in return that made you think it would be beautiful together, or just dealing with the many incompatible people. Dating sucks, so why are we wasting time trying to “negatively compromise” instead of just moving on and trying the next person. Instead of juggling 50 at a time, shoot like an arrow, 1 at a time, your all, until you find it. No complication, confusion, and your intro story can be much different. Why? Because what if we all approached dating like talking, telling our day, including ups and downs, day by day to person by person. Living in that moment and not worrying about living vicariously through their Facebook history.
So don’t compromise on yourself, on who you are, and on how you date. But when you do meet that person who is right for you, remember this…
Compromise is a beautiful thing we done by the actual definition, but do it by the socially accepted viewpoint and it has a tendency to break you down. Compromise should not be a synonym for settling.
I am probably going to be tossed out of man society by giving up this “well kept secret”. But let me explain the move that for SOME REASON all guys think is the best icebreaker for a first kiss IN THE WORLD. And by ALL guys I include myself.
I call it the Tickle Kiss.
This is the move where you are awkwardly at a standstill with talking or the date has gone well really well and you are both kinda jonzin(yes I said jonzin) for a kiss, but you cannot get up enough courage just to be rico suave and lean in. You say, “Are you ticklish?”(in a very sinister and and before they get a chance to tell you, you begin to prod and poke looking for it. If you are lucky you find it. First you just do it once as a joke and you both smile. The girl is almost guaranteed to look at you back and say, “Don’t do that again” in a playful tone. This is when the guy will immediately go for the move. He will begin to tickle her until she is in uncontrollable spasm. This usually ends up with the guy overpowering the girl and them ending up in very close proximity or with him on top of her on the floor, on a couch, whatever the tickle gods have deemed necessary for him to continue tickling her as she tries to get away. So for the time being lets say it ends up with him over her on a couch and her leaned up against the armrest of one of the far sides of the couch when he stops tickling her.(that is if she hasn’t pee’d herself) Now their eye meet, and they are close to each other, and BAM KISS!
This is like the fallback, goto, default, first kiss move to do for any first date where you just NEED TO but don’t know how.
There are a few exceptions though which makes for a dry evening and the guy usually taking a moral hit, but often guys will ask you the following questions and make some of these statements prior to the first date. Mind you these questions/statements seem innocent enough but they have a deeper meaning than you expected! Are you ticklish? Where are you ticklish? I’ll find out where you are ticklish! I’m gonna jump you and tickle you to death! (aka I am going to jump on top of you tickle you until we are so close, if we don’t kiss it just isn’t meant to be)
And if you are NOT ticklish oh man you have just made the guy go into panic mode! Not only can he not take over an argument or conversation by tickling you, which usually ends up with a kiss to make it better, but he cannot make his first move with the Tickle Kiss.(way to fuck that up ladies!)
What still confuses me, is the GIRLS ALWAYS ACT AS IF THEY DON’T KNOW WHAT JUST HAPPENED. As if they are not onto our little device for kiss timez! We kiss them after the tickle kiss and when we pull away the girl AND the guy say the same thing, “Oh I’m sorry” with a wicked grin on their faces, acting as if they didn’t expect it. And then usually if all is kosher they kiss again. Now I am not saying these are not amazing moments of goodness but it is still fun to think about how it all plays out. I guess sometimes we just NEED to really have those moments of cheese to make the days go by. So bring on some more cheese I say!
I swear depending on where you are in life your life moves at different speeds. Ever have a dream and wake up instantly? Ever have a dream that lasted days? But in reality it was still the same time period in terms of a clock time. Now apply that same idea to a job or a year of life. How fast did your week feel? How long did the last few years feel? If I felt like my week sped by and you felt it crawl by does our perception of time actually change how we would see each other? If I said I will talk to you in a week and my week flew by but yours was drawn out, would you feel like I was ignoring you or as if you needed to find someone else to talk to when it felt as though all I thought about was you?
It is on snowy days like these that my past relationship drives a dagger deep into my heart, scratch that, twists the knife that was put there already and slowly working its way out. I guess I saw a lot further than was feasible. I saw a predicted snowy and cold winter but instead of buying salt and shovels, I bought scarves and hot chocolate. I was truly excited about an extreme winter. Screw the cold, the arctic vortex’s, the snow… I had someone to lay next to. Someone who I could stare at in the morning while the blurred snow flakes from the window behind the bed fell in a rhythm. Sitting there watching her eyes move from the dreams she would be happening, feeling the heat of her body, and being pushed up closer to her by my two little furry friends on my right.
Those eyes and lips. They were beautiful. They were kissable. They had emotion. That picture it painted, the picture I didn’t need my camera to capture, the simple memory of the moment, knowing it would be there again and again. But perhaps there is something to a personal muse for my photography, being able to capture the, what are now fleeting moments.
Then arguments start with myself to get out of bed, go on with my day regardless of the heat and affection all around me. But I loved knowing later that night, I had something better than radiator heating to look forward to in my bed. A warm body, a kiss, and her subtle wiggle when I pulled the covers over us that pushed her into me slightly more than I could establish, hand on her boob as I fell asleep.
So instead of walking around and seeing a beautiful snowy day, I see a day that was lost to, once again, a poor choice in someone truly willing to be open with me, truly willing to “for good and bad” with me. Someone who was more worried about the worth than the value. So I am sorry if I want this winter to be over desperately. I hate spring and summer. I love fall. If I could live in fall all year, I would be so happy. But I sit here waiting for the first sunlight to melt away the crystallized memories. For the wind to shift and stop the beauty outside, the snow, the ultimate equalizer for the world. Making it quiet and forcing you to be there with the person you loved. But now it forces me to be with my thoughts. While I embrace this and I look to heal, it doesn’t make it hurt less.
Loved. It is amazing how quickly that can turn into past tense. So do I think the snow is beautiful? Of course! I love it. But I would have “loved” it more if she was here to weather it with me. Actually… I wouldn’t have, it would have been a terrible winter. But it reminds me of how much I yearn for that connection with someone who can turn a cold winter into a warm embrace.
…we often prioritize our accomplishments over the simple accomplishment of bringing a smile into someone’s life, being there for someone, or unconditionally loving. It is so important in a world that grows up on disneys ideal love and finding that prince or princess that we put a little more effort into our interactions as we would for that promotion or next client. This leads me into why love is not enough.
Every one of my last relationships has ended because “love” was enough for them. “Love” is the beginning of opening up the rest of your life. It lifts the weight of trying to find the unattainable life goal so you can do other things magical with the love, the person you have found, and your life in general.
So why stay in a relationship defined by hopelessness, I am not a hopeless romantic, I am hopeful. Should you be “waiting” for the perfect moment? Is it like where you love your job but don’t know if it is where you want to be till the end, so you stick it out waiting to see what will happen in a few years time that may push you closer, further, or to a similar path? So should you be waiting or should you be fixing, actively, or is the waiting, part of the fixing. There is no black and white to any of this shit. It is what works for you or what pushes your brain to the edge of insanity allowing you to evolve to the place you need to be.
About Me
Meet Tristan Pope, a passionate Emmy award winning Artist and ardent romantic. As the host of the podcast ‘Lost in Txtlation,’ Tristan delves into the complexities of love beyond mere words. Through open, stream-of-consciousness discussions, he explores online dating trends, relationships, compromise, and self-discovery. Each episode offers insights into the intricate puzzle of love, sparking conversations that guide listeners through toxic relationships, inspire self-appreciation, and create a sense of companionship on their journey.
Whether you seek relationship guidance or crave open conversations on love, ‘Lost in Txtlation’ invites you to explore the diverse facets of dating and relationships. Think of it as a choose-your-own-adventure through Tristan’s unabated, stream-of-consciousness journal. Feel free to skip around or ask questions through the Q/A section. Tristan’s writing is an open discussion, embracing different perspectives and colors of the grass. Join the conversation and share your thoughts with Tristan, as he listens and engages with the ever-evolving narrative of love.
A journal entry to himself with the intent of others reading it. Feel free to get lost eating each of the breadcrumbs he left behind for his depreciating mind.
