Breaking up with your girlfriend's boyfriend.

I don't think blog entries need introduction but I think that this one might need some explanation. You see my girlfriend and I recently had an amazing modern, serious dating experience which we collectively felt needs to be told to the world. It's been a while since I have written an entry so I felt, as did she, that this was the perfect opportunity to write a blog about a recent experience that we hope helps you, the collective readers of this blog, to make good dating choices.

So I'll start out...My gf and I have been happily dating for about four months (and argumentatively for one month). During this time of courtship my gf told me that she had this admirer from across the ocean, I won't say where (England), who was writing her consistently. I figured that was ok, after all, it wasn't like the guy was an exotic European like Spanish, Italian or Austrian...(Think Shwarzanegger). Let's face it, English and sexy don't go together, David Bowie had to start cross dressing just to be considered sexy. How big of threat could he be? He lived a continent away, he was on the loosing end of a two-hundred year-old butt kicking that we celebrate annually by blowing crap up.

Then in August his emails started becoming more and more frequent...I'll let my gf explain.

Dr. Girlfriend
So let me give you some background on how this relationship blossomed into his obsession with me. I have some British friends who had a friend over from England. They told me that he was bored and that he needed to go out with some American girls. I was sort of dateless and let's face it desperate at the time so I agreed to go out with him. I picked him up (he can't drive in America) and we had an amazingly romantic night at the Sizzler and the pictures (British for movies.) It wasn't the best date of my life but it wasn't the worst either. So he wanted to go out again and I being still dateless agreed to go. At the end of the date he kissed me on both sides of my face and asked for my email address I gave it to him thinking that if I ever went to Britland I would have at least one person to show me around. So keep in mind this was a total of 2 dates. TWO DATES!

Jefe
Let me interject here a few things before we continue. English guys are pervy, I can just see this lechorous old fart (did she mention that he's a decade older than she is?) licking his wind cracked lips with a smarmy grin shuddering as he says "blimey mate, I sure would like to get me hands on some good American tail." Also, ladies if you go to a guys hometown who you think is kind of creepy the last thing you want them to do is be your tour guide. Trust me, you will be better chasing around the fat, white tennis shoe wearing tour groups, at least you won't end up on the ass end of London wondering if this was the last alley some of Jack the Ripper's victims saw.

Dr. Girlfriend
Anyways the email started out friendly but then they got more and more frantic. This is the one I received that set Jefe off. I will paste some of the best parts here..
"Well before I retire I need to ask you if you received my last 4 e-mail's I
sent you,I'm presuming you did,but I didn't hear any replies back from you.
Anyway I sent you one on the 6th august and mentioned that I was more than
likely coming over for thanksgiving,so I was really hoping to meet up with
you again and see if we get on as well as we did before,also so I can book
ticket's and make plan's with you.By the way where are the photo's of the
red dress your mom brought you,you promised me you would send me some. Hope this reaches you and the other one's I sent you did also. love and miss you lot's."

That's straight from the email.

Jefe
I wouldn't say it set me off, but I certainly felt like this was a problem, kind of like the little pest who keeps threatening you, even when his big bully body guard friend is gone. The thing that bothered me was that my girl friend hadn't told him we were dating, and she assured me he looked like this...



Now I'm no Tom Jones, but I certainly can out shoot that guy in a pretty-pretty contest. Still I felt that it was only respectful that my girl friend told this guy that she was involved with me.

Dr. Girlfriend
So Jefe decides to send him an ever so friendly to let him down easy. This is basically how it went. met a boy, he lives in Salt Lake, he's a school teacher, he loves
the gospel and we've been seeing each other for about five months, he
met my family at the end of July and they love him, as do I. That's
why I haven't written you in so long, it's been a busy summer, when I
haven't been working or planning parties, I've been with him.

I'm sorry I haven't written you sooner about this, I think you're a
wonderful friend, and I really would like to see you again if you come
to America, but I would feel better if your plans didn't totally
revolve around me.

There are many women who would be lucky to have you, it's just the
distance between us was so far and life moves so quickly, I wish you
well, and hope for the best for you.

I think that makes it pretty clear. Don't you? Well here is the response I got. The title of the email was best "if i don't see you" and then what followed was this.

just need to know and ask you this one question in one of the e-mails you
sent me when I got back ,you asked when I was coming back over and what my
plans were for the summer.If I had come back in may or june would there of
been
any chance of us getting together and something happening between us?
I just thought we got on really well and was hoping to carry on where we
left off from february.I only ask because of the e-mail you sent me today,it
sounds like if it wasn't the distance between us that you mentioned,there
would of been something there between us-answer yes or let me know if I'm
reading it right.
Anyway I only ask because I had a friend who I was helping out staying with
me,he's getting married in 2 wks to a sister missionary who served in my
ward.She finished her mission and they kept in touch by phone when she got
back,it's been a long process for them but they've sorted the visa's out
from both sides and now she's over her till they both go back.
Anyway I'll go now but boy's find it harder to deal with than girl's,it may
sound daft what I've asked but I'm devastated and will have to see how I
feel when I come over.

Jefe
"WHAT?" I said out loud when I read this. I'm not known for my alpha-male prowess when it comes to girls, admittedly I'm kind of an emo-ult (emotionaly+adult = emo-ult) when it comes to girls. Even I knew that this was ridiculous. Which really reminded me of what I said earlier about Jack the Ripper, I'm still wondering where in White Chapel this chap resides!

You see, the first letter I really wanted to let him down easy. When I read this second letter I realized that this guy was actually making a play for my girlfriend! I decided that if this limey snaggletooth wanted to have a chivalrous fight for the heart of my gf, then the gloves were coming off. This time I sent him (yes me, my gf didn't really want to have anything to do with writing him back) a very poignant letter that was going to impress upon him the idea that not only were his electronic advances on her unwanted and inappropriate, but that it was borderline electronic assault!

Dr. Girlfriend
So this is the email that Jefe sent (with my approval of course) I would like to be honest too. My boyfriend and I love each other alot. Things are pretty serious between us.

To be honest I think your absolutely wonderful and I had a nice time
with you but I didn't feel anything more than friendship between us.
It is this reason that I wrote to you to begin with. I think you are a
great guy, I know that somewhere there is a girl waiting for you,
dying to meet you who will appreciate you for all of the good
qualities you possess.

I thought Jefe did a great job of being as direct as possible this time. I just hoped it would finally get through to this guy that despite all of the fantasies in his head about us being eternal companions stuck on seperate continents would be obliterated. So after that email I got no response. I told my british girlfriend about it the whole thing and she said he usually took things like this way to far and pretty hard. She said she hoped he wasn't sucidal. I began to worry, I didn't really want to be responsible for something like that. So a month passed and I still didn't hear from him until one day I got this email...

hi there it's me writing to thank you for the e-mail,I'm glad your'e
so
happy and you were honest with me(even though it does hurt)I'm still hoping
to come over for thanksgiving and stay with the friends I stayed with last
time. Well I'll get going now but I'll see how I feel when I come over and if you
want to see us again.

So I have to say I am glad he didn't commit suicide over our internet break up but you got say this guy doesn't back down easy.

Jefe
First of all, what's up with the usage of plural nouns to describe himself. If I say "us" in meaning "me" wouldn't you assume that A) I am schizophrenic with multiple personalities. B) I'm Karl Malone or C) The fleshy facilitator of the spirits known as legion? I know it's petty to be so persnickety about such details, but you can see how exasperated I am at this point! This guy is relentless. I thought that after he hadn't emailed my gf for a month that things were over, unfortunaetly this guy thinks that no matter what him and my gf are destined to be together.

So, what's the reason for all this. Well, I like to think of it as a small morality play. First, for all of you who are chasing tirelessly after that lad or lassie that you think is the one and she isn't returning your phone calls, or he isn't taking you out on honest to goodness dates, they arne't in to you. If your most intimate conversations occur through text message, if your most meaningful means of communication is email, it's not working. If you went out on two dates and you feel like it's meant to be, then it's time you put your heart and your head back in the oven of maturity, because you were taken out a little early, and your still a wee bit soft in the middle.

Second, if you have a stocker, if they be at home or abroad try being honest. You help no one by indulging people's hopes. Your not being kind, your being cruel in a very socially exceptable way, which really isn't exceptabel at all. The hard thing is that sometimes that person your unintentionally (or intentionally) stringing along will do some pretty amazing things to keep you interested, like invite you to stay with them in their exotic home country (England?) They may offer to buy you tickets to see Arcade Fire, or buy you huge teddies. The truth is that as the mentally healthy one, you need to take a stand and kind of push people through their misguided feelings and guide them in the right direction. Trust me, there is someone just as crazy as them (or you) that will love them for who they are, rotten teeth and all.

he built himself a world and put people on it

i was at my niece's birthday party a week or so ago when my dad told me about how he read that people are attracted to each other because of pheromones. specifically, he said, we respond to pheromones secreted by people with different immune systems than us. this makes sense since the offspring would have a more more complex immune system which would lead to a higher chance of survival. this bit of information from my dad surprised me because we have very different views on the evolutionary history of humans -- he believes god plays a big part in it while i barely believe in god. but whatever. the point of this retelling is you (and i mean i) would be surprised how many people believe that biological processes not controlled by our conscious self largely determine our social interactions.

lewis thomas talked about this stuff all the time. i think because he was an entomologist and saw humans sharing many of the characteristics of other social species like ants and bees. the example of his that comes to mind is how his researcher friend would measure his beard trimmings of periods of time he was out in the wild doing research where he didn't see any females versus the periods of time he lived in the city (and saw females and interacted with females all the time). he grew substantially more facial hair when he was around women.

twice in my life, i've created arbitrary checklists for girls i would be interested in. it's a stupid thing to do, but it was supposed to be a joke about people who prefer blonds over brunettes or whatever other superficial way we construct our dream baby. (i mean baby in a gender-inspecific, pet name kind of way, but mostly i used dream baby because i like the roy obirson song by the same name.) but the joke really didn't work because i didn't realize i was (and am) an idiot.

the first time i was 22 and had just got out of provo. my checklist: (1) didn't own a cellphone and (2) listened to the pixies. the first girl i liked after creating the checklist owned and regularly operated a cellphone and barely knew who the pixies were. the second checklist came a year later: (1) live within 15 minutes of me, (2) own a car since i hate to drive and (3) play(ed) soccer. the next girl i liked, while living close and owning a car, didn't like soccer.

so much for my checklists. but i'm ok with having no control over who i'm attracted to. i let my genes handle that.

(p.s. i used to think the pixies were cool and while i still like doolittle, the jesus and mary chain are way cooler.)

Strung Along No More...

i meant to do some sort of introduction for guest posters but of course but i forgot at the time and then remembered today when i asked brian about it. he suggested doing some sort of italic introduction at the beginning of any guest post. that is what this is. the author tends to like bold pure colors... greens and blues.... sometimes rust and burgundy... i believe this post was inspired (and correct me if i am wrong) by my post on what is or isnt a relationship/dating and the ever changing definitions/situations.

How is this for a dating story… or um… I don't know what to call it since I was never really given permission to define the drama… but according to the criteria…
1. Held hands
2. Kissed
3. Kissed more
4. Stopped kissing
5. Still held hands
6. Invited to move into boys house when girl needed a place to stay
7. Most holding of the hands and cuddling stopped
8. Emotional intimacy and occasional hand holding and cuddling

In girls mind: more than just friends
Boy’s introduction: housemate

In the beginning:
Boy pursues... but then he just really doesn't… Girl interested and then not… girl deletes boys number… boy calls several times… he is pursuing again… girl interested again… girl spends most of summer with boy… because of lame circumstances girl ends up living in boys house temporarily… he offered… a month later boy meets another girl at a party… original girl is at the same party… boy starts dating the other girl… this is confusing… girl original doesn't understand… two days prior boy shared very intimate conversation… cried… and boy and girl cuddled… boy told girl how much he cares about girl… and that these things take time…and everything he likes about her… boy is totally sincere… (Girl being of the salt of the earth kind of girl recognizes sincerity)…

Okay… so two days after totally intense conversation boy goes on date with new girl… of course old girl knows about this because she lives in his house and can read him like a book… boy calls meeting up with the another girl just something to do… boy insists that he has feelings for girl original… talks about how he will miss her when she is gone… girl is not convinced… girl tells him so… girl and boy talk about it for several hours… next day boy hugs girl … smiles… flirts…at this point girl doesn't trust boy and will not be lured in by his ways… and of course that night boy goes out with new girl again and tells third roommate that she is "a woman I am seeing"… boy is a liar to girl original…
Girl number one loses respect for boy… she is finished

But wait… why does it infuriate the girl when boy brings new girl over… if girl really is finished why would she be so enraged??? Girl so close to telling girl in front of boy that she is “only something to occupy time”… but girl leaves for yoga instead.

Girl is angry…

In yoga girl imagines a little three inch version of herself totally enraged… girl holds the little angry self in her hand and watches her… it was kind of weird and cool in a very cosmic sort of way…

Later in conversation a friend tells girl she has no right to be angry because she knew what she was getting into… girl realizes it is true… girl was seeking a relationship with a boy who is too broken to have one… it is not girls fault… it is not boys fault… it just is…girl is looking for clarity and the ability to honestly see the truth in the situation… to understand what it is girl was looking for in boy and how she would and will never get it…

Even with this newfound clarity that will continue to clarify…

Girl original ate love brownies made by new girl…it is the least new girl could do for original girl… thanks for the brownies… they were really good… good luck new girl… and it will probably not be as fun as you think it will be.

Girl original is now doing yoga everyday… sweating the boy out of her system…replacing him with an open-heart… clear mind… and connected spirit…not to mention a smoking body…

i am dealing with it on a date to date basis

i think brians idea for everyone to workshop (post) modern dating theory is a good one. although to a degree it has already been accomplished. dating standards, ideas norms, mores and values can be extrapolated from the previous posts but one must make a lot of assumptions and read between the lines (not unlike dating) in order to come to any conclusions. i think it would be interesting for everyone* to write about the different stages (i think brian did a great job of outlining those) and the problems in each stage and in general.

anyway i thought i would discuss predating. or my ideas on predating. situations i include in the predate are people you want to date, people you are actually dating (initial stages) or maybe even that guy at the bonfire on saturday who wants to ask you out when all you want to do is talk about autism and fire safety.** my analysis of the predate also has a great deal to do with gender roles. it seems like traditional gender roles are emphasized during the predating stage.

perhaps my disdain for dating derives from my disdain for gender roles and i am afraid if i participate in formal dating it would be endorsing traditional gender roles. a traditional date consists of a man calling a women and the following activities occur (if he wants to get kissed goodnight (on the third date)): picks her up at her house (maybe meets her parents, seeks fathers approval), opens her car door and any door she may encounter through out the night, pays for the food and and the movie (i do like movies), and then takes her home and walks her to the door. during the night the man may discuss his ambitions and education and his ability to provide and the women will discuss her family and hobbies.

the whole activity is designed because men have traditionally shown respect to women through a series of meaningless or close to meaningless acts (such as walking on the side closest to the road). furthermore providing for a women used to be paramount to any marriage relationship (so the boy pays). meanwhile these actives encourage the woman to take a more passive role to the date (perhaps so they can showcase their supportive role to their potential spouses ambition and ability to defer to his reasoning).

my problem with the whole system if i dont feel respected when someone opens my door. i feel respected when someone listens to my opinions and values my ideas. i dont care about earning potential or a man providing for me i just want someone who is there for me. i can be supportive of someones goals/careers but in return i want someone to be supportive of mine. i think the perfect first date is when two people go out and their conversation isnt marred by expectations and their actions arent dictated by the their chromosome alignment. if dating was like that i would do more of it.

*we are open to people writing guest posts if you would like to submit one please email me (contact info on my profile) and we will consider it.

**the guy kept trying to ask me out and i kept not letting him. finally the smoke from the fire started blowing our way and i had to move away from him and he asked if i telepathically asked the fire to do that so i could escape and i said i didnt think so....but am i telepathic? with fires? this could open a lot of doors.

what will future anthropologists say about our love?

i've been taking notes for this post for a week now. instead of gaining some focus about what and how to write i've got pages of ramblings in my notebook. i'm afraid this post my be all over the place and boring. but whatever. you gotta write something.

this post is inspired by natali's post about her friend who got email-dumped months after hanging out with some guy. (i thought email-dumped was a funny thing to write, but obviously that's not what happened since she was already engaged to someone else and that guy was hurt about something and decided to take it out on her.) but the questions i see growing out of this incident (and out of many of the stories related on this blog) is what are the different types of dating, where are the lines of demarcation between different types of dating and what gestures are appropriate within which types of dating?
(on a side note: how come when you save drafts it reduces all your double-spaces after periods to a single-space? i know it's not a big deal, but i really like the look of double-spaces between sentences)

i actually wrote like twenty different questions related to understanding, identifying and negotiating different types of dating, but i'm not going to list them since they're sort of repetitive. they all have to do with the problem of changing feelings within (somewhat) fixed relationship categories, the pressure of fitting personal dating experiences into idealized cultural/historical dating norms including nostalgic dating models that prove ineffectual in the information age (maybe because digital communication changes dating relationships) and the relative fluidity of gender roles which challenge older dating models.

but you get it, right? or maybe not. maybe this is my difficulty with dating: articulating feelings.


so i think our blog (rather than me alone cause i don't know what i'm talking about) could and should workshop this. we'll collectively develop a loose theory on post-modern (mormon) dating. i like the very generic classifications of pre-dating, dating and post-dating. maybe something of a continium like pre-dating -> dating ->post-dating where each category blends into the next (with sometimes post- blending into to pre- in the case of dating someone for a second time). it'll be difficult, but i think we can do it. we'll need to seriously challenge our current notions of dating and get rid of actions and attitude that don't hold to the scrutiny. i mean, if you want to.

i need help

25 and-a-half years ago (happy half-birthday to me yesterday), i laid in the hospital nursery batting my little eyes and crying an inherent flirty cry to the little boy babies around me. (this is actually a lie – i was in an incubator with jaundice for two weeks..) the point is, we’re all born with the natural ability to flirt. some of us lose it between about first and second grade when pinning your love interest and spitting in his/her face all of a sudden seemed like the best way to show your affection. others lose it later in life when they never grow out of spitting on their dates. anyway, i’d like to think i’ve kept a fair amount of my flirting ability over the course of my life. i can’t tromp the best of them, but i recently grew out of my spitting phase, so i guess i’m about average. i can hold my own – we’ll say that.

and then, enter the internet (boo! hiss!) i’m yet to get into the whole internet dating thing – not for any particular reason – i’m not anti or anything, i just haven’t delved into it. but i do know this – online flirting is definitely not included in the inherent-flirting package. we weren’t born knowing how to online flirt. and that’s recently become painfully obvious.

see this random boy (if you want to know his name, ask me. there’s a good chance you might know him – crazy small mormon utah internet-savvy world. then you can just hook us up in person) wrote me on the ldslinkup saying something brilliant like “hey what’s up.” i’ve gotten messages like this before, but this time, the boy seemed not only fairly normal, but also fairly attractive and fairly my type. so i wrote back something equally as brilliant like “hi you’re hot.” we exchanged a few emails in a very short period of time (like hours) and then he gave me his beloved email address, so i immediately (per the norm) emailed him…and then nothing…so, i wrote back to him on the linkup just making sure he got my email because how silly if we stopped talking due to msn thinking i was spam-a-lotting. he wrote back immediately “yeah i got it. sorry, i’m busy with school now. i’ll email you soon.” perfect. how heavenly. but then nothing for awhile. and then he found me on facebook.com and asked me to be his friend. and i immediately responded yes and then wrote something flirty(?) on his wall. and then, he removed me from his friend list…and i haven’t heard from him since… (p.s. i think my pictures look normal, but i might be wrong)

so here’s my question. what the hell am i to do? it occurred to me that i’m probably seeming way too excited to talk to him given my immediate responses and should play harder to get, but he’s cute and i WAS excited to talk to him and it was only like 2 sentences at a time so i feel like that doesn’t even count. plus, how do you play hard to get over the internet? but now he hates me. and i can’t write him again and tell him not to hate me because then that’s just sad. so what is normal online flirting protocol? what should i do next? i’m probably supposed to marry him but because i’m not wired to online flirt, my destiny is kissing me goodbye (only without the kiss, which is too bad…unless he’s a bad kisser…how am i even to know?)

sorry i have a thing for energy consumption

the past two days i came to a couple of realizations. first is that i hate basil more that i knew. my office kind of smells like basil. the second is that breakups can happen at any time regardless of your current relationship status. in fact it bears little relation to your previous relationship status. you never know when you will breakup. i think i always knew this but it really hit home after THIS happened to my friend. you should read THIS. its pretty good. just because you are engaged it doesnt mean some guy you went out with 7 and 1/2 times eight months ago wont send you and email with a belated clarification that you were never dating and you were just hooking up. and that his new girlfriend is a model. and although he didnt mention how big his new girlfriends breasts are you can only assume large and perky. he will probably clarify that later.

i admit its hard to know if you dating. but there are classic signs. holding hands, calling each other tiger/kitten/muffin and going to movies with each other more than other people. so if its hard to know if you are dating its equally tricky (perhaps more) to know if you should break up. the world is kind of complicated and undoing relationships proves a challenge. but its a skill that you should really try and develop because most of the people you date arent going to be in your life in two months (weeks). i am not quite sure what the best approach is to breaking up. i did get best breakup ever nomination once so i feel like i have some insight into the matter. i think you should ONLY break up with someone you havent kissed/touched/dated in three weeks (or however long) and no one has said anything about it (because the phase out was appropriate) if you dont like them and you are feeling kind of spiteful. otherwise i think you dont need to break up.

why does my office smell like basil?