Tell Me What You Want (what you really really want)

Spice girls jokes aside, I think that it's important to know what you want, what is reasonable, and what you're willing to give in relationships, any relationship for that matter, not just the romantic ones.  I think it's good to know where your lines in the sand are, your deal breakers and makers if you will.

I found an old journal from last year while I was cleaning house and there was a really great (patting myself on the back here) entry about what I wanted in a relationship. I've added to it since it's discovery and now I'm ready to share it with the world.

• I'm looking for a partner in life.  I'm not looking for a boss or to take over his mother's job of raising him.
• I want someone who can make me laugh, and understands that sometimes I just need to cry.
• I am looking for someone who makes me feel safe and loved no matter what environment we're in.  I want to trust that we can make it through any situation that is tossed in our direction as long as we're together.
• I need someone who is honest with me, someone who believes in us.  Someone who doesn't find monogamy unreasonable or too demanding.
• I want someone who encourages and inspires my dreams.  Someone who values what I bring to the table, who sees me as his equal and not just entertainment.
• I want someone to share adventures with, who isn't afraid to try new things and will be eager to broaden each other's horizons.
• I don't want to worry about whether or not he'll be able to hold his temper, his alcohol, or other harmful personality traits.  I don't want to clean up drunken vomit or have to slowly back out of a room because I'm scared.
• I want to feel like I belong when I'm with him and his people whether that be his family or his friends.
• I want him to be both intelligent and educated, and to not feel intellectually intimidated by my friends, but at the same time not be a snob about it.
• Ideally I'd like him to be able to look into my eyes and see beyond my "poker face" and know how certain situations make me uncomfortable and do his best to make it better.  I realize that will take more communication on my part.  I will have to learn to open up when something bothers me instead of insisting that it's "fine" when it's not.

This list is not saying that I want him to do all the work to accommodate me and my needs only.  I know that relationships take (some times hard) work, honesty, communication, and compromise.  I know that if I want someone to be supportive of my dreams and to vanquish my fears I have to pick up my sword and be just as willing to slay some dragons for him.  I need to occasionally take the backseat and put his needs first and help him lay his insecurities to rest.

I am experienced enough to know that at this stage in the game no one comes into a relationship without some scars on their hearts and minds.  People have an uncanny ability to heal and move on, but we do so with more caution than when we started out.  Sometimes that means we are extra careful in how we treat others, sometimes it means that we hold people at a distance until trust is gained.  Often times its a combination of the two with a few other unique coping mechanisms thrown in to keep things interesting.

I'm not the girl who stares out her office window waiting for flower delivery on Valentine's Day.  A dozen red roses doesn't prove that someone loves you, it proves that they have money to burn and know how to call a florist.  Cut flowers wither and die in stagnant water and end up dropping sad petals all over your desk within a few days.  Real love is every day, and while romantic gestures are nice (and appreciated) they don't guarantee love.  The boyfriend who always bought me thoughtful gifts every time he went out of town did so because he felt guilty because he was schtooping some other broad in Southern California while to told me his was visiting his parents.  The sweetest and most thoughtful birthday present I ever received from a lover came from someone who responded to an "I love you" with a "you're confused."  I'd rather have someone show their love by being honest, caring, and someone I can count on than celebrate a silly holiday once a year.

Tell me you love me every day, prove it with your actions, and I'll do the same for you.  Make me laugh, hold me when I cry, please be patient when I'm crazy, understand that when I give my heart to you that it wasn't given lightly or without thought.

Blogaversary

Hey friends and faithful readers... it's that time of year again, can you believe this blogging journey is about two years old now? Okay, for me is seems longer, I almost posted that it has been a four year long journey... and not because it feels like it's been dragging on, but because it has become so much a part of what I do. I think the past couple years have marked the most consistent journaling I have ever done in my whole life... and while I may not post every event or thought that crosses my path, I do get a lot of it out.

Over the past year I've started chronicling my dreams, posting album reviews, recipes, and working on monthly updates about what has been going on in my life along with other posts about current events. I feel like I've given deeper insights into who I am now, and maybe a map of who I'm becoming as a woman in her early 30s who is still trying to find her place in the world.

In the past two years I've had close to 6,000 hits on my blog, and while that may be far from viral, it's still a voice in the blogosphere, people...strangers care about my thoughts and opinions and while that can be intimidating, it's also gratifying.

I suppose now is the time for my yearly wish list or resolutions to carry me into 32.

Over the past year and a half I've maintained a monthly "wrap up" journal style post, I'm not sure I want to continue that beyond this month. I do enjoy looking back at all the fun I've had, however it's beginning to feel forced and I can see that my writing style is suffering. I want to write about things that matter (not that having fun with friends/family doesn't matter) instead of just spewing a laundry list of diary entries that only my closest friends care about. I haven't ruled it out, I'm just thinking about making some changes.

I want to really learn how to use my camera and be a better amateur photographer (I hesitate to use that title, because there are real talents out here and I just want to better my hobby). I want to be creative and make beautiful things and I don't want to be limited because I only have basic knowledge.

I want to fall back in love with life, right now I feel like I'm treading water and that I need to create some new adventures and experiences before I drown. I'm not hating anything right now, I wouldn't even really say that I'm depressed, I'm just bored and apathetic, and that really needs to change.

Ideally I'd like to lesson my social network addiction, I feel like it takes up too much of my life, and for what? What do I have to show for the hours upon hours that I spend playing on facebook or twitter? I don't my presence to vanish, but I think it will be better if I'm not so connected all the time. So far I feel like I've done a decent job of not being logged into twitter or Facebook while I'm at work and my productivity levels have increased exponentially. It's amazing how much time is wasted on things that are really not that important (not that keeping up with friends and family is unimportant, but when I'm at work, I really should be focused on what I'm being paid to do, like a grown up would do).

Girl Blog 3 of 3: A New Wishlist

Happy Anniversary Blogger, its been a year already and I think its appropriate to celebrate with a new wish list. My first post on this site was My Wish List and while a lot of these wishes are still hopes I have for the future its time for a new list.

My hopes for women haven't changed, if anything I hope that in the years to come we won't have to still be fighting the same battles our grandmothers fought for equality, reproductive freedom, and won't be judged on anything but our own personal merit.

A lot has happened since I posted my wish list last year, it was a chronical of my thirtieth year in many ways... and with the year winding down for me (my birthday is Friday, if you want to send presents I'm totally on Amazon.com) I thought maybe this could be a New Year's Resolution type post. Not just wishes for the population as a whole, but more localized.  The way I want to live 31.

• Don't sweat the small stuff.
• I know its totally cliched, but I get so caught up in making things that don't matter in the long run matter in the present that I lost sight of what really is important.
• Chill on the out of control spending
• Do I really need that sweater in 4 different colors? Will two or {gasp} one suffice? Do I really need it at all?
• Write More
• Whether it be here on the blog, or short stories, or in a journal, set the pen to the paper and get the words out.
• Appreciate EVERYTHING
• Good times, bad times they all have their lessons to teach.
• Experience the Out of the Ordinary
• Take chances that I wouldn't necessarily always take. Who knows where it could lead.
• Don't Be Afraid to Say No
• I know this almost contradicts the one that I posted before, but this is more in the sense that I tend to overload myself because I want to be able to do it all. Sometimes I need to sit back and either let something slide or let someone else handle it. I don't need to be in charge all of the time. I can share the reins.
• Cultivate Positive Relationships
• Sometimes people are in your life for a season, sometimes a few years, sometimes a lifetime. Everyone you meet has a specific purpose in your life, even if its just a small encounter, who knows where you might find inspiration to do the next big thing.

I think that these are all do-able goals and I look forward to tackling the new year.

My Wish List

I have this same article/paper/note on Facebook, so if you've read it there, this is just a repeat, but I feel like its important enough to post it here as well.  This goes along with my strong opinions more than customer service shenanigans, but its all part of the adventure.

I was reading an article in cosmopolitan magazine online this afternoon and came across an article about a “shocking” and potentially dangerous new beauty trend…anal bleaching (http://m.cosmopolitan.com/secrets/81386/full/). At first I just cringed at the thought of it then continued to read the article. This is something real women are doing, not just porn stars and the wacky Hollywood types. It made me sad that women are so insecure about their hind quarters that they have their ass cracks waxed then literally bleached so they have no skin discoloration on their anuses. This is real!!! That with porn becoming more mainstream than ever that XXX movies are starting to dictate what America’s standard of beauty is and what “normal sex” is. I thought the idea of bedazzling your vagina was creepy enough, and I’ve never had a Brazilian wax because frankly, the idea of allowing someone to put hot wax on my lady bits makes me cringe (I’m totally okay with waxing my eyebrows to that perfect arch though), that being said, I’m pretty sure I can single handily keep Gillette in business with the amount of razors I go through to keep everything neat and tidy (just a little lady-scaping, I don’t try to look like my 12 year old self, razor burn sucks and those little bumps you get from shaving itch too bad) and between my arms, under arms, and legs its quite the ordeal.

Now, I’m not one of those women who get all bent out of shape over adult films. They can be entertaining, but I don’t think they should ever be taken seriously as a model for real life. I think the allure of porn is in the fantasy. When you start trying to create your real life around a fictional world you’re bound to run into problems. I think as women we create so many of these problems for ourselves… We forget that the best thing about having a fantasy is in the dream. I’m beginning to think that women are using too much logic when looking at porn stars as role models for being beautiful in real life… This is the best thought I can come up with right now, but it makes a lot of sense to me. I think women are thinking

“Men enjoy watching these women having sex in ridiculous places and situations, they think these women are beautiful and desirable, the things they do and how they look turn men on, therefore I need to be like these women.”

Except in real life??? In my experience I have never been intimate with a man who complained about my legs being too hairy, or my skin too discolored (not that I allow access to my “backdoor” region anyway, no judgment on women who do, it’s just not something I’m comfortable with), or even having too much of a “fur bikini.” For the most part the men I’ve been with have been happy enough to be having sex. Who knows maybe they talk to their friends or they write in their secret boy-diaries about it, but honestly? I don’t think they care. I think they get that porn isn’t real and that it’s really just for fun. It’s not the guidelines for the life they want to live for real… Sure a little role-playing fantasy sex might be great sometimes, but I don’t think they expect that kind of sex and bodies all the time.


That’s the back story to my wish list… This is what I want for all the women of the world.

I want girls to grow up encouraged to be whatever they want to be. I want them to be loved for WHO they are, not what the look like, what their last name is, what side of the tracks they grew up on. I want girls to be able to truly be friends with each other without the competition for men and jobs and every other silly thing we feel the need to compete for. When we get dressed up, I want us to be able to do it because it makes US feel good and not because of what someone else’s opinion might be.

I want our self esteem to be based on how smart and independent we are and not solely on how pretty we are and how easy it is for us to catch a mate.

I don’t want pretty and smart to be mutually exclusive. Reading is sexy; being smart lasts forever, but pretty often fades as time goes on… Although my great-grandmother is 101 years old and I still think she’s beautiful, but she’s also a good person, and I think that reflects in someone’s eyes and how they carry themselves. I could also be partial because she’s family, but I don’t think I am. Girls take care of your bodies and your bodies will take care of you.

I want women to truly be treated as equals to men on an intellectual level. I’m not going to get into physical equalities, because let’s face it we were genetically engineered to do different things. We can talk about physical equalities when a man can carry a baby to term. We think differently but that doesn’t make one better than the other, it just makes us different. You learn more from people who have different thought processes than you do from people who are completely like-minded anyway.



I want girls to be able to go for a walk at night and not be scared that someone might attack her for just being there. I want girls in college to be able to go to a party and have fun without having to worry about getting drugged if she doesn’t watch her drink like a hawk….and then get blamed for the roofie because she was too pretty, too flirtatious, too drunk, too whatever. When did flirting become a crime or an invitation for being taken advantage of?

I want women to be able to love freely without being worried about showing too much emotion. Why is having feelings and expressing them considered a weakness or crazy? Why is it so horrible to cry when you feel the need to? It is not always a form of emotional terrorism to shed a tear or two. I feel like on many days I’m an emotional hoarder. I have so many feelings bottled up inside me because it is not cool to express them that one of these days I’m going to explode like a Molotov cocktail of emotion and I’ll get put in a straight jacket and locked in a padded room. That can’t be healthy.

I want girls to be encouraged to be self sufficient. Being able to share responsibility is a great thing, and having someone who WANTS to take care of you is awesome, but having the skills to be able to fend for yourself is as important as any other skills you may acquire over the years. You never know when you might be left on your own. There was a time in my life when someone asked me if I was going to college to get my M.R.S. the person asking it of me didn’t mean any harm by it but I felt incredibly insulted by the question. I couldn’t believe that someone thought the only reason a girl would go to college would be to meet her future husband, and that getting a degree wouldn’t really have value otherwise. Well, I graduated from California Polytechnic University at San Luis Obispo with a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Business Administration and concentration in Marketing… I still haven’t obtained that elusive M.R.S. but I don’t think that I’m any less of a woman because I don’t have a husband or children (and I don’t think any less of the women who are married with children, I just haven’t found that person I want to spend my life with who also wants to spend their life with me).

I want girls to grow up being taught that true beauty lies in kindness, generosity, being respectful and demanding respect for yourself, an education, taking responsibility for one’s actions, and independence. That they don’t have to fit some cookie cutter mold that Hollywood or Mattel decides to sell us as an ideal. Barbies are fun and pretty, but they are just as much of a toy as stuffed animals, and actresses and actors can be beautiful on screen, but there is a lot of makeup and air brushing that prevents them from looking like an average person you’d find in your local grocery store. I think real role models for girls should be teachers, doctors, scientists, authors, people who have made real accomplishments, not people who make their living by having the talent to read lines that other people have given them and being able to look good doing it. I don’t completely disrespect the entertainment industry. I just think that we place too much value on things that aren’t real.

I want real women, to become the real beauties of the world. I’m tired of being told the only way to be beautiful and loved is to be plastic. I’m pretty sure that even though it sells magazines by the ton, it’s a lie.

I want us women to look at men differently as well. A man doesn’t have to look like Jake Gyllenhaal or Bradley Cooper to be attractive (and I picked my two favorites as examples), the men I’ve loved most haven’t really fit my physical type at all, but they fit everything else so much better. The men I’ve fallen the hardest for are the ones that make me laugh, the ones who make me feel safe and comfortable, the ones who make me feel the prettiest girl in the room even when I don’t have any makeup on and I’m wearing my gym clothes. The men I’ve loved the most have encouraged me to live life unfiltered and let me be me when I’m around them. They’ve challenged me to learn new things, pushed me farther than I would have ever pushed myself, and I’m a better person for it. The men that I’ve merely been physically attracted to have exited my life just as swiftly as they entered without even leaving a scratch on the surface of my heart and the ones that I've loved will always have their own corner of my soul (whether I like it or not). I want everyone to be able to feel the joy of just snuggling on the couch with that someone watching something incredibly stupid on Comedy Central (or whatever channel tickles your fancy) and just be happy because you’re together…

So that’s my wish list. It might be a little sappy and emotional and all those other words so often used to describe women’s feelings, and it is all of those things. Feelings are great things to have, and I’m glad that I had the opportunity to share them.