Vacations… as a Diagnostic Tool.
From my blog in April, 2010:
He and I went to Puerto Rico, drank a lot of beer, wandered around a rain forest, and swam in the ocean off the coast of a tiny island. And I was miserable. I cried whenever he wasn’t looking. I had way too much time to realize how much was wrong with us. As I ventured precariously into the water, the waves higher than any I’d ever attempted, I looked at him and said “I need you to pretend for five minutes that you’re my boyfriend and that you actually like me.” I said it as if I was asking to borrow his pen. I didn’t think about it before I said it; I just knew, at that moment, that that was what I needed. I needed him to act like he gave a damn just for a little while. He picked me up and helped me through the waves and we gave each other salty, wet smooches. It was the happiest I had been on the entire trip even though I got sand in my hair and was waterlogged for weeks afterward.
Then we broke up.
I am infinitely more productive and focused when I am single. I have a propensity to structure my life around the person I am dating… which would be fine if I ever did so with the right person, but that hasn’t happened yet.
And I’m getting more OK with that every day.
