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STRAIGHT UP
I know exactly when it all started. I was six years old and had just finished up another grueling day in first grade, Mrs. White's class. I walked into the house and there, in the t.v. den was my Mom. House was clean, dinner was simmering and at this point in the day was when my Mom could be found watching one of her only two favorite t.v. shows... General Hospital. (Years later she became a Nursing Aide.)I looked at the screen and there I saw the scene of a man on one end of a room, a woman at the other end. Everyone else had left and now the camera just bounced back in silence at the expressions between these two. No dialogue, just those "looks". Being the inquisitive little analyst I was, I asked my Mom,
"How come they're just staring at each other?"
"Oh.. he's in love with her. But he can't tell her that."
"How come?"
"She fell in love with his brother who's now hiding from the law somewhere, he's real mean to her."
"Him?"
"No, the brother. And she's in love with him, that man in the room."
"So how come she doesn't tell him?"
"Because her best friend loves him too and only has a year left to live."
"So how come she doesn't tell him?"
"Because it's... because they're grown-ups and it's... drama. Just watch."That moment shaped my life. I kept asking that question for years, and still find myself asking. Now, in some cases I suppose a bit of tact will require some pensive thought as to -how- something should be asked or discussed. But so many times I find that since we can't read each other's minds, the only way we're gonna get an answer to our questions is... to ask.
Too many times I've "assumed" or "supposed" someone knew how I felt about them only to find later they were oblivious to the notion. So I figured the next step was to show how I felt with subtle or overt actions. That led into my high school beginnings with flowers, notes, candies, poems, etc. But then I noticed the guys getting all the gals didn't bother with such things much. Hmm... some other factor at work here. (not that I'm advocating not sending flowers and such.) Many years, books, dates and relationships later I've found it much better to simply address a situation directly rather than all this confusing "game playing" and "I thought you thought what I was thinking all the time" comedies of errors.
Now, in the course of this approach I've encountered two things. First off is.. you run into people during a dating/relationship conversation who are almost offended that you would either ask them a direct question or make a direct statement that's not hidden behind a cloud of cryptic innuendo. Again, there's a time and place for everything, you can't just say, "I love you" or "Do you love me?" on the first date. Not even a good idea for maybe a good two months or so, all things considered. But other questions like,
"What would you like to do this weekend?"
"What did you think of the movie we just saw?"
"How do you feel about 'us'?"These should be basic issues that you'd think wouldn't ruffle someone's feathers. But oh how I've seen people squirm and dance around the subject to avoid something so simple as.. a direct answer. So I try to make things easier, figure these things are just gonna fall into place in a 'natural' fashion. But it's only as we're having our very last "..and another thing..." argument before she walks out the door that she tells me how enraged she was for months that I never fixed her car antennae. Hey, she never asked. Not only that, she knew I wasn't mechanically inclined, but if I'd known it REALLY was bugging her, I'd have paid to have it fixed while she was at work. Only thing is... she -thought- I knew, or should've known without her having to mention it more than once in passing. Hmm. Maybe if we'd talked about the issue -this- honestly -before- it got to be such a heated point of contention, we'd still be together. Even so, at least we'd be communicating without so much animation involved, in my opinion.
The second thing I noticed, or encountered, are people who get offended with -you- because you didn't speak honestly with them about their faults "fast enough". Somehow, in the middle of them offending you, it ends up being your fault that you didn't mention you were offended until the end of the day. (Rather than on the spot, which isn't always practical nor respectful in my opinion.)
In some strange way we've also re-defined 'honesty' into a a twisted, updated version of compassion. The idea being we spare someone's feelings by never really telling them, "I don't love you anymore, I want to end the relationship. I'm sorry, that's the way it is." But I still don't agree with it. Ask most any guy or gal you know, "If the relationship was over in the other person's heart.. would you rather hear it in one honest conversation from them, or figure it out as time went by?" Then I think it's obvious we'd rather get the news honestly, up front, than finding ourselves ignorantly haunting over something that isn't there anymore. That can be a real bummer.
Because I can't trust myself to always be the 'great guy' I'd love to be, (I can be a real idiot lots of times) I have learned to avoid some of these situations by following two basic rules in dating:
#1) Never say or promise anything you don't really mean.
#2) Never imply something you aren't willing to follow through with.Take for instance, my situation with Brandy (not her real name). She and I met about 3 years ago at the same time I'd met a different gal that I became seriously involved with. Brandy and I became good friends. After my break-up with the other gal Brandy and I began to spend a lot of time together. We discussed lots of things and found lots of common ground. But she and I soon found we absolutely, positively stood head-to-head on the issues of child-raising and group therapy. (I'll spare you the hideous details.) She came out and stated, (in a very honest and thoughtful manner I might add) that she felt she could really love me and wanted to get involved, but that these issues were something to really consider. My honest, direct response was, "I really like you, I enjoy being with you but I can't say I'm in love with you. I myself think we'll never agree on the other two issues."
Now, not wanting to throw out the 'baby with the bathwater' I was willing to give it a few more months of spending time together to see if either she'd change her mind or if I could fall in love with her enough that it might not matter. But during that time, as we had dinners, spent New Year's together and such, she always knew it was clear I had not yet said or implied I was in love with her yet. I didn't kiss her, we weren't intimate, we just hung out a lot to give the whole thing a chance. After three months I didn't see it ever happening and discussed that with her openly. We continued to hang out, a little less often, and we even talked about her new boyfriends as time went by.
All that to say that it is possible to be with a gal, let her know honestly where you stand and not promise anything you didn't mean. When I tell a gal I love her, I mean it. If not, I don't let her think I do. Meanwhile, we're friends. Simple. If my girlfriend wants out of our relationship, I'd much rather she just sat across the table from me, said, "This isn't working out, there's nothing you can do. I'm in love with someone else." Will it hurt? Ohhh... life will SUCK for a while, that's guaranteed. But it's a clean wound, life goes on and you work it through knowing the facts. Last time I broke up with a gal we talked for about 45 minutes. She knew why I was leaving her, it was no surprise I hadn't tried discussing before, and there was no mistaking that it was with regret, not relish, that I felt we had to end.
So the old saying, "Honesty is the best policy" may be hard to live up to. God knows I've blown it enough times to know that. It takes a lot to stand there and just tell it straight, or take it. But I still feel it's better than all the guessing, bitterness, misunderstanding and confusion that come with trying to weasel our way out of the truth... truth we hope will just sort of tell the story for us somehow, someday when we're not there. Courage is a scary thing... almost takes courage just to use it.
~Henry Velez / Copyright 1999; all rights reserved.
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