So between getting nostalgic for the Scholars days earlier this week, move-in weekend, and baking about 16.5 dozen cookies (some of which I will keep for us but most of them going to the New Student Festival on Sunday) I've been thinking about college a lot. I really loved college. It's where I met my best friends/ husband, where I learned to trust people outside of my family with the "real" me, and got a better idea of who the "real" me actually is... oh yeah and I got a degree I don't use. But that's ok... it was worth it anyway. There were some rough times, but I don't really remember them that well...mainly I just remember staying up late and a lot of laughter and cookie baking. Oh and flirting... we were young and mainly single after all.
How did you guys "crush" on people? I think I was weird in this respect. Basically what I did throughout high school is that I would pine away for one guy for a whole year. Then over the summer I would get over him and then when I went back to school I would like someone else and moon over him for a year. I never wanted the guy to know (how embarrassing!) and I always tried to seem as though I wasn't affected by any of that silly stuff. This led to three things: 1) not having a boyfriend in HS, 2) being the good friend (aka the one people went to to talk about their relationship woes... ironic considering I had never been in a relationship), and 3) not having a CLUE how to flirt or recognize flirting when it was directed at me. This "pretending-to-be-above-it-while-secretly-crushing-on-someone" thing continued into college, until I discovered a couple of things. 1) The whole unattainable love thing is *miserable.* 2) If I actually knew that the guy wasn't interested then I was no longer interested. The thing is I had to be sure that he wasn't interested, and just telling myself, "he isn't interested" didn't work cause I've always been a hopeless romantic and heroines in many a Jane Austen book tell themselves a man is not interested when the reader knows he actually is. So since life is so very similar to Jane Austen books, normally, I came up with a really weird system. I would develop a crush on a guy. I would get to be better friends and pay attention when he was around for several months and see if I was still interested. I would do all the fun squealing and over-analyzing every sentence with my girlfriends. And then when it started to get to the part where it's not fun anymore- you know, when it's just angsty and melancholy -here's the crazy part- I'd tell him. It sounds crazy but if you will note the 3rd result from high school you will see that I didn't have a clue how to flirt or to tell if someone is flirting back or just being a genuinely nice guy. (And *goodness* knows I only ever fell for the really nice ones!) So what was a girl to do? The thing is I'm totally shy so I'd never have the guts to tell him to his face, so normally this came in the form of an e-mail or letter. Not IM because that's kinda a big thing to broadside someone with and then expect them to have some sort of immediate response (I reasoned to myself.) Plus, I think the suspense might have been something I enjoyed... the last few hours/days of hope while waiting for a response... who knows. Kara was always very much against me telling the guy each time I would discuss it with her... she felt I was not guarding my heart by telling the guy.. that I wasn't making him fight for me. And that's true and good advice that followed the words of the Christian relationship counselors of the day- I read Elisabeth Elliot, too! But I did not take this advice. I'm kinda a one guy girl, so when I would find out for sure that the guy wasn't interested in me... well I'd mope about for about a week and then I'd be ok and start noticing other guys. It honestly got to a point where I would say something to the effect of "I'm pretty sure you aren't interested, but I have to tell you that I like you so I can get over you." I probably sounded a little desperate and like a big whopper, but it really was the truth! Ok, granted, I only did this with 3 or 4 guys that I can recall, and my real relationship did not start because I told Nathan I had a crush on him... but honestly it was really effective for me and I wasn't wasting my time being all star eyed over someone who had no interest in me... plus I never have to worry about might have beens. I do feel a bit sorry for the guys, cause most of them were totally scared off by this approach. If they could handle it, though, I was fine being around them and didn't "relapse" (though the poor things were probably terrified and over-analyzing their own every move this time around.) What can I say? When it comes to relationships, I've always been a bit intense.
You know... you think you know where a blog post is gonna go and then it just takes a left turn at Albuquerque and suddenly you find yourself rambling on about how you handled crushes in the far distant past.... You know, like 5 years ago. I think this is the problem with titling blogs before you write them. Perhaps something to try to remember for the future....
Yeah, I'm glad you broke your crush pattern eventually, even though the resulting dating-but-not-dating pattern we developed was kinda weird in its own right...
ReplyDeleteIn any case, I think it worked out well! :D
I followed a similar pattern in high school...except that it was a few guys over and over again, and I was terrible at hiding it, so I just looked stupid denying it.
ReplyDeleteIn college I changed mindsets (for a number of reasons). I would have a cruse, but wouldn't pursue it unless I could imagine marrying the guy. Not immediately, of course, but if I *couldn't* picture it...well, that wasn't a good sign, was it? I knew I would get crushes on boys, but I was pretty content not pursuing or being pursued, unless I thought it could work.
And without IM, Jon and I may never have gotten together. 'Tis truth.
I also had long-term crushes that I would deny to my dying breath! But I was convinced that no one would ever, ever like me because I was too brash, sarcastic, and tomboyish. Why, oh why, didn't I read Jane Austen in high school? She would have saved me so much grief.
ReplyDeleteThis was a really interesting post to read. Not having been part of the Christian-single scene, things like making a guy fight for you and guarding your heart were not really part of my thoughts when I was dating. It sounds like sound advice, but it seems to me that telling someone how you feel IS guarding your heart-- from a lot of fruitless pining at least. Too often, I find advice for Christian women is based around adopting a passive role. But that is just not how the Bible heroines I know & love operate-- they get out there and do what needs to be done, whether it's leading the nation of Israel into battle or sneaking under the right guy's covers at the right time (chastely, I know, I know! But you can't ignore the mild raciness of the Ruth & Boaz story, I think).
In the end, for me, the practice of denying my feelings worked against me both ways-- I denied that I felt attracted to someone, then I denied when I didn't anymore and stayed in relationships long past their expiration date. Until my better instincts kicked in and suddenly-- I acted! For me, making those moves was always a turning point. I realized that I couldn't just let fate move me where it may-- or let silly boys decide if they liked me or not, or what our relationship would be like-- I had to DO things. Case in point: I was dating someone else when Matt moved out of town. I helped Matt pack up his stuff, went over to my boyfriend's house, looked at him, and realized that I didn't care if I never saw him again. (It sounds awful, but really, he was a schmuck). We broke up and three weeks later, Matt came up to visit and I didn't let him out of my sight for three days until he kissed me. I think I let him settle in for all of a week before I told him he should start thinking about where our relationship was headed, because if he wasn't in it for the long haul, I was going to have to keep moving. After his shock died down, I think he was glad. At least I hope he was. And if not, too late for him! He's six years in now and there's no abandoning ship this far from land! Mwahahaha!