Must .. not .. share .. feelings ..

Talking to a young male friend the other day – he was excited after a coffee date with a girl he rather fancied. It was cute..However he was lamenting to me the fact that he didn’t know how it had gone.. Now bear in mind he’s young and stupid (everyone under the age of 40 fits this category when you’re my age, deal with it) but our chat got me to thinking..

HOW the hell come it’s not the done thing to let people know how we feel any more?

I’ve experienced this exact same dilemma as my young friend. Just last month I was gob-smacked to find myself thinking “should I text and say thanks or will that make me seem too interested?” after having been out on a date with DTR. Remember him? Yeah we never recovered from the Xmas discussion I’m afraid. Ah well.. wasn’t meant to be.

But back to the bit about people not being willing or able to communicate any more. And, worryingly – the fact that I seem to be falling prey to it..

That realisation really pissed me off because til recently I used to just act on instinct.. I’m a firm believer in following your gut however it’s also fair to say that I tend to wear my heart on my sleeve. And you know? I’d generally say that I think this is a nice way to be but yeah, well .. look how bloody well that’s worked for me thus far, huh!

I do know that as a result of the last big break up, I’m trying to be more circumspect because as we all know – showing interest and being open is a dating code word for DESPERATE!

Or at least that is what it seems to mean to so many people now. However, that is a topic for a-whole-nother rant, today I just want to ponder why and when did it become normal to not be able (or willing or allowed!?) to communicate how we feel ..

And worse, when did we start acting like this about someone we obviously liked enough to go out on a bloody date with?

You see, normally with me you 100% know where you stand. I loathe playing games, I find them time consuming and wasteful.. And they often end up just hurting people. And for all I like to think I’m a tough old broad, I dislike hurting people.

I’d rather be up front and honest, even if it hurts initially – than lead someone on or ignore them. Honesty is the best policy when dealing with affairs of the heart, I believe.

I think the thing that annoys me so much about this whole dating “game” is the fact that a) the rules are not given out at the start of the game and b) the rules are subject to change at any moment, usually right about the time you think you may be starting to understand said rules.

Still, I console myself with the fact that beautiful people, young people, rich people, stupid people – even smart people – all seem to struggle with the rules of this game. So it’s not just me that has no idea what I’m doing.

This morning someone posted something on a blog I follow  that made me think we’re all going about this dating thing wrong. I realise when you read his blog you’ll wonder at the leap to where I’m going but work with me k 😉 You see maybe we shouldn’t PLAY hard to get, perhaps instead we should just BE hard to get.

By that I mean sure, we should value ourselves sufficient that we make good decisions. BUT once you’ve made the choice to go out with someone – run with it, enjoy it, be real .. and importantly: Don’t dick the other person around.

This post is a little disconnected and that annoys me but I’m gonna run with it anyway!