There are a few things I am good at. I play a mean game of Scrabble. Nobody, I mean nobody, googles information as good as I do. My head is full of trivia (albeit miscellaneous and generally useless trivia). I dance really great when I am drunk. I can write a fairly interesting story. I am an absolute champ at designing things in MicroSoft Publisher. And my husband says I am an above average kisser but there are just as many things that I am bad at. I have a difficult time matching names with faces. I cannot make delicious sugar cookies. When I am sober I am an awful dancer. I am mathematically retarded. And I have always had a hard time breaking up with people. There! I said it! I am a bad breaker-upper but at least I know it. (However, it probably would have been more beneficial to figure that out when I was still dating.)
In the 7th grade I went steady with a boy named Donnie. I thought he was cool because he played the drums. We "went together" for two whole weeks and held hands twice. However, as magical as it sounds, I quickly realized he just wasn't the one and I needed my 12 year old freedom. Despite that, I just couldn't bring myself to hurt his feelings. So I had my friend Kendra call him and tell him we were through. He took it fairly well. He immediately started seeing Molly the first white girl in our middle school to exclusively date black boys. Then my freshman year, I had to break up with a super sweet uber geek (he was way toooooo nice and I just couldn't take it). Therefore, I carefully picked a fight with him until he was really mad and then I burst into tears. I yelled, "I can't believe you are breaking up with me" and I ran into the house. Poor guy didn't know what hit him. When he would call I told him that I couldn't talk because it was too painful. Coniving? Yes but after about two weeks, he had gained a bit of a bad-boy rep and had completely forgotten that he really hadn't wanted to break up with me. Eventually we became friends again. Even as an adult, I once dated a guy for nearly seven months after I stopped liking him because I just couldn't bring myself to say "Hey dude, I'm just not that into you." (Alright! Alright! Maybe I am not being completely honest. Part of my inability to part ways in that situation was the fact that I didn't want him but I really didn't want anybody else to have him either. But that is only because I can be a little territorial. It's only natural, I'm a Leo!)
I don't know exactly why I had such a problem saying sayonara when I wasn't happy with someone. I guess, I just don't like hurting people's feeling and I (I've told you this before) have an unnatural need to be liked (and needed and loved and lusted after and... well, I'm sure you get the point). I like when people refer to me as "nice" or "sweet" or even "funny" but I would hate to hear some guy in a bar telling someone I was a bitch or calling me a heartbreaking whore. Was I always honest when I ended relationships? Of course not (But honestly, who is?) I have a friend who stopped dating a boy because she realized she had been also seeing his cousin. Would it have been right for her to cause a big family dispute? No! So she told him he lived too far away (he didn't). Another friend broke up with a guy by telling him she didn't have time for a serious relationship because of an increased work load but the truth was that he moaned too much and far too loudly during sex. Should she really have told him that? It would have crushed his spirit. Hell, I once broke up with a guy because his curl activator smelled like corn (white people if you don't know what a curl is ask a black person). But I told him that I couldn't see him anymore because I had heard that he had been smoking crack. Now doesn't that seem nicer than screaming "Your head stinks and it gives me a headache"?
I guess I am saying that A.) if you have to break up with someone, you should be gentle and think about the damage that you can do to their psyche and B.) I am awfully glad that I am married to the perfect husband and will never have to break-up with anyone ever again. Why? Because Neil Sedaka was right... Breakin' up is hard to do.
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