Two weeks after my ex and I broke up, while still in the cake/wine diet phase, I decided to put in a movie with no love story to it. I settled on a football movie, so that I could watch big beautiful men tackle each other. The film had taken professional athletes and cast them as the characters, one of which I had developed a major crush on years ago, from the moment I saw him in the film.
While watching the film, in sweats that I hadn't changed out of in days, my hair held prisoner in a scarf in order to keep it out of my face and thus saving it from being lopped off and sacrificied in a fire in offering of the broken hearts of every "single girl," I decided to find out a little bit more about the athlete I had pined for, primarily if he was married. I just wanted to be able to fantasize with peace of mind. My web research came up inconclusive on the marriage question, though it did tell me he is based out of my area, is two years older than me, and that we had gotten degrees from the same school. Though I found this all interesting, I didn't think much about it outside of that maybe I'll pass him on the street someday. Then I decided to take the marriage query to Facebook, because you can find out anything on Facebook. What I found was a few fan pages, and one personal profile for him.
I decided to write him. What's the worst he could do? Not respond? Oh well, I'd survive. Within a couple of hours of writing him, I got a reply. Then we were emailing a few times a day. Within days we were chatting for hours. Within a week, he'd invited me out to the Metropolitan Grill, an incredibly posh restaurant in Seattle. I went there still trying to wrap my head around what was happening. I was two thirds convinced it wouldn't be him, and that it was either a joke, an assistant, or some dude from Hoboken New Jersey toying with me. Then the thing I was terrified about the most happened. The host took me to the table, there were three men with their backs to me, and one facing me. He was facing me. I almost fell over. He was grinning ear to ear when he saw me. He stood up, gave me a hug like we'd known each other for years, and sat me down next to him. We couldn't stop looking at each other the whole dinner. I ate bacon for him. I've been a vegetarian for 13 years, and I was so smitten when ordering that I forgot to ask for no bacon on my spinach salad. I ate it. It was one of the best dates of my life, not because he's a celebrity, but because of how we got along, how our knees touched the entire night, how he made me laugh and vice versa, and how he made sure to escort me to my car, and gently kissed me several times. I drove home in a daze, I couldn't even talk to my friends about it. We didn't even wait 24 hours before seeing each other again.
And then reality happened. I had started hitting the gym heavily when he and I started talking. My ex had liked "big girls" - which turned my stomach when I met him, realizing that I fit into that category, but it was easy to be lazy knowing that my boyfriend reveled in it. I've dropped nearly 50 pounds since, and when people ask me what got me started, I tell them the truth. I started dating a man I was really into. It was dating my athlete, who is still a professional fighter, that made me take a good look at myself. I've always known I'm fabulous. I've known I'm an attractive girl from the neck up, and I've known that if I got the rest of my body to stop ballooning in difficult times, and if I let it thrive to it's potential, then I'd be a showstopper. I decided I had to stop the excuses. If I was going to give the relationship I wanted a fair shot, I had a lot of work to do. I needed to do what I was capable of, mentally and physically. With the promise that I would see him in three months, after his next couple of fights abroad were done, and the TV shows and interviews were completed, I continued working hard, and we'd text, chat, call, skype, and email daily.
Then three months turned to five months. Texts turned to arguments. Five months turned to ten months. Skypes turned vindictive, phone calls nonexistant, and all texts were angry. It was so bad that I actually got to the point where I hit on his opponent right before one of his fights. Not to say the opponent isn't a good guy, completely shagworthy, as well as has a great sense of humor, but it wasn't right. I knew something was really wrong with me and my fighter when I asked his opponent to hit him once really hard for me. Once again, I was done. Another hopeful situation gone very very wrong.
And then something happened. A couple of months later, I contacted him, and we became friends. Actual and honest friends. I was still talking to the opponent, who he is friends with as well, and had started dating a former NFL player in the meantime. I guess when it rains it pours. I also guess that when you raise your standards, and realize that you have value, that there is no end to what you can acomplish and who you can attract. I had contacted my fighter because the NFL player had played on the same team as him when he was in the NFL. I wanted to find out more about the man who was trying to nail down a commitment from me, and he helped. Things didn't work out with the NFL player, and I am very grateful for that, very, very grateful. Though my fighter said nothing negative about him, he was a great friend when I was having major qualms.
Something else happened. He stopped pushing me away, and started letting me in. He started telling me honestly about his problems, and about his medical issues and injuries, and has basically ruined me forever. Somehow, this man that was at one point just an adorable big man (6 foot 5, 370 pounds primarily muscle- I like 'em big, what can I say?) on my television, has now become one of my closest friends, who I talk to daily. He listens with intent to silly little every day dramas. Ever the single girl, I have learned my lesson about putting too much stock in things that I wish would happen. I am keeping my sanity by continuing dating the men that I find the slightest bit attractive, though the dates, one referenced by my first entry, leave a lot to be desired. I have even continued to talk with the opponent which feels sick and wrong, though the conversations are flirty and fun. I will be seeing my big fighter in a few weeks, when he comes home for a necessary procedure. In the meanwhile, I continue to go to the gym, enjoy our conversations, and try and keep myself romantically available. I almost hope we'll have an argument. That would be so much easier.
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