Life and Love

One of my favorite shows for a period of time was Glee. Yeah, yeah, I know, shocker. But, I will say that the first season was great; the second was alright; the third was meh; the fourth picked things up, the firth, well I don't know what really happened there; but the sixth was just gold all over again. Yes, I watched every season. Several times over. I'll even be honest and say I was an active editor on the glee wiki page. Let's all move on from the judgment now.

Anyway, one of the cornerstones of Glee was the meaning behind what the actual word glee meant.

But, as you watched the show, you realized that Glee was much more than just joy. It was also anger. Sadness. Regret. Hope. Loss. Pain. New Beginnings. Love. What opening yourself up to joy really meant was opening yourself to every single human emotion. It was never going to be easy or expected, but by opening yourself up to joy you could open yourself up to a life that had been lived.

And just like the show, dating for me was experiencing a life that had been lived. And after a couple years of dating, things sort of ended for me with the whole Chris debacle. I kind of didn't want to open myself up anymore. Every single date, or match, or swipe, meant opening yourself up just a little bit every single time. It meant opening yourself up to joy. To anger. To sadness. To regret. To hope. To loss. To pain. To new beginnings. To love. And after opening myself up over and over again, and getting met with nothing in return, I felt too vulnerable to continue. So, I took like a 6 month break. A break from dates, from matches, and from swipes. I just needed to redefine my glee. My life.

And so 2019 started and I decided that I would do this dating thing all over again. Why? Because I'm a romantic and because I love love. I love that love is hard work. It's commitment. It's a blessing and a curse. It's putting something out there and in return getting everything back. How could anyone possibly not want to be in love?

And in February I met someone that I thought I could love. Someone that I really really liked. Six-ish weeks later, just like Chris, he's just vanished. And I will say going from daily hundreds upon hundreds of messages back and forth with this guy (and I will someday write about this one, too) made me feel alive again. It made me feel sexy. Wanted. Cared for. Simply put, it made me feel.

It's been a couple of weeks since him and I last spoke and at first it hurt. Once again I had the same thoughts running through my mind. Was I horrendous? Was I so broken that I couldn't be loved? Was I so naive that people just saw me as a joke they could ghost or catfish? Despite wanting to be in love and give love, was love something that was just not meant for me?

All of those or none of those questions might be a yes or no. Who knows. But what I can tell ya, is that I'm not giving up on this journey of dating and love. Why? Because just as glee is about opening yourself up to joy, love is about opening yourself up to being human.

Love is the most universal language that we have. Allowing myself to love and be hurt allows me to feel every emotion one possibly can. Anger. Sadness. Regret. Hope. Loss. Pain. New Beginnings. Joy. Love lets you feel them all and why would I ever deprive myself of the experience of being a human?

So, the rest of my life's journey might be filled with awkward dates. It might be filled with unanswerable dating questions. It might once again be filled with a ghosting or catfish experience. Who knows. But you know what? I can't wait to find out.

The Journey Continues!

Javi