mishalak | On Fancying People and Love

Mishalak Babbles On Relationships
Inspired by my correspondence with Constance (

green_amber).

I don't like secret admirer sorts of stuff. It feels wrong to be fancying someone or feeling in love without telling him. Or her as the case may be, but I tend to thinking in terms of liking guys due to my own perspective. Being a secret admirer is safe, there won't be any rejection, but there won't be an acceptance either without coming out from behind the safety of being anonymous. And worse it could turn out to be like Christmas where a person is disappointed by the present, not because it isn't wonderful, but because he has built it up to be something even bigger in his imagination.

Love is bright and terrible and if you've got it all that can be done is to throw yourself over the edge and hope that there will be wings on the way down. That is perhaps a bit too dramatic a way of putting it, but it sounds so nice I can't help but say it again. It always feels like jumping off a cliff when a person asks another out on a date, says "I love you", "I find you attractive", or similar. And it feels like fall will crush his fragile body if his love doesn't reach out and grab his hand. But the thing is that though it feels terrible for a while, there is no lasting damage from not being caught by the angel of the evening. Jumping off the cliff feels profoundly dangerous, and always will, but in matters of love we're all vampires, werewolves, or some other supernatural oggy. The fall will hurt, but we survive and are as good new (or better) after picking ourselves up at the bottom.

There is a good bit of a great movie about things like this.
T.E. Laurence performs his 'trick' of putting out matches with his bare hands. One of his subordinates attempts to copy him and yelps in pain. "Ah! It damn well hurts!" he says. "Certainly it hurts," replies Lawrence. "Well, what's the trick, then?" demands Potter. "The trick, William Potter," remarks Lawrence with amusement, "is not minding that it hurts."

I totally understand not wanting to admit fancying someone unless he is reciprocating. It makes it a lot less scary, but I worry that if people rely on this too much it will shut off all sorts of good opportunities. We need the skill or nerve to just ask people if they would like to get to know each other better, go on a date, or whatever. Are things like The LJ Match Generator bad? Not really, but still it makes me slightly worried about my generation being unable to relate to one another except online. But I don't have any answers, in the end I'm just writing in my livejournal because I love the sound of my own words. Let me know what you think.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

There was a really dangerous couple of generations in there - most of the 20th century, at least for the United States. Matchmakers are not inherently bad - there are people who cannot make the first move. I know - I'm one of them. I spent 20+ years frustrated and single because I couldn't figure out how to ask a girl out. I could become friends with a girl - that was actually quite easy. But going from friend to something serious - that was impossible.

Then along came the internet, and services like matchmaker.com. I met Irene through matchmaker.com. The good thing about matchmaker.com and its ilk is that you know that the other people are actively looking - so you aren't going to get turned down because they're already involved with someone else, or not currently interested in a relationship, or ...

There were uncounted times in my 20's and 30's when I wished for a matchmaker or an arranged marriage. I'm glad that there is something that can function as a similar service for the general public.

This may be why I liked Shards of Honor (AKA the first half of Cordelia's Honor) so much - in some of Cordelia's interactions with Aral early on, she described herself in a way that was very much the way I would have described myself.

I've had trouble with guys hanging out on gay.com not actually looking for someone to date as he is already in a relationship. That weirds me out somewhat. But that's one of the hazards of being gay. We're all men looking for sex and we all know it or something like that.

I've wished for a matchmaker, but I eventually became rather disillusioned and decided that if I don't find him myself he's never going to find me. Especially since I'm looking for that sf fan or near fan who won't mind me popping off to conventions every other month.

Well, along those lines you seem to be doing what I would think of as the right moves - looking at SF conventions and SF groups for gay people. I'm straight, but the same thing worked fine for me. (I know of friends who are gamers whose wives don't game and therefore are only allowed 'out' to game a few times a month - whereas I'm in four ongoing RPG campaigns and may be joining a fifth.)

Dear god - four? D20 has a lot to answer for.

Oh, right, we're talking about you. Hang in there. Geeze, if I wasn't married I'd be awful tempted myself.

Oh and while I'm looking at my old posts, thanks for the complement! I ment to say so at the time, but I didn't for some reason.

Oh, good. *relaxes* I was beginning to think you'ld decided I'd gotten all creepy on you.

As usual I'm impressed by your entry( got here by your memories).
First let me say that I am supportive of internet matchmaking, because people like me a lot more if I talk to them before I meet them. I honestly don't know why, but with the exception of a few females, people seem afraid of or uninterested in getting to know me if I encounter them in person first. It's very odd. I seem to be the same person... I don't know, perhaps I don't meet people with enough shared interests? Maybe I need to get to a con or something and meet guys there. But on the other hand, I make a poor fan. I'm more a fan of fandom, with only certain elements of it myself. And if we're talkign similar interests, you'd think I'd have met SOMEONE in all the time I've been doing theatre, I mean there are plenty of gay boiz to go around.
As for gay.com, well, that's gay.com, you shouldn't expect too much out of there. Try a site that focuses on personal ads, if you're going to go that route. Of course, most of those are pay and require far more money than they're worth.

<mock humility> Oh no I don't like having my ego stroked like this. Honest, what, I didn't say stop giving me complements, did I?

I don't even remember what exactly possessed me to sign up with gay.com. At first I met a number of interesting people, like my friend (Martin

heck1701 who ought to log in more often), but now there doesn't seem to be anyone else. I've already found the few fans and everyone I contact now is just a repeat. So when my subscription runs out I guess I'll try somewhere new.

Most fans are fans of fandom. That is that we're more about our circle of friends and interested in fandom than we are hard core readers of science fiction. After all one can read the books and be as fanatical a reader as ever walked the earth without once having to meet a fellow fan to talk about them. Fandom is self-referential. It started as a place to discuss a common interest (and still is to a certain extent) but it now is about the perpetuation of a place for people of a certain mind set to let their hair down and act like themselves.

I'm going to have to turn these thoughts into a post of the main page sometime. Not that the thoughts are particualarly origional, but they need to be said on occasion so that people outside of fandom realize that it isn't like the movie Trekies.

I definitely need to meet me some fans, then

To be honest, the phrasing I've often used is "jumping off an asteroid"... so sure that there won't be anything to catch me. But, there always is... be it friends, or work, or just playing with my computers.
And yeah, the Christmas analogy is very apt as well, I've been there a few times myself, and usually end up freaking out either myself or the guy I'm with.
I still stick by the "all in due time" thing, even when my bi friends 5 years younger than me are getting married :)

Love is bright and terrible and if you've got it all that can be done is to throw yourself over the edge and hope that there will be wings on the way down. That is perhaps a bit too dramatic a way of putting it...

No, I don't think that's too dramatic a way to put it at all. I think that's a near perfect way of putting it actually.

Thank you!

"The trick, William Potter," remarks Lawrence with amusement, "is not minding that it hurts."

There are worse things than disappointment and rejection. Living eternally in crush-world is one of those things. It's one of those brain-damagingly comfortable places that is based entirely on fear and fantasy. Nothing will ruin your life faster than that. Or rather, nothing will ruin your life more slowly and steadily and permanently than not facing up to the fear of rejection, and building an entire edifice of fantasy that has never been tested against other people.

So - get out there and bash up against a few crushes. Smash 'em to bits. Find the bits you like, appreciate them for what they are.

It's hard to watch you go through this but I do hope you'll throw yourself off that cliff a few times. It's easier in the long run. It's one of those things that eventually lands you a mate with whom you can have a laugh about the bad old days, and say "Hey, remember that time we both jumped off the cliff?"

Which is priceless, I'll admit. Start jumping.

On Fancying People and Love

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

I'd have to agree...

no subject

no subject

no subject