Music/Retail/Cleaning Therapy

When I need to think I usually do one of three things.

1) I shop. Usually when I shop to think, I have to shop alone. I will wander from store to store letting my mind work out my problems. I have no idea why it works but it does. I think it's something about being alone in a place with chaotic activity. It forces my mind to focus. There is also the process of looking for a particular object - say a new skirt - that gives my mind a primary purpose. So while I am looking for a particular item, my subconscious is working through whatever is bothering me.

2) I play my violin. I have never been one of those musicians that can count in her head and really focus on the intricacies of the notes. I tend to learn the rhythm by ear so that I can think about other things while I play. There is a reason that Joshua Bell is Joshua Bell and I work in fundraising. However, practicing is very therapeutic for me. While I am playing various songs, I can think through my problems. If I am upset, I tend to play sad or angry music. The emotion of the music allows me to vent my frustration. Usually by the time I am exhausted, I've played for a couple of hours and I feel a little better. Or at that point, I'm so tired that I no longer care about whatever was bothering me. Either way, I have a respite from my problems.

3) I clean. I am not talking about regular cleaning like washing the floor or dusting. I full on reorganize my life. I will take everything out of my pantry and put it all back in a different order - something that I have deemed more efficient. I will go through all of my clothes and ruthlessly decide to get rid of things. I think this works because it mirrors the problem solving process. At first there is chaos (because the contents of my closet are now all over my bed). Then there is a plan of attack (how do I want to put things back in my closet). This is followed by calculated elimination (keep, dump, and Goodwill piles). And in the end there is a new order (fully organized closet!).

Lately I have had a lot on my mind. I have been playing my violin like crazy, which is good because I had not picked it up in over a year. I'm rusty, but I'm getting a bit better. I have been doing a ton of shopping. This is not so good for my bank balance, but I do have a lot of really cute new clothes now. When you get compliments from strangers, you know it was a successful purchase! This weekend, I am feeling a closet reorganizing cleanse coming on. Hopefully once that is complete, my mind will be fully at peace and all my problems will be solved. If that does not happen, I can always head for the mall. . .

Sad Songs

Sometimes I am in the mood to listen to sad songs. I actually have a special list on my IPod just for them. I know that sounds a little crazy but there are times that I just need to give in to sadness, nostalgia, etc. Usually I will watch a sad movie or listen to some sad songs and then I'm over it.

Anyway, I was listening to my sad songs list today at work. Whenever I listen to this playlist, I always get stuck on "I Can't Make You Love Me" by Bonnie Raitt. It tops my list of the most wistful and sad songs. There is something so powerful about the story - a woman who knows that no matter how much she loves this man she cannot make him love her back. And that their relationship has come to an end.

Bonnie Raitt has such emotion when she sings this song. I can feel the sorrow pouring out of her. If you haven't heard the song in awhile, watch the attached video. You'll see what I mean.

Dating and Tequila

I went out for drinks on Monday night and had the most interesting conversation. We went to Alero in Dupont which has been the site of many an interesting conversation. I blame it on the strength of the margaritas. I swear they must pour half a bottle of tequila in them. I drank 1 and was lightheaded and then my friend ordered me another and my head started to spin. I could not even finish it.

One of the women that I was with is going through a miserable divorce. I feel terrible for her. I cannot imagine what that must be like. She is really handling it well though and is already thinking about dating again. She was asking me for dating advice. Anyone who knows me knows that is an hysterical concept. I was talking to her about online dating, and I'm pretty sure that I scared her off. It did not help that my one friend told her that she should look at men in their 60s and 70s because men in their 40s want 20 year-olds. She does have a point as I get matched online with many men in their 40s. But that does beg the question that if men in their 40s want to date 20 year-olds, what does that mean for men in their 30s or 20s? Hard to imagine that they all want jailbait.

My soon-to-be-dating friend was not so excited about this prospect. I get where she is coming from. It's hard to date someone who is a generation older than you. I know it works for some people, but I have often found it to be confusing. I once dated a guy who was 11 years older than me. That was a bit of a stretch. It became awkward when he would talk about things he did in college and I realized that I was only in elementary school at the time.

I find it really hard to date and I am childless. I cannot imagine how tough it would be to date with two small kids at home as well. However after a few drinks, I think my friend was starting to cheer up. We even defriended her soon-to-be-ex-husband from her Facebook account while we were at the table. That was a big step for her.

Ironically, I followed this evening up with a "phone date" with a guy who is in his 40s. Let's just say it was one of the most awkward conversations of all time. It's hard to talk to someone on the phone who you have never met. Small talk is much easier when you can discuss something that you are both observing in a restaurant or something. I was thinking that I should pass this guy's number along to my soon-to-be-divorced friend. They may be a better fit. However, maybe she is too "old" for him being in her 30s and all. . .

Decisions Decisions

Over the past few weeks, I've had a lot of conversations about relationships. I've had conversations with friends, family, co-workers, and even clients! These conversations have really got me thinking about how I make decisions and what I really want out of life.

I always knew that no matter how much advice you give someone, they are always going to do what they want to do in the end. If your advice follows their path - great for you. If not, then you may lose a friend in the long run. I don't believe in losing friends over disagreements. Everyone is entitled to their opinions, and I just need to accept that. The harder lesson for me to learn is that if everyone is telling me to do one thing and I really want to do the opposite - that's ok as it is my life. That's a lesson that I had to learn the hard way once before, but I seem to be learning it again now.

I also think that decisions are harder to make when you are battling not only the opinions of your friends and family but also your own reason. I hate having internal battles. When my head says one thing and my heart and instinct say another. Usually I go with my gut instinct as I can tend to over think things. However it's hard to know that if I follow my instinct and things get screwed up, I only have myself to blame because I KNEW what I was getting into. It's much easier to face bad experiences when you can blame someone else or claim ignorance. Much harder when you have to own up to making a consciously bad decision.

Ok, this definitely means that said decision is a bad one. What if it is the right decision and you do not make it because of fear? I would hate to think that I would make a safe decision and then miss out on something great. That's always an internal struggle with me. I was raised to be responsible and practical, but sometimes I wonder if I am missing out on great things in life because of this attitude. What if I am supposed to throw caution to the wind and take the leap? What if instead of falling into an abyss, I find something wonderful?

It's such a risk to take, but maybe it's time to stop playing it safe.

Entertainment Weekly Got It Wrong!

EW.com recently put out a list of the 25 most romantic movies. I think that this list is crap. I mean how is it possible that Doctor Zhivago would NOT be on a list of the most romantic movies? Simply impossible.

So in response I am creating my own list. I only kept 5 from the original EW list. I put stars next to those.





1. Doctor Zhivago
2. Persuasion
3. The Way We Were
4. Out of Africa*
5. Sense and Sensibility
6. Love with a Proper Stranger
7. Love Story
8. Splendor in the Grass
9. Pretty Woman*
10. Painted Veil
11. Roman Holiday
12. West Side Story
13. Gigi
14. Firelight
15. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind*
16. Dirty Dancing*
17. Three Coins in the Fountain
18. Long Hot Summer
19. Indochine
20. Pride and Prejudice
21. English Patient*
22. Sweet Home Alabama
23. Atonement
24. Two Weeks Notice
25. Walk to Remember

Jennifer Weiner

I really think that Jennifer Weiner might be the coolest person on the planet. She is so funny and self-confident. I really admire her for just being who she is and not apologizing for it. That's just awesome.

During the booksigning tonight, she said some of the funniest things. I'm going to paraphrase a few of my favorite quotes. As you can tell from these quotes, she's truly a typical woman. Listening to her was like chatting with my girlfriends.

1. JDate is the place for the unchosen chosen people.

2. I decided that the fate of the entire publishing industry is on the shoulders of Dan Brown.

3. In these troubling economic times, people want porn, romance, and happy endings.

4. I told my publisher that my new book cover looks like a douche ad.

5. My best friend Susan dated a guy named Ian from Montreal. It was a bad break-up. She now hates not only Ian but the city of Montreal and the entire country of Canada.

6. Google was invented so that I could check up on my ex-boyfriends.

7. While buying a gift from a wedding registry, I immediately searched the registry for all of my ex-boyfriends and one popped up. I called my friend and said "he's getting married. How can this be?" And she said "Jenn, he's registered for an acrylic chip and dip dish. You could be eating guacamole off of acrylic. You made a lucky escape."

YAY! I got an award.

My awesome friend April gave my new blog an award. I'll take that as a vote of confidence that I should continue! I have no one to pass this award on to yet as April's is the only blog that I read so I'll just say thank you.

According to the rules of the award, I now have to share 10 random things about myself. Here I go!

1. I love sunsets.

2. I'd rather listen than talk.

3. My favorite color is yellow.

4. I love big band music.

5. I'm addicted to online shopping.

6. I think the mob is kind of cool.

7. I really want to go to Egypt.

8. I hate the zoo.

9. I buy vitamins and take them for a week and then forget about them.

10. One day I want to own a Maserati.

Taking the Emotion Out of Marriage

Yesterday, my parents celebrated 34 years of marriage. In this day and age, that seems like quite a feat. I'm sure it hasn't always been easy and that there were times that they wanted to call it quits, but they managed to work through it.

My experiences with my parents' marriage as well as the successful ones of some of my friends make this article that I read today seem hilarious. They have reduced the success rate of marriage to a blend of statistics. Blaming things like whether or not they are poor, drink, smoke, have children, etc as the sole reason for divorce.

I am not denying that these things will have an impact on whether or not a couple will stay together. But, it seems to me that it would be an amalgam of factors that would lead to the demise of a marriage. It's easy to point a finger and say "well he was divorced before so therefore our marriage was doomed from the start." It's much harder to look at all of the factors that make up a relationship to figure out where things went wrong. Did the couple talk to one another? Were they honest with one another? Were they faithful? Was one of them verbally or physically abusive? Did each person contribute equally to the relationship? I'm sure that these are all underlying factors.

I mean if a person gets divorced just because their partner had kids prior to their marriage, then they probably should not have gotten married to begin with. . .

Billy Joel and Elton John

In honor of the AMAZING Billy Joel & Elton John Concert that I went to yesterday. I've decided to post a list of my favorite Billy Joel songs. Elton songs will come another day.

I pretty much love them all, but if I could only listen to 10 for the rest of my life. These would be it.

1. All About Soul
2. Keeping the Faith
3. Matter of Trust
4. My Life
5. Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)
6. It's Still Rock and Roll to Me
7. Piano Man
8. Innocent Man
9. River of Dreams
10. Scenes from an Italian Restaurant

Why I Love The Way We Were

The Way We Were has to be one of the best movies ever made. Barbara Streisand and Robert Redford falling in love and then realizing that their love cannot survive because of outside factors. It's just the greatest. I could watch Barbara Streisand brush the hair off of Robert Redford's forehead over and over again. I mean it's such an iconic moment that they wrote and entire Sex and the City episode about it!

However, there are many reasons why I feel that I should not worship this movie like I do. For instance, Robert Redford's character Hubbell (whom I adore) is a total ass in this movie. His character is so weak that he cannot handle the strength of Barbara Streisand's Katie. She is too strong for him and makes him realize his own weakness. He also decides that instead of working things out with his wife - he's just going to have an affair with his old girlfriend. I HATE when people take the easy way out of relationships. So not cool. Especially when your wife is pregnant with your daughter - whom you abandon because you cannot handle seeing her mother anymore. So pathetic but yet I still love him.

And why I still love him is because Katie is flawed too. She pushes him to be something that he is not, never was, and never wants to be. She knows this about him and she doesn't care. She just continues to push because that is her nature. In the end, she ends up hurt partly because I think that she realizes that she had a strong hand in the entire situation.

It does not matter how many times I see this movie. I always want the ending to be different and for these two characters to realize that they can work things out and stay together. It's like watching Romeo and Juliet - I always want that ending to be different too but it's never going to happen. So I continue to watch The Way We Were time and again always sad at the end but always blissfully happy to have spent 2 hours with these characters.

Not in the Mood to Read

Ever since I was a kid, I have loved to read. However, lately I have no desire to pick up a book. Even on the metro, I would rather sit and stare into the distance than read. WHAT IS UP WITH THAT?!?! It's really disturbing to me especially since I have a ton of books to read. I buy books all the time. I cannot resist a bookstore. They suck me in. I'm pretty much physically incapable of going into a bookstore without purchasing something. I feel guilty for leaving the books behind. It's slightly crazy I know, but hey, that's me.

Maybe the booksigning that I am going to on Thursday will jumpstart my interest again. It's Jennifer Weiner so what's not to love!

So after talking about if for weeks, I've finally decided to start a blog. I've never done this before so please bear with me.

Originally, I had thought that this blog would be about my adventures in online dating. I will probably still post about this because I have many funny stories that I can share. For example the date that lasted 25 minutes, the date where the guy picked a place that was closed, and over-sharer guy. Trust me - I have been on my fair share of bad first dates. In retrospect, I'm convinced that going through all of these bad experiences will help me to better appreciate the good ones. I mean you do have to kiss a lot of frogs. . .

Anyway, I have decided to expand this blog to include anything that is on my mind. Dangerous road may be ahead so stay tuned!