In Memorandum of Serial Dating

I haven't blogged in about two months, and in the past two months, I've probably gone through more insane crap than I've experienced in a five year window at any other given point in my life. Well, that's not true. Anyway, I am about as anal as a person can be without being locked up in the looney bin, and with that being said, I am a big fan of order. I like systematizing things and keeping everything alphabetized, color coded, chronological, size-distributed, etc. So, the deal is, my grandfather died in mid-February, and I wrote about his death and how I was processing my feelings of loss. I was dreading posting my entry because I did not want to revisit that sense of grief, and I was burned out on crying. I hate to cry. I hate that raw, salty feeling and having a sense of heavy emptiness. I'd rather slam the refrigerator door on my skull than cry. Now, let me differentiate. There is a huge difference between pity-party crying and crying because you are broken hearted. It's okay to have a pity-party cry. For instance, if you have a raging case of PMS, and you feel fat and ugly and zitty, and then someone says something to you like,

"Rachel, why does your hair look like Cruella Deville?"

and at any other point in your month, you'd say,

"Shut up, beeyoch, or I'll shank you in the baby-maker,"

but today, your life is so screwy and chemically imbalanced that you feel like you could throw up, a little pity-party cry is kind of therapeutic. Sadly, I don't often have this luxury- normally I just get really mad and want to shove my fist through the wall, but you get my point. Heartbreak crying is the worst crying of all. Those deep, heaving sobs, where you physically feel like the ground can't support your weight, and every time you think of any memory you fall apart again- that's the worst kind of cry.

So anyway, I say all of this to say that I have not been ready to post about losing my PawPaw. It was, by far, the toughest thing I have had to work through since I have lived in Los Angeles, and I have avoided posting what I wrote about his death. Back to being anal: I have not wanted to post anything without first posting about him, but then I decided, I'll go ahead and write out of order anyway. Who cares. My chronology will be all whack, but this is good therapy for me. Rachel, let's first accommodate, than maintain. This is the first step to recovery. Moving on.

I have stopped serial dating, hence the title of my blog. I feel like this is paramount in my life. Reasons regarding ditching serial dating: Numero uno, I don't have the time. I got the job that I wanted, and I am crazy about it. It's a great gig. If only I could write about my encounters with clients. Sigh. There are only a few bad things about having a helping-professions job, and one of them is this ethical standard of keeping peoples' business private. So, though I'm not bound to confidentiality, I still think that it'd be pretty crappy of me to disclose a few scenarios that I have found HILARIOUS, but trust me, no matter what profession you engage in, my job is way, way, way, more bizarre and funny than yours. Trust me.

With that being said, back to being a retired serial dater. Because I work a 40 hour week and take 3 graduate courses, I simply don't have the time to date multiple people and keep all of their stories straight. Now before you go assuming that I am a hoe, let me specify. I am an extremely proactive person. I always have a 5-year window of tentative plans that I intend on accomplishing. My PawPaw Haley is like this, too. He always has a project. I talked to him last week, and he was painting a little fence that he built to hide his generator. Mind you, this is a man in his mid 80's worried about the aesthetics of his front yard. He said,

"I ain't even put the first lick of paint on it yet."

I do not know what this means, but anyway, we had a nice little talk about how we like to always be working towards something. Back to proactivity. I have always thought that online dating was weird, but then I moved out here and got on a site. My reasons for doing this were:

A) I wanted to date around, because I had never just "dated" before. I didn't really date until my senior year of high school, and I had two or three serious (lame sauce) boyfriends through college/early career endeavors (Before I became the seasoned and wise 24 year old that I am today, of course).

B) I wanted to meet people.

C) Uh, online dating stories = HILARIOUS.

D) I had a wing woman who was fully willing to participate in my endeavors to meet crazies and to laugh her head off with me while we discussed how totally awkward our dates were.

E) I figured that online dating was a proactive way to jump start my new serial dating plans.

Anyway, because I have retired, I deleted my profile a while ago, but I decided to copy and paste the content, just to show you my screening process/evil mastermind plans for my online dating candidates. Here we go:

"Your mom will love me.

About Me

Hugs are underrated.
Professional booty dancer.
I refuse to be the big spoon.
I drink coffee black and completely disrespect men who use cream, sugar, & flavor.
I abhor mayonnaise.
Jesus is first.
I eat chunky peanut butter right out of the jar.
I am in love with Halo 3 and Rockband.
I will never drink beer out of the bottle. EVER.
I have not seen my natural hair color since 6th grade and do not care to do so.
I do not wear open toed shoes unless my toenails are painted.
I will be in school for at least 5 more years.
I hate codependency.
Frozen yogurt junky.
Avid reader.
Enjoyer of sushi.
Lover of clever humor.

Please do not contact me unless you have your crap together, are taller than me, have all of your teeth, and are respectful. If you are a serial killer, please do not contact me. If you are a man whore, please do not contact me. If you do not know how to properly use: they’re, their, there, two, too, to, your, & you’re, please do not contact me. Non smokers only. Please be educated. Imperative: open my doors. Chew with your mouth closed. Be old school. Optional perks: glasses, boat shoes, 5 o'clock shadow, nice head of hair, no extra body hair (ew), 6’3” and up, college graduate (at LEAST), have a real job, be nice to your mom, take your vitamins.

First Date
First dates are always weird, so movies are definitely ruled out. Sitting in a dark theater with someone you've never met AND no opportunity for convo exchange? Sounds like the recipe for suicide. I don't want to go to your house on the first date, nor do I want to make out with you. I just want to go someplace chill, get to know each other, and if things go poorly, I will shank you.

Oh yes, and I normally do not go on a first date without my wing woman, Robin. She and I meet up with you and your hot friend (fill in the blank __________) for drinks, then we determine whether or not you are serial rapists, then if things go well, you and I can go on a follow up solo date."

And this ends my online dating profile. If you come off as a hard-ace right off the bat, you eliminate the wimps. Plus, if you get a response e-mail with "Your to cool," then you know he clearly did not understand your spelling rules, and he's elimidated, too.

Anyway, I only went out with two different online guys, and one of them was so bad that I probably should have deleted my profile then and there, but once again, the situation was so awkward and hilarious that I actually went out with one more person. Guy numero uno was about 5 feet tall, had gray hair, and breath so bad that I almost passed out (thank you, wing woman, for being there to double with me). His profile picture looked NOTHING like him, he had no social skills, and the guy he brought with him to double with my wing woman absolutely hated my guts. He tried to verbally assault me every five seconds. The other guy I went out with was actually cool and we're still friends. So that's it for my online dating reminiscing. I am officially hanging up my serial dating shoes. Goodbye, plentoffish.com. Goodbye, multiple L.A. douche bag guys. It was real.