Dear Cary,
I've spent the past six years of my life with a wonderful man who is educated, caring, wonderfully attentive, incredibly expressive, and who happens to be a good fuck. I know of people who would be willing to settle with someone who possesses any one of his traits, but that seems to be what's hounding me, that word "settle." Years ago, before knowing this prince, I embarked on an infinite and fruitless number of dates with ogres, fiends, frogs and prince-posers. I met him in a period of my life where the prospect of spending my 30s as a dejected, jaded dog was slowly becoming a reality. I did not want to be that lonely man, the kind who spends just a tad too much time contemplating the latest selection of ice cream at Safeway. I wanted passion in my life. I needed stability. And when I met him, my dreams were fulfilled 50 percent.
My parents love my mate, and my nieces and nephews are crazy about him (they call him "uncle"). My friends all think that I am lucky to be with such a person (they're all single), and when I broke off with him once, my father cried. It only took 12 hours for me to call my boyfriend back, begging for forgiveness and a second chance. Afterward, I felt like a lying schmuck, because what really guided my hand to dial the digits was not wanting to waste the three years we were together. And that I would be alone again in the world while someone else gets to have this wonderful guy.
He's a psychotherapist by profession, and I know that I can talk to him about anything. Yet I dread having a talk with him since I'm not sure what outcome I'm hoping to come from it, or what I even want to talk about. When he cuddles me in his arm and kisses me tenderly I feel that I am home and secure as a bug. I've learned to adore him through all these years and I can picture myself being with him for the rest of my life. But that seems so final and long, and the thought that I was never really swept off my feet when I first met him haunts me daily. Sometimes I feel that maybe it's me, that I wouldn't know love if it tagged me on the forehead. Or if it sprouted slowly in my backyard. What do you think is wrong with me?
Kinda Confused
Dear Kinda Confused,
What I think is wrong with you is that you think something is wrong with you. If something were truly wrong with you, you'd have bruises or burn scars and there would be a police report. You'd feel like killing yourself; you'd have no shoes; you'd be sleeping on a cot at the Salvation Army; you'd be penniless and on the street; your family would have deserted you or your lover would have betrayed you; you'd have a gun in your mouth, or you'd be in prison, or you'd have jumped out a window. You would not be hinting around that something might be wrong but you don't know exactly what it might be.
You don't have problems, so much as unanswerable questions. Why you weren't swept off your feet is an unanswerable question. It's not a dumb question; it's understandable that you ask it. But there's probably no concrete, complete answer, and, anyway, it doesn't need to be answered in order for you to be happy. I think if you knew it was OK to not be swept off your feet, then you could just stop asking the question. So try replacing those doubts about why you were never swept off your feet with the affirmative knowledge that it is OK for your love to take the form it has taken.
I know it sounds a little trite; I wouldn't say it except that the alternative is so destructive. What if you threw off what you have, tore asunder the fine bonds of family you have worked hard to form, dashed the hopes of the one who has been constant and true, and had a big garage sale? When you emerged no richer, no younger, no thinner, no better-looking and with quite a few dishes missing, would you have improved your chances of being swept off your feet by a new man with all the qualities of your current lover plus the added bonus of his off-the-feet-sweeping ability?
Not likely. In your mind there may be a storybook romance that you feel you could have if you only weren't stuck in the romance you're in. But the romance you're in sounds remarkably lifelike. That makes it better than anything in a storybook, we being, after all, remarkably lifelike humans and not characters in a book.
You're a lucky guy and you've got a good thing. Cherish it. If you really think about how good you've got it, you might jump for joy; you might even get carried away and sweep yourself off your own feet.
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