I just had lunch with two friends I usually enjoy.
Out of nowhere, they started giving me advice. It went thusly:
Marriage is hard. A lot of people just keep looking around for the perfect person. He isn’t going to come. It’s OK. I understand. We all have an idea of our perfect person, especially little girls, but he isn’t there. You don’t get to evolve like this until you make a commitment, if you just walk away, saying, no, you aren’t exactly what I want, you’ll never have this. I have another friend like that. She has a fear of commitment. … I’m so happy now. I never thought I could be so happy. I’m just happy and peaceful.
I hadn’t been saying a word, so I finally said, “Are you giving me advice?”
Then they started talking about OTHER people they know who, like me, are single. Prognosis: Fear of commitment.
Ahhhh… the worst part about this is that it was aprapo of nothing. I hadn’t been talking about dating. The only time I would think it would be appropriate to get this kind of advice is if I had just said:
A. I really want to get married.
B. I’m dating this wonderful man who I love being around, I trust his character, I know he’s a good person. We both have the same goals in life and
C. He wants to marry me. but
D. He’s not blond and blue eyed like I always pictured and he doesn’t play tennis or golf so I’m thinking of dumping him.
I need all of the above type of statements to be true to ever have need of the type of advice I got today. Frankly, I don’t think I will EVER need that advice! Oh, that I had need of it!
It reminded me of something John Bytheway said at a talk I went to once. He said he got a lot of advice about being too picky and he said, it’s kind of like people asking, “Why aren’t you playing that duet?” He said: well a duet requires two people to play and someone, of their own free will, has to choose to sit here and play with me.
It really sucks to sit at a piano bench alone and get advice about how to play a duet.
He also said something that may help soothe my inner savage beast today. He said, don’t let those people get to you. The same people with an “underdeveloped sense of appropriateness” who are bugging you about getting married now will be bugging you about having children later.
“Underdeveloped sense of appropriateness.” I love that.
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