New

I was thinking some more about this whole dating thing and the weirdness I'm going through going on these dates with these strangers.

Staring at the ceiling in bed the other night waiting for my brain to switch off, I realized something. With the exception of my first few relationships, I've always had a pattern. Not that the pattern is anything I'm proud of but at the time it's what worked for me.

When I think back on the great majority of my relationships I'd meet the guy (usually in some group setting where he was a friend of a friend kind of thing) and we'd click and hit it off that night. From there, we'd usually make plans to meet up solo a few days later and, well, then we'd usually end up sleeping together within a date or two.

As I've said, I'm not proud of this or condoning it but it is what it is.

And when you realize that my last three or four relationships were all variations of long distance relationships, things get skewed again. Because long distance relationships are all about intensity and being together when you are together and then longing for each other when you're not.

So fast forward to now and I think I can fairly say I've never done this before. I don't know the protocol, I have no history to refer back to.

I've met a few guys over the past year or so for a date, maybe two and then my brain starts messing with me and playing tricks and wondering when they might call or if or why or what it all meant. Because,usually, once I've met the guy, we're together.

Sex'll do that to two people.

So my previous relationships have (not including the first two, one of which was during high school and the other during my first year of University) gone like this:

1. We meet
2. We click
3. We have sex
4. We're a couple

Which means I have basically no experience with dating.

Even with the relationships where I didn't sleep with them right away (or at all as the high school case may be, I was a sweetheart of a girl at one point after all) we didn't date because we were just around each other all the time and our social group was shared. So I don't have an understanding or any practice in this area.

I haven't really gone through the "just hang out" phase or the "hang out a few times and then kiss" phase or the "I don't even know what to call it because I haven't done it" phase.

So when my brain gets all "bleargh, person X from last week's date hasn't called or person Y from the site hasn't messaged me back" I have nothing to fall back on and say "meh, no biggie, it's just part of the dating process; part of the getting to know you process."

I'm kind of relieved to have realized this because it means that my freaking out isn't so much because I'm insane and more because I'm going through something that's completely new to me and lacking a reference point means I'm figuring it all out for the first time when the people around me all have experience and and understanding of the process that I missed out on.

And no, I know it's not that simple and yes dating is confusing and complicated and no one really understands it but imagine it like this. . . yes I've been in a car before. But I've always had someone else driving for me and I just thought that that was how it worked. You got in the car and the driver took you where you wanted to go. Now I'm in a car again and I'm supposed to get somewhere, but there's no driver and I'm supposed to drive myself and I'm a little overwhelmed and confused by the whole thing and I'm pretty sure I can drive, but everyone else seems to be assuming I know what I'm doing when the truth is I can't even find the thing to turn on the wipers.

That's me and this whole dating people you don't know and also not sleeping with them thing. It's new.

I guess I just really do have to keep practicing and learning and easing into it.

Maybe I should stick an "L" plate on my back just to be on the safe side.