Chapter 0 : Are You Even Ready to Date?
Dating is not an ancient art. Before dating, we use the word courtship to describe a blooming relationship between a man and a woman. But courtship intends that men are actively searching for a bride, while women wait patiently for a man to sweep them off their feet. In the modern world, both men and women are active participants in the game of love. From the point of view of men, dating is a very old ritual. But for women, to be allowed to see/date many people, have more than one relationship in their lives, THAT is brand new! And the rules of the game are always changing! So, in a world where everybody can date anybody, what is a gay girl supposed to do? There are no historical references to explain how courtship between two girls works, no ancient texts to give guidelines. Dating girls kind of feels like you are playing a game of cards, but there are also dice involved in this game, and a board where you have to move your peg around. You also have to do charades and fight over a wood figurine, and if you don’t knock twice on the floor before your last turn, you lost. If this board game I just described is confusing you, you must be close to feeling what I feel every day of my life.
So I’ll make my own rule book for this confusing game!
But before we start the game, you need to make sure you are ready to play. If you still call your ex “that stupid girl who broke my heart and stole a bunch of my stuff,” my guess is that you are not ready to date. Same for all of you out there who still cry over their exes, who keep cute pictures of them in their phone to look at when you miss them, who named their cat by their exes name: Not ready to date!
Let’s not kid ourselves, for your exes you’ll probably always feel a bunch of confusing feelings. It’s not like you have to self-induce amnesia to be ready to date someone else! You’re allowed to keep souvenirs from past relationships, whether they are pictures, little tokens of your first few dates, clothes you bought with them (but not their clothes that you kept, that’s weird!). You are allowed to have feelings for your exes, as long as they are not romantic ones. A little anger, a little love and affection, a lukewarm feeling of joy and sadness when you think back to all the good times you two had. But if you can think of a girl you used to date without feeling this soft ache in your heart, my guess is you are ready for someone new.
Because there will always be someone new, someone else, another one. There is never just a one for everyone. There are a bunch of ones, just at different times. Maybe the last person you dated was the right one during that moment of your life, it was the person you needed to meet in order to grow. Maybe being with this person made you who you needed to be in order to meet the next girl! At least that’s how I like to think about it. Now you just have to find her, this next girl. Let the games begin! (and may the odds be in your favor.)
Images obtained from:
https://www.google.ca/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja…
https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5575f3cfe4b019b0586d6c91/5577c9fd…