Dear heavens, I feel as though my throat, lungs and chest have been passed over with a cheese grater. I’m used to short, intense bursts of energy, but 30 damn minutes at about 10mph just friggin slaughtered me. I’m not sure if that is a good pace, or a wimpy pace, but it was pretty much a killer pace for me, and that’s all I really need to know.
But enough about that – right now I got a gajillion other things on my mind. Primarily: This girlfriend I have is sweet, super intelligent, really a quality person . . . but I am starting to realize that . . . it just isn’t going to last. Which should come as no surprise, really, since every relationship anyone has ever been in has ended in either a break-up or a death, and if I have to choose between the two, break-ups are much easier to explain to mutual friends. What I don’t understand is why I seem to go into every relationship thinking that this one will be “the one” in which we magically sail off into the sunset. Somehow it always catches me by surprise when I find that this girl is, in fact, not the fucking complete package – the perfect- in-every-way woman. You would think I would have learned by now that every relationship is certainly going to be flawed, (I mean, hell, I’m involved in it, so it’s bound to be fucked-up to some degree,) is going to require some work, and most likely will be, to a greater or lesser degree, temporary.
I’m ready to do the work – I know we will fight and have difficulties, but I guess I am not yet prepared to accept that every girl is most likely just a temporary stop along the way, and I cannot figure out if that is a good thing or a bad thing. It seems as though it would be taking my cynicism to new heights to just acknowledge to myself at the outset that this girl is probably just a temporary harbor from the storm, (no need to continue with the “docking” metaphor, is there?) and sooner or later I’ll be moving on. In a way I appreciate the naivete with which I approach the relationships, and the fact that I am actually looking at them for long-term potential, but maybe I am just being dishonest with myself.
On the upside, as a result of my approaching it with an eye to the long-term, I really do fall for these chicks – but perhaps that is part of the problem. Perhaps by going in “hoping for the best” I allow the swirl of emotions to cloud my judgement, and thus am taken by surprise when deal-breakers pop up. I also have to wonder to what extent I actually allow myself to fall for them because the “swirl of emotions” in me tends to have a positive effect on them – so maybe in the end it is just all cynical manipulation on my part anyway.
The previous girlfriend had a lot going for her – she was extremely sweet and caring, and very, very attached, and AMAN TANRIM did this girl get turned on when you took out a camera. Tall, good looking, amazing body (did ballet for 16 years, till she got too tall) – an ass I could stare at all day – and did, in fact. She had gorgeous silky long black hair, lived in high-heels and was always perfectly turned out: weekly manicures, waxes, whatevers, the whole 9 yards. And then she asked me if India was close to Brazil. And slowly, what emerged was the fact that her grasp of economics, philosophy, art, biology, fuck- you-name-it, if it wasn’t within her very circumscribed experience, it was a bleeding mystery to her. In fashion, style, femininity, and social charm, however, she had a fucking black-belt.
I am not sure, even at this remove, if I am being fair to her. I mean – to what degree am I cognizant of the ins and outs of office politics in the magazine publishing division of Turkish media conglomerates? Hell, to what degree am I cognizant of ANYTHING of practical value? Not much, I suppose, if we want to be honest. I guess my very circumscribed experience just happens to include an ass-load of books and articles on world politics, literature, art and history, and I (for no doubt unjustifiably self-centered reasons,) tend to favor my set of knowledge over hers. Cultural imperialism? Mebbe. Classism? Mebbe. Inevitable? ‘Fraid so.
There was, in fact, one other problematic detail – she had a disturbing habit of tracking my eyes, and making sure to register every other woman I looked at. This by itself is nothing really, but if you have ever been in a relationship with a jealous person, you start to see the signs early. And it was not long before she started asking odd questions, and poking about in a jealous manner.
So she was served notice some time ago that . . . well . . . I put it as kindly as I could . . . that I was not really in love with her. But she kept coming around, (even the most repugnant boys are difficult for a girl to get over once they have fallen for them, and I am not the most repugnant,) until I told her I had met someone new.
And had I ever. We met at a book club (auspicious beginning, yes?) and she worked for a group who advised governments on ways to promote transparency in public policy. She had done a year at Harvard, and was in the dissertation stage of getting her Ph.D from one of the more prestigious schools in Turkey. So whereas the previous girlfriend didn’t know who Khaddafi was, or Mubarak, or how long he had been in power or whether or not he was generally viewed as irredeemably corrupt, or . . . nevermind . . . the new young lady could tell you offhand the number of gas pipelines coming out of Russia into Europe, and how the proposed new pipelines could affect former soviet-bloc countries. So whereas the last young lady had spent business dinners on the phone with me so that visiting foreigners wouldn’t figure out how little English she spoke, the new young lady travelled to Tanzania, Ukraine, India, Thailand, the Czech Republic, etc, to give speeches on development. Let’s just say the difference in conversations we could have were notable.
Yet – what is lacking? Oh, dear – I have to confess – I’m afraid animal vibes are what’s missing now. When I smell her neck . . . I am simply not overcome with a desire to fuck her. There’s nothing wrong with her physically – she’s quite fit – used to be a swimmer – nice ass – fucks with conviction – but . . . we just don’t have animal chemistry. I’d rather cuddle and watch a movie than fuck. And what am I to do about that? I mean – for the first time in my life, I am wishing we had just stayed friends, because now I have to break up with someone who I really, really like talking to.
I determined a couple of years ago that if I got married again, I wanted one who was drop-dead gorgeous, as well as intellectually interesting. (Go ahead, snort in your coffee, and say “well, don’t we all.” Fuck you – you aren’t me, bitch. Sit back and watch. But I digress.) So I decided there were two directions one could take to arrive at this end: 1. Start photographing models, and sort your way through to the smart ones, and shop one of those. 2. Start chatting your way through the academics until you hit a hottie, and take her home.
As a result, I spent a week or so last year in Ukraine, photographing models, (this one goes under the name Alissa White – don’t look her up on google images with a low filter setting if you got excitable young males in the room,) and I joined a book club. So far, things aren’t working out too badly – but it looks like it’s time to pick up the camera again.
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