Oh my it feels good to be back among the living!

First, I want to say thank you to all those who responded to my questions in the previous post. I had hit a lonely rough spot there for a sec & hearing your stories revived my belief in the possibilities I had begun to doubt. With each of your experiences I gained a better perspective on what real life looks like when in a long term relationship, & you helped me understand what it takes. I love my community of readers, your support keeps me hopeful as I search for love ~ thank you for being open & having the willingness to share your stories!

You may have noticed I’ve been quiet for a bit (or maybe not), but I’m back & feeling chatty! So a lil catch up ~ I got a fun opportunity back in May to work on a zombie movie, which was a genre I had never done before & I jumped at the chance. The first thing I learned Zombies = Nights (& lots of them)! So with accepting this job I knew I’d be giving up dating (& it turns out socializing in general) for a couple of months, but I figured it’d be a great Summer gig, meeting new people & I could practice my flirting skills with a whole new crew in the meantime.

With the post-wrap glow, I can say shoot ended up being a pretty great experience. Sure, we had our challenging days, endless hours under the moon & moments of questioning our choices in life, but when it came down to it we were creating something fun & doing it with cool people! And luckily for me, the crew did include a bunch of handsome, interesting men for me to get to know & while most were married or had a girlfriend, it was fun being reminded there are great quality guys in L.A.

I also learned quite a bit about myself during this shoot, here’s just a few of my revelations

• While I consider myself a “night” person, turns out I’m not a “wee hours in the a.m.” kind of gal, the smile fades & I get very quiet, but then the sunrises & I’m back!
• All willpower I may have at the beginning of the day when visiting the craft services table goes out the window at 1a.m. – in the battle of carrot vs. chocolate, chocolate always wins, especially if in the form of a cookie. I became a total cookie monster!
• When I get tired (usually hitting bout 3:30-4a), I wanna snuggle. I’d feel this real need to be close to somebody, something & hug. I’d find myself leaning in to the Prop guy (my set “boyfriend”) for human contact, or putting my arms around the metal C-stands when just about anything would do to snuggle with. Curling up in my chair with an extra hoodie soothed the urge at times & added warmth too…
• It turns out I’m verrrrry territorial over my personal workspace & when it gets invaded with complete disregard I flip out! My set partner could only just laugh at me, repeatedly. It worries me a lil how I’ll react if/when I ever live with a man??!? I may need to start chillin out, but I like my space…oy!

Despite all the craziness that occurs on a shoot, when you get to see a cut of what you’ve been working so hard at, you can’t help but get excited & want to create more! Telling visual stories is so addicting…& like that, I’m sucked back in 🙂

In some semblance to maintain sanity & a sense of reality, I’d try & connect with friends over the weekends or do some activity to remind myself that sunshine & summer fun was in full swing all around me.  One night a few weeks ago, a friend had extra tickets to the Hollywood Bowl, with a girlfriend visiting in town who had never been,  we, of course, jumped on the opportunity to join.

I have probably mentioned this before & I will again ~ I looooove the Hollywood Bowl, it is my favorite L.A. summer activity! It was Opening Night, with 3 great acts, fireworks & not a Zombie in sight. I was full of excitement.  And then, there he was. Like a punch to the gut, the wind was knocked out of me. There sat my ex & his latest girlfriend having a romantic pre-show picnic.

I knew this was bound to happen at some point, but of all places. I didn’t need/want to see that in a place where I hold special memories with him, but what can you do…new Bowl season, new girlfriend to bring to it…thankfully they didn’t see me.  I managed to push him out of my mind & enjoy my friends for the evening…until I couldn’t anymore.  The evening’s final artist performed the song “For Good”, which he had sent to me post-breakup saying it reminded him of me & our time together. It meant a lot to me then & still does…and with that the tears began to fall uncontrollably. I tried to stop my brain, but I couldn’t help thinking if he was now saying that to the new woman by his side.  With some (a lot) of wine, fireworks & friends, I survived the evening. Thankful to have not crossed paths again, I am glad I got the 1st couple sighting out of the way & that I had the support of my girl’s with me.

And, now that I am back to living in daylight hours again, I’ve been feeling like its time to jump back on the dating bandwagon!

As I walked around the lake the other evening, a calmness came over me, with a soothing sense of readiness – it’s time to  put my profiles back up online & take an active role in finding my partner. While I’ve enjoyed the past few months following my interests, in the theory of ‘love your life & love will find you’, not one date has been on the calendar. Time for action! Let’s get the momentum ball rolling!

As this decision was being made in my head, the Universe was already one step of me & as I drove home from the lake two things occurred

• I received a text from a guy saying “hi”  (well, hello’s back at ya)
• I got a message from a friend asking if I’d be interested in a ‘fix-up’ with her eligible bachelor friend  (yes, please)

I will say I am continuously amazed by how a slight shift in energy & thoughts can create a ripple effect, even quite quickly at times.

So, I text back the mystery guy whose name was not ringing a bell, & I can tell once I opened his text, we had chatted previously back in Sept, but never met up…at least that I could recall. We texted a couple of polite rounds & he asks if I remember him? I go for honesty & point blank tell him no. To jog my memory he offers to send a pic, if I send him one first, which I figure means he doesn’t remember me either & was just trying random #’s in this phone, hoping for a bite.

I decide to play along in the pic game out of curiosity, so I scroll through my phone looking for a good selfie & send it on over. He snaps his pic & sends one back. Oooooh, I remember that face (thankfully), but that’s all I remember! We had narrowed it down to eHarmony, so I figured at this point if we jumped through all their hoops to getting to the exchanging numbers part, I must’ve liked something about him…then he asks for another pic! I joked 1 a night is my limit, yet he kept asking & snapped another of himself to show me just how easy it was.  Now mind you, the pic I sent was from a lil bit ago when I was having an ‘I feel pretty’ moment. I was currently sitting there with my hair pulled back, make-up off & glasses on (not feeling my prettiest we’ll just say) ~ there was no way in hell I’m snapping that image for a stranger.  His persistency paid off & there I was at 10:30pm digging around my closet for the top I had on in the original pic I sent & fixing my hair to recreate the same look…playing in to the fantasy that we ladies sit around looking ready for a photo op anytime…I can’t believe I fed the illusion & didn’t present the real me in the moment, but what can I say…modern dating is silly! I’m silly & I want a date dammit!

So to recap my ramblings, here’s the current standings:

• Date with old eHarmony match set
• Pending evening out with the friend fix-up
• Online profiles going back up this week
• Enjoying daytime sunshine & sleeping at night
• Life is good

I’m feeling super grateful to have some time to take care of myself again & I’ve got a good feeling about these next few months…who knows what lies ahead but I’ll keep you in the loop

xo

Life is just a bowl of cherries…