holly wynne approximately

I act stupid when it comes to boys. Well, I used to. I guess I still do a little–dunno, you’d have to ask a boy.

Anyway, I have never believed online dating was the right thing for me or that I was really the type to make long-distance work, but I happened upon the eHarmony personality test.

Let me tell you, in case I haven’t before–I LOVE me a personality test. I’m obsessed with my Meyers-Briggs type, and there was once this great quiz site whose name escapes me that I used to spend hours on so I could know what car I would be and what my theme song was–over and over.

So, the eHarmony test was purported to be very thorough and accurate, and I couldn’t resist. Obviously, though, there was a greater purpose to it, and once registered, I started getting these emails that boys had “initiated conversation” with me. They were fun to look at–you know, just to see who would be interested in the Holly–but after doing so, I would quickly chuck them into the trash folder.

One young fellow caught my eye, though. I don’t even remember why. He had a couple of answers on his profile I liked. AND, his profile mentioned where he worked. On a whim, I went to his employer’s website and typed in his first name in the search box. Bingo! I had his work address and I dropped him a line.

Honestly? I think part of it was the thrill of subverting the system.

Long story short, we emailed back and forth for several weeks. We shared a religion, and he seemed nice enough and articulate enough. The pictures he sent were fine–I could see how he could be a cute guy, but I figured these just weren’t his best pictures. (Unfortunately, they were, but that’s beside the point.)

I get really attached via the written word. You can see where this is going. After a month and a half or so, he suggested we meet. So we did. Again, it was fine.

It was also the only thing either of us had going.

Then, he got weird.

All of a sudden, a couple of weeks later, when I wasn’t ready to talk about marriage, he got really sulky. Not just sulky. He decided to punish me. I wasn’t allowed to talk to him for three days. If I called, it meant I didn’t respect the fact that I had “crushed” him and that he needed time to think and decide if he was going to break up with me or not.

See, this is when I should have run. But, I’d spent all these hours crafting emails to him, and I’d even changed my phone plan to accommodate our marathon calls, and I had all these friends and family members telling me he was a nice guy, don’t wig out like you always do, HOLLY. We had nothing in common and I wasn’t attracted to him, but boys I did have stuff in common with and was attracted to had always been mean to me. I thought I was being shown another way.

(Turns out he was just unattractive and completely wrong for me. But that’s harsh. Back to the story…)

So, I waited out the three days. Then I called. Like a three-year-old who falls off a rocking horse and blames the nearest adult and then forgets about it four minutes later, he was chipper and happy to hear from me. So we were back on.

Then…you know what? I don’t even remember what happened, it was so pathetic. I just know that the day before Thanksgiving, 2004, I drove through the night to patch up some argument–something I’d said that did not meet with his approval again. I packed up–I was in Alabama at the time–dropped off my cats at my folks’ place, then headed on to Murfreesboro.

Once there, I got a motel room. He arrived and explained to me everything I’d done wrong. I cried and agreed it was probably for the best that we break up. We hugged and talked about our favorite memories from our (3-month-long) relationship–you know, reliving the good times–then he left.

A few minutes later, he showed back up at my door. “I can’t do this,” he said. I think he mainly just wanted to make out, but it made for a nice movie moment.

I think we lasted about two weeks or so after that. The next Sunday he insisted we meet each others’ parents. At some point I think I ticked him off again and he “needed some time” again. I started to give him the time, but then, while driving somewhere with my friend Katie, I remember saying, “you know…I’m beginning to get sick of this.” She sighed with relief and said, “well, I wasn’t going to say anything, but…” The next day I called and said, “yeah, I think this is over.” He hung up on me, sent me a REALLY nasty email the next day, I boxed up the crap he’d given me and put it in the mail, and that was the end. Like, the real end. I guess he could do that.

So, tonight, even with a migraine and some other sadness looming, I’m so very glad I’m spending the night at my parents’ house, and not some cheap motel off of 840 trying to salvage something I didn’t even really want in the first place.

Turns out it’s a lot more painful to have your heart broken when you’re being true to it. It’s a lot harder to let go of something real and beautiful, though undeclared and unofficial, than it is to perform a mercy killing on something forced and artificial. I knew that back then, of course, but I really learned it that year. Something inside me changed, and whether I consciously decided it or not, I determined that I would not hurt that way again unless it was a true pain for someone who was worth it. I’ve made good on that promise to myself.