Boys Boys Boys....

Well, September came and went and I have yet to encounter a move moment. However I did just say yes to a date this Friday, but the guy keeps spoutin' out these weird comments on facebook that I don't know how to respond to. Par exampla:

Guy: It's okay. I'm used to rejection. I got rejected al ot. I was a little creepy and still am a little weird. I mean look at me (the guy has a nose ring and a fo-hawk. which is totally fine with me)
Me:Weirdness is okay, but creepiness I'm not so sure.
Guy:I just have a weird personality
Me: aren't you supposed to be convincing me to go on a date with you? Maybe you're the only one who thinks you're weird.
Guy: No, I get it a lot. This will be a horrible date.
Me: Dude, have a little confidence. what's so weird about you?
Guy:No I'm just messing with you. i am a little weird, but I'm not going to oversell myself either.
(this whole thing is over facebook chat,mind you. Drew Barrymore hit the nail on the head with her description of modern day dating in "He's Just Not that Into you")

Or how about this one after he turned our getting coffee on my way St. Louis into a dinner date over sushi (yumm!)

Guy: Now I just realized I'm going to have to get my haircut and shave tomorrow

How's a girl supposed to respond to that? And I asked him almost exactly that. Yet again, he said it was a joke.

This could get interesting. But for some reason I'm excited. I don't even know if I like the guy, and I have yet to mention how we met:

It's after midnight on January 1, 2011--the beginning of my 24th birthday and what is so far promising to be the best year of my life (and not because of this date). I'm at Campus Crusade's Conference in Denver walking around the 5 dollar prom, looking for friends to dance with, when this guy comes up to me and says:

"Hey, I know this is going to sound weird but I really like you're hair."

I stop, almost in shock. "Oh!" "I say. "Well thanks! I just dyed it" (my mom hates the black hair, but i personally love it!)

"Yea, I like short hair on girls."

"Thanks!" I say again...and walk off.

Later, I'm milling about again--going from friend to friend, making sure I get the most out of my new years eve experience--when I see him again.

Eye Contact--that dreadfully wonderful act that can give you want you want or lock you into something you wish you'd never met.

"Hey!" He says. "I'm Eric."

"Hi, I'm Rachel."

We exchange small talk for a few minutes and then he says, "Well, I think we should hang out sometime."

"Oh..." I say. "Ok...well, I don't know. Maybe. We'll see. OKay, bye."

And I walk away.

Damn it! I did it again! Shut down and without a second thought. ha! What was I thinking! I should really apologize to him. That was so rude!

Seriously, I don't know what's wrong with me. I didn't even give the guy a chance, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't know how I got this way. With a history like mine and the devil playing tricks in my head, of course I find a way to find something wrong with every guy that talks to me. And if nothings wrong with him, I find something wrong with myself.

Well...long story short...Eric runs into my friend Kayla who he doesn't know is my friend. When he finds out she knows me, he tells her that he thought i was cute, tried to talk to me, then I just totally blew him off.

Oops! Now I feel really bad. I finally find him and awkwardly apologize for the way I acted. I explain that I really won't have time in the next day and a half to hang out and that my mind just got ahead of me.

"Well, I was thinking maybe we could hang out back in Missouri," he says. "You're not that far from St. Louis."

"Oh, ok. Maybe," I say (what is with me and that phrase?). "Well yea, just facebook me."

And that's how I ended up here. Sitting at home in Tennessee, typing on my computer, and setting up a date in St. Louis. I'm already flustered with anxiety preparing for a talk that have to give on Thursday, and I just got back from Chicago, which filled my head with high hopes and dreams of moving there. Life is good! Seriously! Yea, I know its a little sad when I look at all this stuff and you hear me babbling like a mad woman when I say that life is good, but the fact that I have a date with a weird guy (?), dream of moving to Chicago, and can actually feel my anxiety speaks to some improvement to me as a person over the last two years.

Okay.....deep breath. Stop acting mad (as in Mad Hatter Mad) and go to bed.

Goodnight!

Movie Moments

I'd like to start keeping track of the movie moments in my life. I had to go to Urgent care today because a rash is spreading across my face. The waiting room was quiet and the atmosphere was crisp. I gave my name to the receptionist, and a few short minutes later, what I'm guessing is a male nurse called me back. An older, balding man, joined him and they proceeded to interview me, typing their answers into electronic key boards that made me feel like some sort of lab rat.

"What was your last period," guy number one said, taking my blood pressure.

"Ummm....about 3 weeks ago."

The nod, type, glance at one another, then walk out of the room.

Hmmm....that was interesting. I wonder if he's single.

A few minutes later, McDreamy walks into the room. Okay, so he's no Derek Shepard, but I'd call him the real life equivalent. Unfortunately for me, its probably a breech of ethics for a doctor to ask a patient for her number.

As I walked out of the office I thought, "What if he liked me so much he looked my number up in the system? It could happen!" (these are the thoughts that run through a woman's mind, no matter how old she is).

My cheeks are red, my ears itch, and my left eye is almost swollen shut. In short, I look like Alex Hitchens after he ate shellfish. I walk into Walgreen's, staring at the floor the whole way back to the pharmacy.

"I'm here to pick up a prescription," I tell the lady at the counter.

"Are you Rachel?" she asks.

"Yes," I respond. I hand her my insurance card.

"What's you're phone number."

I give it to her.

"And you're address?"

"1700 Forum Blvd..."

I spot a man in scrubs out of the corner of my eye. He's in the back filling prescriptions and he perks up when he hears my apartment number. I see him smile. Maybe I'm reading too much into things, but this blog wouldn't be any good if I didn't. What if he lives at Katy Place? Maybe I'll see him again.

I sit down to wait on my prescription. When he's done filling it, he calls my name and I pay $7.37.

"Here ya go. Have a nice day." He makes eye contact and smiles. Probably just some customer service coincidence. I hope he didn't notice my swollen left eye.

I get in my car and head for home. As I turn into my apartment complex, I spy a man walking his Beagle right outside my apartment. My bangs are falling over my left eye, but I manage to sneak a peak at the dog owner. He's shorter, about my height; wearing a baseball cap, shorts, and a t-shirt. His face is clean shaven and a little pudgy and he wasn't wearing a wedding band (you'd be surprised how much a girl can take in from a quick 2 second glance). I'd call him average, but cute.

He catches my eye and smiles politely. I smile back then avert my eyes back to the rode.

"I wonder if he found me attractive?"

I rounded the corner, pulled into my parking spot, and considered the thoughts of the man with the beagle. I wonder if he too, dreams of having movie moments: That girl's cute. What if I asked her out? What if I waited until she got out of her car and asked her for her number? Or what if I just said hi and we struck up a wonderful conversation? I bet she'd like my dog. What if I just stayed? What if I didn't walk away? What if....what if....aw, those things never happen. But I'll keep thinking about the girl with the glasses and black scarf.

The man walks away. I get out of my car, grab my things and head toward the stairs. I take a half glance back because maybe, just maybe he's still there. Then I remember how terrible my face feels and I forget the whole thing.

Do you think other people ponder movie moments like these? Don't think that I'm obsessed or that i put an unhealthy amount of energy towards day dreaming about the way I will meet my Prince Charming. Actually, its not like that at all. None of my fantasy's ever end in a date. I always stop with the hello because I know that none of them will actually ever happen. Maybe if I started believing, I'd start making things happen. Mr. Beagle Man could use the same advice.

Back to Blogging

Welcome back from East Asia. At least that's what you should be saying to me. No, I didn't go on any Asian dates, although an old guy with no teeth trapped me on a bus and breathed in my face for 30 minutes telling me how beautiful I was. Somehow I wasn't flattered. I just felt awkward. But rest assured, one of the valiant young men I was with attempted to come to my rescue but the old guy persisted until his bus stop. Then he snapped a picture with cell phone and walked away. My image is forever captured and roaming the streets of East Asia making some creeper's otherwise dull day a little brighter. What can I say, I do what I can.

Tonight, my friends and I had to go to a game night outreach for Campus Crusade. Students are back and classes are in full swing, which means my life is consumed with smiling faces and heart felt conversations with girls in their dorm rooms. Do I sound bitter? Because I shouldn't. I actually like what I'm doing this year. But that's for another time and another place. You are not here to hear stories about ministry. You are here to slurp up the juicy gossip of my nearly non-existant dating life.

I picked up my friends Alan and Laurie to go to the game night. You might remember Alan from post #2 where I appropriately dubbed him my Personal PR Person. I am now adorning him with the title of Professional Dating and Relationship Advisor.

As the three of us pulled out of the parking lot of BreakTime (I had to stop and get gas), I glanced to my left and saw an attractive man in work attire motioning to me. I didn't notice his resplendent physical features at first because I was a little creeped out. I think I just stared at him for a minute as he mouthed words and pointed to the back of my car.

Did I leave my gas tank open? I wondered.

I looked at Laurie and everything seemed to be in slow motion while I figured out what this guy was saying to me.

Oh! I thought, as he put his hand in a fist and began rotating his arm like he was cranking up a jack-in-the box. Roll down your window!

So, I did. And we both laughed.

"You have a tail light out," he said.

"What? Oh..." my face proved my disappointment.

"Yea, its on the other side. On the passenger side."

"Well, that sucks. Thanks though," I said with heartfelt remorse. "Bye!" And I rolled my window back up.

"Well, that stinks," I said to my cohorts.

"Rachel," Alan said. "You should have asked him for his number. Is he married?"

"I don't know I couldn't tell."

"Those are the type of movie moments you need to take advantage of. Roll your window back down and ask him to help you."

Then we brainstormed a few seductive scenarios for such a conversations, but stopped after "well, you can light me up!" I was afraid of where the "tail" light reference would go.

Clearly nothing juicy happened, but I got a good laugh and my wheels began turning. Why shouldn't movie moments happen in real life? Yesterday, I was making my lunch and realized I needed a can opener. I considered running next door for a moment and asking the cutie from Illinois if I could borrow his. But I chickened out and walked to the next building to borrow Laurie's.

"Those are the type of movie moment's you need to take advantage of. You gotta put yourself out there a little bit."

Because that's when things get interesting. So, I'm committing to it right now, the next time I need a can opener, I'm marching myself next door and asking the neighbor. Call me juvenile for making such a claim on the Internet, but you gotta ask yourself: would you have the guts to do it?

Until then, its back to blogging....and I can't decide if it feels good to be back or not. I'll try to up the ante on the humor next time. Have a good night!

What to Wear on a First Date!!!!!!!

Okay...let me start out by saying that I am no Stacey London. However, I do love her show and would recommend that everyone watch "What Not to Wear." I'm not recommending it because I'm some sort of style snob. I'm sure I have plenty of crap in my closet that London would love to throw out, but the show gives good advice and for those of us living on a missionary's salary, its soooooooooo much fun to lust after the clothes that we could have (is that type of lust also a sin?)

Anyway...let me start out by telling you about the process of outfit selection for my own first date. If you haven't noticed, I've been in a state of discovering myself for the past few months. In the process I've realized that I've done a lot and said a lot of things that aren't actually what I wanted to do or say. In other words, I did what other people did or what I thought they thought I should do so I could make sure they would like me. Sound weird? Well, you probably do it too.

One area that was affected by my inability to be myself was my wardrobe. I suffered in high school, stressing out every time I shopped because I wanted to make sure that what I bought would be acceptable by my fashionista friends. In college, I had even less money than I do now so shopping didn't happen much. I also realized the lack or originality I had when it came to shopping but didn't know myself well enough to establish a style on my own so I pretty much deleted any style that existed in my wardrobe and opted for plain Jane pieces that allowed me to fade into the background.

Well, let me just tell you. As I am discovering more of myself, I'm discovering an intense amount of creativity and liveliness, and fashion seems to be a perfect place to let that explode. Its been fun to redo my wardrobe and frustrating at the same time because I really don't have that much money to go shopping. Nevertheless, shopping has become less stressful and I look forward to it when I do get to go.

That being said...rule # 1 when picking out an outfit for a first date is BE YOURSELF! Don't bust out a sexy little black dress if that is not who you are. You won't be comfortable and your date will be left with an inauthentic impression of you. While shopping for a new outfit might be fun, you probably have something already in your closet that says, "this is me and I'm gorgeous. Thank you for taking me out on a date!"

After Davo (ha....I used his real name) asked me out, I went home and immediately started thinking about what I was going to wear ( and I"m not ashamed to say it because every girl does it). I knew I wanted to look cute, but more than anything I wanted to feel good about myself and I wanted him to notice me. Its okay to want the guy to notice you. Remember what my friend Elizabeth said about being alluring? Its so true! And that allure starts from the inside. Your outfit should never be used to cover up who you are, it should be a a reflection of what you are on the inside--confident, carefree, and sexy!

Rule #2 when it comes to picking out a first date is a little more practical. I would say that unless he's taking you to a Broadway musical or a black tie dinner at the White House, jeans should do the trick. You don't want to over do it on the first date. Jeans are a good way to be sexy without dressing so well you intimidate the guy. Every girl looks good in a pair of jeans that fits well. Pair it with a cute top and heals and your good to go.

Rule #3- Wear heals. This rule is a little flexible. If you are seriously not a heal kind of girl and know that heals would be totally against everything you stand for and you would be miserably thinking about your feet all night, then don't wear them. But for me, wearing heals makes me feel sexier. I don't wear them very often, but when I do, I stand a little taller and feel a little girlier. For my date with Davo, I busted out a pair of strappy yellow sandals to brighten up my black shirt and cropped hunter green jacket. Heals are a good thing. Don't be afraid of them. But make sure they are comfortable.

Rule #4- Color! Color! Color! Me and my friend Michelle went shopping for 3 hours the afternoon before my date. In my mind, I pictured myself wearing something bright red or yellow. Something fun that called attention to me. In the week before my date, I looked at my closet and realized it was void of any bright colors.

"How did this happen?" I thought.

Then I realized it happened about the same time I decided I didn't want guys to notice me and started my four year hiatus from dating. Well, now its time to stop. Colors are good. Colors are fun! And as I'm gaining confidence on the inside, I want that to be reflected in the brightness of my wardrobe. It's just who I am!

Unfortunately, shopping in Columbia is terrible and we didn't find anything. I decided to wear the jacket and shirt that I described earlier (which is actually what I had in mind from the beginning if I wasn't able to find something similar in a brighter color). To add color, I bought a copper bracelet, some earrings with the same color green and purple accents on them, I painted my nails a shiny light purple and my toe nails Emerald City green (which is now my new favorite polish) and finished it off with mustard yellow heals. The shoes may sound like they don't match, but the other colors in the outfit were dark and subtle. The shoes gave the outfit the pop it needed. I felt like a million bucks and was comfortable the entire time.

I've given you three pretty basic rules, but I want to conclude with the most important thing that I want you to get from this post. Be yourself! If your not yourself, then your inside won't shine on the outside. You won't have the confidence that will attract a guy to you, and your outfit won't be reflecting who you are. During my day of shopping I tried on several things that were cute and looked good on me...but all of them felt fake. Opting for new jewelry and an outfit I already owned was the best decision I could have made.

So girls, hair and do your make-up, not because you need to, but because you want to! We're girls! We like girly things and dressing up and primping make us feel good about ourselves. Go have fun!


And Laurie...I'm excited for you. You have cute style and you can be alluring. Get out there and show Kiren what your made of = ) Ha!

COMING SOON!!!

What to wear on a first date.....and its not what's in the picture....I just like those colors = )

If I didn't have to wake up so early in the morning to drive to Nashville, I'd write it right now.

So I guess I should stop procrastinating and actually go pack....bleh....

First Date Anyone?

Its been a week since my first date, and I know you've all been waiting expectantly to find out how it went. I've been debating on whether or not I should write about it, considering he knows that I have a blog, but then I thought to myself, "what harm could it do? I don't think we'll make it to a second date anyway?"

Again....my life is destined to be a romantic comedy. I've seen these things happen before and even as I'm writing, I feel my hands trying to withdraw from the keyboard.

In light of a recent post on wanting my writing to beneficial and encouraging, I'm not going to rip apart my date and tell you everything he did wrong--in fact, I'm not sure if he did anything wrong. He was himself, he was nice, and I had fun. I actually wish I could go back and watch the date to see what I did wrong. Maybe then I would actually learn a thing or two. However, I shall relay to you the details of something I did learn:

Be yourself.

A couple days after the date, I was telling some friends about it and one of them said, "Why were you nervous? Nobody is themselves on a date! Its dating!"

But I beg to differ. If you can't be yourself, even a little bit, then you're not going to have very much fun.

In their book, Boundaries in Dating, Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend make the remark that you should always know yourself before you get into a relationship.

"Maybe you will use dating to figure out who you are," they say. "But be sure you know who you are before you get serious."

Otherwise, you will lose yourself in the other person which will cause all sorts of issues.

I've done this in a lot of relationships in the past--both romantic relationships and friendships, and I think its safe to say that I'm not the only one. If you don't know who you are...that's okay! But don't just stand there, go figure it out! There's a whole world out there waiting for you to discover and if you just sit on your butt and do what everyone else does, you'll never get to see it. Once you figure out who you are, the world of dating is a lot more fun and a lot less intimidating.

Less intimidating, that is. Its still intimidating and scary, but a lot less if you know who you are. In fact, it will actually be fun. Yes...I left this date thinking, "wow...that was fun! I want to go on more dates!" And not just for the free food.

question marks

Okay...so I don't really know what to write right now, but I have a bunch of thoughts running through my head and they need somewhere to go. Maybe they'll all come together and make a little sense, or maybe you'll all be left agreeing with the new url for this blog. Either way, I'm going to ramble them off.

My friend Michelle gave me a book called "Boundaries in Dating." Its by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend--the same men that wrote the book "Changes that Heal," which I read last semester (totally changed my life....everyone should read it...and that is not being said lightly. I'm serious. Read it).

Anyway, I started reading "Boundaries in Dating" last night and as I was reading, I began writing down the fears that I had when it came to dating. While I don't feel comfortable putting all my fears on this blog as of yet, I will say that some of them include: a fear of messing up, the fear that I won't be myself, and a fear of not knowing what I want.

I'm not ready to unpack what all of these fears look like or why they're there or what to do about them. And underneath all of those fears lie even more fears that I have yet to uncover. They're like little voices hiding under the surface that I can't quite hear what they are. This is the type of thing that most people shy away from sharing, and I am the queen of isolation and shutting people out. But if there's anything that I've learned this year, its that relationships are key in both personal growth and living a full life. We were created for relationships and we can't fully function in isolation.

Tonight Davo gave a talk at Cru from Genesis 12. He discussed Abraham's faithfulness in blindly following the Lord.

"Has God ever held out his hand to you and said follow me, but you don't know where you're going?" he asked.

I thought about it, and I'm not sure that I've never known where I was going. I just haven't been sure if God would pull through for me. In the same way, I think all of life is one big blind step after another. If we find ourselves growing complacent in our lives and we're not growing or developing in some area, then we're not relying on God enough and we're not taking faith steps to insure growth and maturity.

Davo then focused on the blessings that God bestowed upon Abraham and how Abraham celebrated by holding a "church service" in a lost land and using his blessings to bless other people.

"That's why God gives us things," Davo said. "To give them back to other people. God blesses us so we can bless others and they can ask us what why we're blessing them and we can point to Jesus."

Sometimes...actually most of the time...I don't think I realize how much Jesus has blessed me. I'm quick to hide behind being politically correct or culturally relevant, and I neglect the truth about the person who saved me and gave me something to worry about cultural relevancy in the first place.

Jesus saved me and continues to save me everyday and that's something I wish everyone could experience. Unfortunately, many people will choose not to and that makes me very sad....especially those that I am friends with.

So what the heck does all this have to do with dating? I didn't mean to get on a religious soap box back there. It just sort of happened as I am in a time of intense reflection and personal growth.

After Davo's talk I began thinking about the gifts that God has given me and evaluating how much I use them to bless other people. Without even getting into finances, I see that God has clearly gifted me with the ability to write. Most of the time I don't think about writing as a gift from God, but it totally is. And if it is a gift from God, then I should be using it to bless other people. That being said....I recognize that I make fun of people way too much. As previously established, my tendency to be critical in the dating arena is a defense mechanism to keep guys at arms distance. However, if I continue to do that, I will never get to know someone on that deeper level that could lead to love. And isn't that what we all really and truly want anyway?

Do I use my gifts to bless others? What would it even look like to use writing to bless others? Is this blog a blessing? Or is it merely a way for me to gain attention and spark a few laughs here and there. I think the latter has been subconsciously true for most of my blogging career. But I don't want that. I really want everything i do to be a blessing to other people and not an act of selfish ambition. Isn't that what's really wrong with world? At our cores, all people are selfish.

So, if this blog is to be used as a blessing to people, what would it look like? Would I come back from my date and bash every mistake he made or read into things so much that I find flaws that don't really exist? Absolutely not.

I'm not sure what a dating blog that exists souly to bless other people would look like, but I think it would be something like this: 1.)a place to offer advice--to use my mistakes, my fears, and my experiences to give you something to relate to. I wish I knew enough to actually give you something to take away from reading it. 2.) A place to have fun. I like to laugh just like the next person. Its just that its a lot easier to laugh when you're making fun of other people. Fortunately, dating is a wacky stage of life anyway (as if I would know), so I'm banking on some pretty awkward and embarrassing stories to come along with it.

And the last link I want to put to dating and all the rest of this stuff is the area of blessing and encouragement. I told Michelle that I didn't want my date to become some sort of guinea pig for me to test out all my fears and emotions on. Thankfully she was encouraging saying that since I was aware of it, that probably wouldn't happen. However, she did say something to me that I liked:

"Well, how about this. Why don't you guinea pig yourself! Test yourself out. Take a risk and be encouraging. Just be yourself!" (whatever that means).

Be encouraging. Its a lot easier said than done when your natural tendency is to push people through hurtful sarcasm. Encouragement requires a lot more vulnerability because you risk telling the person what you really think. You risk being nice and have them fall for that niceness. But I think its time to start taking those sorts of risks. I don't want to be immature anymore.

Hope you enjoyed hearing my serious side for a while = )