It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year... YEAH RIGHT!!!

Let me start by saying I do love Christmas. Allow me to add, I hate it too. I love the reason for Christmas, celebrating the birth of Christ. I used to love the family get together - to an extent. But then, the family get together is also why I hate it.

Christmas comes down hard on the single person unless they are not interested in being anything but single. Commercials, at this time of year, are all geared towards family and couples and can be especially depressing when you are alone. I get tired of hearing "Every kiss begins with Kay..." Kiss my A@#. Oh, and I really don't care that he went to Jarod's.

Getting together with the family used to be the one boon at Christmas, until my parents started going down to Miami to spend Christmas with my middle brother and his family. I understand why they do. But it tends to leave me to having lunch with my oldest brother and his family, when they remember to tell me when it will be. That sounded bad... I love my brothers but you may have noticed a little theme here - My brothers and their families. UGH, me single them married. Which is why I also hate the family get together.

And so another Christmas is upon us, with it's commercials written to rip the heart out of the single people of the world, family get togethers - maybe but, on the bright side, we have all the lights and television specials. But most of all we have the birth of Jesus.

So I love it and I hate it all at the same time... just get me through another one please!

Will being me ever be enough?

Will being me ever be enough? Sounds like a dumb question. But is it?

NOTE: this is going to be a bit of a down blog post!

It's been almost a year since my ex-girlfriend broke up with me, saying it wasn't me but her. And yet I'm the one who feels like a loser. I'm the one who feels like I didn't do enough and really have no idea what to do.

I have never had anyone break up with me because I did something wrong, I just haven't ever been enough. And apparently I am so much not enough that no one has been willing to give me a second chance. To be honest most women haven't been willing to give me a first chance. On that I can't complain too much because I am very picky and haven't really considered dating someone just to have someone to go out with. If I am not interested in someone then I'm not going on a date with them. At least that is how I have been. Maybe I should change that but I think that I am getting too old to change my ways.

The only reason I bring this up is that my ex (who I must admit, I am still in love with) can still set my mood for the day without realizing it. Today it was a MySpace status that quoted Einstein: "The value of a man should be seen in what he gives and not in what he is able to receive." There was a bit more that she added about the guy she is dating now but this quote made me think. What is a guy to do when he doesn't have a lot to give other than himself? I am not rich, I don't own a lot and with my limited dating experience (even at 40 years old) I don't really know what to do or how to do it when it comes to a woman's wants and needs. It isn't that I don't want to do things and give things and be there, it is that I either don't have it to give or don't know to read the signs of what I should do. With my ex I want(ed) to give her the world. I would die for her. I gave her my heart. But that apparently isn't enough.

I know that people say there are plenty of fish in the sea but I feel like I am fishing with the wrong bait. Apparently I am not the right bait.

So I ask: Will being me ever be enough?

Happy Couples Annoy Me

I used to say, with little humor, that "Happy couples annoy me." And, at the time, I know I didn't really know why. Why should seeing a couple holding hands as they walk down the street get under my skin? What upset me about seeing a couple sitting together, flirting and laughing? And how could any one not enjoy seeing others finding happiness in each others arms? I know the answer now and it surprised me to realize it.

Yesterday, as I was driving home, I started thinking about it. I was sitting at a stop light, looked into the car next to me and it just hit me. There was a couple riding along talking and laughing and I remembered what it was like, what it was like to hold hands while driving, talking about what we where going to do, where we would go. It isn't so much that the happy couples annoy me as they make me realize what I lost.

Before it was just some vague annoyance without reason. I didn't know why because I was missing something I never had. Since last year that changed. Now I know what it is that annoys me and it isn't the Happy couples of the world. It is the loneliness I feel when I see them and know that I am going home to an empty apartment, single meal and no one to call my own (I do hate that phrase, but it fits).

But I know that I will continue to say "Happy couples annoy me," even though I now know why. Because it amuses me to say it. And the single life is what I will have to deal with until I either get over the love I had last year or learn to settle for what is left out there.