Hi readers,
I'm writing this early too to try and get a head as I'm so busy right now. Originally, the sewing project post was meant to be up first, but then I realized this follows on well from last week's post when I wasn't able to write about two things on there. So, I'm moving that post to August now. Which means the three Mondays for the rest of this month will now be the book reviews of the Soulless Manga trilogy and the first two books in the Custard Protocol series. Though as I've just checked, the second book isn't out till the Thursday 21st July and that's 5 days to read it in. Just pre-order it so it'll come just before or on that day now. Should have got it with my birthday presents, oh well.
The first thing I want to write about today is the question of if I'm a 'serial dater' or not. Now, my only slight risk of writing and publishing this is that there are certain people I'd rather not see this post. But I do want to reflect on recent things and prove that I'm not really a serial dater. So, as most of you know I broke up with my boyfriend back in January. Since then we've still stayed friends and though this has been hard it's working...beside from not being able to break some of the old habits....
Around April, I decided I had to move on and prove to myself that I was still date-able and not stuck on the highest shelf like a broken doll. I joined two dating websites, both of which I had used before though, this time I was going to juggle being on both of them at the same time. My inboxes every since then have been stacked high with messages from men. Unlike the last times though, I tried to be more picky in which men I message back.
Internet dating is hard. Everyone seems to think it's easy, but to be honest it's a lot easier to lie and just say what you want, because you feel more protected by the screen and being home then say if you met some at a bar or public event. So, I get a lot of messages with men just saying "I have great ect 'place body part here.'" or do "I want to have a one night stand ect ?" I don't reply to those messages. Also, its rare I reply to people not in the same country as me, just long distance dating isn't my thing and I have enough friends right now. Okay, maybe I could do with a few more...but I like meeting up and doing stuff, not just talk online.
I have a lot of rules and stuff in place for my safety as I am so aware of the problems online dating can led too. One of my rules is that I try to spend awhile talking to the guy to get to know him. Another is that the first date is actually called the first meet up and we meet as friends. That's how it's been for all my 'dates' and I have stated this every time, we are meeting as friends. Because it's less pressure off everything really and I'm not in a hurry to get back into a relationship. Not because I'm holding a candle for my ex, but because I've suddenly discovered the freedom of being single. Though sometimes I don't like it, I'm enjoying it for the most part. My long term goal is of course to find someone, but right now I'm happy building friendships. They say that's how the best relationships start anyway.
So, Over the last two months or so I've meet up with four guys now from the two dating sites. To code them, I'm going to give them letters of the alphabet and try not to go into too much detail about them personally (just to protect them and myself, because I'm nice like that).
The first guy, A, I have meet 3 times now. I really like him and we get on, there's this flitting between us which I enjoy too. He's very funny and sarcastic, which I like. He makes me laugh a lot and he finds my stories and jokes funny. Also, all the meet ups we've turn into mini adventures as we end up wandering around looking for places! The downside for me is that he does live far away from me, but he sees the city I live in as his true home and he does want to move here one day. I am hoping things will develop with him, but I'm not sure if it'll last, we don't seem to have that much in common as of yet anyway.
B lives a lot closer and we had an okay first date, even if I ended up taking the led on it. Which I don't mind, but he was lacking in confidence for me. Plus physically, I didn't feel attracted to him. He was really sweet, but I think he was too nice and was happy doing whatever I wanted. Which I didn't trouble me, but some input would have been good. We've stayed in connect and I said we could be friends, which I know he's not too happy about. We have yet to arrange a second meet up.
C and I have met twice now. He seems nice, but like B he is lacking in confidence and also he's shorter then me and I just can't deal with that. There's just something about tall men I like and it doesn't help that I'm tall myself! The first time we met, I had to buy my own drink. which I don't mind - it's not a date! but I think it jarred with me that he didn't even ask me about it or anything....unlike the other two guys. We had a good talk and we did have a bit of a walk too - which is how I noticed the height difference!
We went bowling and for lunch as our second meet up and he talked a lot about this girl he liked. I was actually in one of my low moods and the conversation wasn't that interesting. Bowling was fun though and lunch was okay. I fear that he'll go the same way B went though as he's not for me, but a friendship might work.
D does live a bit away from me and we have met twice now. The first time, I broke my rule of not eating on the first met up. I'm not a shy eater, but I can be a bit messy and I'd rather just get something like a drink which can easily be handled. And I was messy! We had a talk about a number of things and I do feel once again that I was far more confident then him. Though for some reason I was really on edge and so chatty. He was taller then me though and paid for lunch - super nice of him because he didn't have to. But then he give me super mixed signals because he decided to leave.
I don't normally set an end time unless I have to, but that meet up only lasted about an hour and 40 minutes. Which isn't that short but compared to the the four- six hours I'm use to it kinda is. I so thought I'd come on too strong and he'd not liked me. I had all this paranoia about it until he texted me and asked me if I wanted to meet again...turns out he was just super worried about missing his train home though they seemed to be every hour. I agreed and decided to give it another go.
The second meet up went a lot better and actually changed some of my first judgement about him. I think it helped that we went and did something this time. We went to an art gallery and had fun looking at the paintings. He made some jokes and we talked a lot about art and relationships. We went for tea and it was my pick this time, I choice a new place I'd not been to before, but the food was good. We split the bill this time and we hugged like three times before he left.
I'd like to see him again and not just because he said he wanted to go to the zoo for our next meet up! But because I think his confidence will grow and we have lot in common.
So, am I serial dater? I don't believe so. For starts, I'm not actually 'dating' them and they and me know where we stand and I make it repeated clear that's the case. Also, this the first time I've seen a number of men at once. Normally, I stick with one guy and if the first meet up doesn't work then I move on to the next. Actually, I only started dating in my early twenties. As a teenager, I wasn't that interested in boys and it's only been over the last six or seven years that I have changed my mind and become interested in finding someone to spend the rest of my life with.
I looked up what the actual differentiation of a serial dater and there's lots of interesting information out there, but I came to understand that it's a person who has a few dates with someone then moves on to someone else and the pattern repeats. They do this because they like the first stage of dating and don't want to commit to anything. Also they don't want to spend time getting to know people, they enjoy having money spent on them and date people who have nothing in common with them. I don't really tick any of those boxes.
Of course, I know there's going to come a time when either I decide to start a relationship with one of these guys or another I've yet to meet. I currently have two guys I really want to meet up with as well. Then I know I'll have to sort things out because I'm so not a cheat. At the minute I'm having a bit of trouble juggling the four guys I'm making friends with, so I can't imagine managing two different relationships! To be honest, I'm just having fun meeting and getting to new people, which is something I don't do really do.
And before I forget here's a link to a tumblr I llike and some of the posts on here just sum up internet dating messages for me really well; http://really-not-ok-cupid.tumblr.com/ If you need a giggle it's a good thing to check out, also it reminds me why being single can be a good thing!
On the flip side of this, for the past six weeks I have been giving up my Sunday mornings to be a part of the group mentoring at the youth center. It's the first run of this and it's to help 8-12 children who can't do 1-1 mentoring because their problems are not big enough or do to their additional needs they are unstable. But, if once we finish in another seven weeks, the young people still need support they'll go into the 1-1. I thought this would be a good way to start my mentoring as I've not been matched up to a young person yet.
I am finding it tough. It's hard to do anything for the first time even with training and support. I think it's going to take awhile for me to get into it as even after all this time I'm just not getting to grips with it. I'm not going to say mentoring isn't for me, I just think I need more practice at it as with everything. Maybe I need to do some more reading around the subject and look at how I can improve myself.
So the group mentoring sees three mentors, a supervisor, a supporter and eight young people meeting to do a range of activities which I divided into doing an activity often based around teamwork and looking at emotions/feels, lunch and small group time which sees the mentors working with the same 3 or 2 young people in a more focused activity. Now, my two kids are brother and sister and they have a bit of a rough home life, not in any abusive and neglecting ways, just that their mother has a lot on her plate it seems.
Last Sunday was also the second time they'd not turned up and it was the four time all together. It bugs me because I'm giving up my free time to help these kids to reach the reasons they are on mentoring and their mum doesn't seem so bothered to bring them. I'm so hoping this is going to change and that I can now spend the next few weeks actually helping this kids out. I keep telling myself that even if I'm just there for them and they can talk to me and I can teach them one coping technique they remember when they are having a bad time, then I'll feel like I achieved something. It'd be goo if I can do more, but as a mentor there's only so much you can do anyway.
Even though I love my part time job, I'm currently looking for another. I'd love to find some morning work in an office somewhere, so that I could still keep my shifts at the youth center. It wasn't my plan to really stay so long and I wanted a full time job, but I've not had much look and I guess I've become to comfy where I am. But I want to move out and get a car and the only way to really do that is to save up and I need more money to do that. So, I'm on the look out again and hopefully, I'll find something soon enough.
The issue is that job hunting doesn't get any easier really. I find it takes up so much time and it's tiring. Being on sites like Linked In and signing up to temp and agencies does make it easier, but it's putting in all the leg work and the fact I don't get many replies triggers my depression. A few weeks back I had a phone call and I was headhunted for this job as a research at a recruitment center. But the interview was cancelled the evening before because the guy said on reflection I didn't sound confident enough and that totally didn't make any sense to me. Also he wanted to hand in my notice that day before I had the interview so he could hire me the next day! That's just weird too.
In some other news, I have finally got a goal date set for my short story collection anthology release. It's going to be on Monday 1st August. This is going to be published on amazon kindle for £1. Which seems really cheap to me! It's going to be a collection of around 30 short stories from the first year of my other blog The Story Files over on Wordpress. I've been saying for ages that I'm going to do it and now I really mean it. I'll post on here when it's ready.
I so want to look at getting money from my blogs. I know its' difficult to do and most people say it's like a full time job. I've never really wanted to actually get money out of this because it me it's always been my space to just out pour, but it'd be great to get some else in return for writing now. Speaking of that and blogs.....
I had a great idea for a new blog and I plan to start that up next week. My plan is to post on that blog on Fridays and it's going to be about fighting negativity and how to stay positive. This blog is different from my current two and others I've done in the past because it's going to focus on advising people. I had this idea after having a talk with my dad then seeing some self-help books work. Originally, I was just going to make a life post about it but when I started planning it out there was so much I wanted to write about that I thought I could just turn this into a new blog.
I have set a word limit of 500 words per-post because that's about the right word count to draw people in and to read it fully. I try hard to keep the word count down on here, but like I said with this being a space to out pour it can be hard to keep things short!
So, I'll let you know about that when I've sorted it all out.
Update! I've set it up and done the first post! You can check it out here; https://negativitybreakout.wordpress.com/
Thanks for reading and please stay posted for some updates on all of this stuff soon!
My other blog: https://thestoryfiles.wordpress.com/
Images from https://pixabay.com
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