For those of you who know what I mean by trouting, have your nice reflective chuckle and then sip your decaffeinated coffee and read on. For those of you who wonder why I am referring to fish on my blog when I do not particularly like fishing and would not be able to tell whether I was eating a catfish or a flounder were I served one of the two at the local seafood joint, 'tis your loss you didn't read my blog in the early days. Oh, yes, it's been a while.....do not go back and read post number one. It is probably boring and contains nothing about trouting. Just stick with me here.
So I was feeling rather frustrated today, as I have been for about two weeks now. Okay, frustrated is not the right word. More like....um....troubled. Or...er...oh, what is that word I always think of when I see a Gothic person? It's on the tip of my tongue. Oh, yes! Conflicted. I have felt quite conflicted for an estimated 10,000,000 reasons, all of which I couldn't put my finger on. Many of them would come to mind, and I would get quite distraught over one thing before another thing would come up, and then another, and another, and pretty soon my head would be bustling with so much commotion that left my head and for a while my mainstream thought processes all took place in my esophagus (it wasn't very comfortable there, either, but it was better than my brain...and I wouldn't dare step near my heart, as it was surely much worse). All of that to say that today I finally decided to stop putting off writing all that was in my brain down on paper, which is the only way I am able to keep anything straight and stay sane ("sane" probably being arguable to some people, but I am not asking those some peoples' opinions at this moment). So, this entry took an hour and 45 minutes and was eleven pages long, which surprisingly did not top the record 14-page long journal entry of June, 2007 (and it wasn't even very interesting, but instead detailed three days worth of happenings, including the first meet of the season that the Seahawks won, a little meaningless piece about un-visiting with people, and the time when Sarah and I decided to start a trend of sitting on the black line on the pool deck). Keep in mind that I do not have the pretty little diary that most girls have. I just use 10 1/2 by 8 inch 1-subject spiral bound notebooks (they are good for long journal entries).
AnyHOOness, I sorted through all my problems (looking back I now see that my handwriting is smaller than it was a year and a half ago, so that means that this entry probably would have been 14 pages had I written bigger), drew lots of conclusions, said lots of prayers, and I feel 97% better! Now, as I was writing I started getting on the subject about how, in the course of my short life, I have come to know a few exceptional guys who have walked into my life just long enough for me to stop being annoyed with them and start wishing they would stick around more, and then they seem to just waltz back out just as daintily as they came. (NOTE: if you are a current/long-time guy friend of mine reading this, then I am probably not talking about you. However, I beg you not to feel insulted. I just take you for granted, that is all *winks*.)
Gee, I want a Bolthouse Farms coffee drink right now!! *resists temptation to jump in the car and go to the store*
So I started wondering, "why does it always happen to me?" Well, it does, because I am me and as far as I know, I am the only one that anything happens to. Aside from that shortsighted observation....um, anyways. So the "nearly ideal" guy comes into my life. I think, "wow, he is....everything I could have ever hoped for!" The guy plays the piano, loves to read Charles Dickens, will talk philosophy with me, is mature, is family-oriented, shares the same ambitions as I do, wants a life I want, wants to homeschool his kids, makes me feel safe.....what more could I ask for? So I get a little seed for the guy and I plant it in my heart, and a little plant grows for this guy. It's not love, exactly. I think it is a sense of completion that I long for that feels fulfilled by this guy. So the plant grows and grows and then something happens. Contact is lost somehow, or I just get forgotten, and it's like the plant is ripped off from its base. The problem is, the roots are still there and they are deep. And once I finally finish digging the roots out, there is a hole and a lot of dirt gone where the plant used to be. And the hole aches in an empty kind of way. I get confused because something that was there is suddenly gone. It's like he died, but not really. When someone dies they are gone from this earth but they are still in your heart. The only thing left of this guy is his hole in my heart. And suddenly I wish I had never known him. After a while I get used to the hole, but I can still feel it.
So then I start feeling insecure and wondering if something is the matter with me, and conclude that I am nowhere near anybody's "near ideal" of a wife. Because if I was, then these wonderful guys would be a little more desperate to have me around, right? Hmph. Well, it's not like that mattered before, right? So why should it matter now? (don't you just hate it when insecure feelings creep up on you when you wish they wouldn't?) So I ignored that idea, and then immediately got another epiphany--what if I am only perfect for one guy?
O-M-G-!-!-!
What a concept, eh? Why didn't I think of that before? Here I was, suddenly wishing lots of guys would be in love with me for some stupid reason (the stupid reason being for my wishing, not for why the guys would like me), and all along how could I have not seen that that isn't the way it should be anyways?
So (in my journal, in the last paragraph on page 8 of the entry) I decided to pose the question to myself so as to make my point perfectly clear, "What would I rather be? Seemingly perfect to several guys who all pursue me but none of whom may be the right one, for actually perfect for one guy?"
Really and truly? The second one. I mean, with me and my female runaway romantic imagination and all, I can't help but look at the latter option and sigh, thinking, "how sweet!" I mean, sure...anybody wants to be loved, adored, and respected by multiple members of the opposite sex. But I like to think I have a soul mate out there, and that he and I are perfect for one another, even if neither of us seems like the ideal to anyone else. And you know what? Less hearts get broken that way!
Plus, I am not all of who I will be in the next two-to-five years when I hope to be married. I will grow a lot in that period, and while my personality will mostly stay the same, I am sure I will go through a lot that changes me. My childishness and selfishness will get chiseled off, and the experiences I will have will "potentialize" me and make me into a fuller version of myself. I am not perfect for someone right now, but I will be one day. *dwells on that happy thought*
Love and Peace or Else,
~Jessica
7 comments:
"What would I rather be? Seemingly perfect to several guys who all pursue me but none of whom may be the right one, for actually perfect for one guy?"
What I'm worried about is the possibility of there not being that one guy. What if God wants me to be... *gulp* single? :P
Hmm. I'm a random Internet person, I can't be offended. ;D Just confused. "Trouting" is a "code word" for "dating" or "courtship", right? (Yes, I went back and read an old post, don't ask how I found it.)
While your key point here is from a girl's perspective, it seems to fit more-or-less the other way round too. It's certainly something for me to keep in mind in a few years time.
Jess, this is very true. I do the same thing a lot of times with guys, and end up regretting it later.
Lizzie, the whole "does God want me to be single" thing is a point of confusion to some extent. One of my friends here was talking to her best friend about this, and he pulled out his bible and flipped to genisis, where God created Adam. He said that it was not good that Adam was alone, and so he created a counter-part for him. Even though Adam had God, it wasn't enough. My confusion with this is whether this applies to marriage or friendships. Clearly it's not good for man to go through life alone, but does that apply to a marriage as well?
Lizzie - Ah, yes...that dreaded singleness. But Allie is right (BTW Allison....I thought you had fallen off the face of the earth! Glad to know you are still alive). It is very confusing about this whole companion thing in Genesis. Still, in...erm...I think it's 1st Corinthians 6...(I could be wrong) Paul talks about how either being married or not being married is okay, because both are used for different purposes by God which are equally good. Plus if you aren't married, it's not like human friends are scarce or anything. Still, like most people, the idea of not marrying and having kids is not something I even want to consider. But it's like you wrote in an old blog entry about what a friend of an author of a book about courtship-stuff said "I am called to singleness....today." It may change tomorrow. *crosses fingers* :P
Jos - Yes, you got it right. Trouting" is a "code word" for "dating"...I think it was slightly established as meaning courtship as well, though I never specified. I am curious as to how you found the old post...I tried doing a blog search on here myself on "trouting" and found nothing but this entry. If you ever feel so inclined as to explain yourself, I'm listening.
The idea was to deter you from asking because it would be a long, and worst of all boring, explanation. However, since you asked so nicely...
I did a Google search for: site:jblog08.blogspot.com trouting, which does a search of jblog08.blogspot.com for the word "trouting". The search comes up with two results. One is really short ("A Few of my Favorite Things"), the other is really long ("Compromise or Contingent?"). Since there was nothing about trouting on the short page (I assume it was your quote at the time the page was indexed), I looked at the long one. I did a page search for "trouting", and came up with your comment about code words. After reading through some of the other comments, I was able to establish that "trouting" probably meant "dating", and a "mango" was a "'relationship'".
I hope that wasn't too boring...
No, actually quite fascinating. :D
Ah, the power of Google! Love it.
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