Stamped: April 17th, 2007 | Toggle Similar
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My post today is lighthearted and fun but I wanted to say that my heart goes out to everyone at Virginia Tech. It's an awful, awful tragedy and my thoughts are with them.

Now for an awkward transition into my blog for today.

She keyed your car and cloroxed all your clothes. He fucked your best friend in your bed, on your couch, and on top of the stove in your kitchen. You’ve been in almost four serious relationships since graduating college and they’ve all ended because “you have issues, and I’m not at a point to deal with them right now.”

“Welcome to my baggage.”

That’s one phrase that I’ve learned since moving to New York three years ago. One that has stayed with me, and one that I usually have to use during the course of the relationships I’ve had here in the city.

New York is a city full of selfish people. We want what we want when we want it how we want it. We want bigger and better. Success by the age of 30 is not an option but a requirement of citizenship. We arrive with BAs, MBAs, and ABJs in advertising, business and communications in hand, ready to conquer the world. We want the duplex in Tribeca, the SoHo loft, the West Village townhouse, and we want it now. If we wanted mediocrity we would have stayed in the mundane suburbia of whatever second-tier city we migrated from. With so many Type-As crammed into a space as small as Manhattan the issue-laden abound and chances are that guy you met at your friend’s art opening has baggage spilling out of his ass.

Unless you’re twelve and embarking on your first quasi-meaningful relationship, every date you have from here on out will more than likely be with someone who has, for lack of a better term—“some baggage.” Once we’ve reached our mid-twenties it’s highly improbable that we will be anyone’s “first love.” Lest you forget, your first love happened back when you accidentally lost your virginity at age sixteen in the rec room of your first boyfriend, who definitely wasn’t your boyfriend at the time but did introduce you to the fact that kool-aid and vodka don’t and never will mix. By 25, we’ve had high school sweethearts and college romances and more than a few broken hearts So don’t bank on that new amazing person you’ve been seeing for two weeks to be completely issue-free. There’s always a psycho ex somewhere in the back story of two years ago and there’s always The Reason Behind The Divorce. Add to these various issues and veritable pounds of baggage the fact that I along with a few million other single kiddies are living in New York City and it's easy to see why everyone here complains about dating. To the naked eye we are a city of self-centered egocentric social climbers who stop at nothing until everything we touch is coated in success even if that means stepping on the hands of a few hundred toddlers in the process. We stop at nothing to get what we want. Which explains why so many of us are still single. We go into possible relationships knowing that our last boyfriend cheated because he was an asshole and also because in the last year of the relationship, we ceased communication which was one of the reasons he started sleeping with his coworker. But still we expect Mr. Right Now to have absolutely no Miss Used To Bes slouching around in the background leaving quasi-psychotic messages on his machine. We expect him or her to be glistening with perfection, doing all the right things, all the right way.

It’s here that we take a little detour into Reality. Relationships are about growing. You meet, you like. You like some things a lot, other things not so much. You break up because things aren’t right and you start again. The mistake most of us make when starting again is simply not remembering what led to the last break up. True, all relationships are different but by the time a person reaches the quarter century mark, your personality, your self is pretty much in tact and or pretty close to where it needs to be, for better or for worse. This baggage that we take from boyfriend to boyfriend, or girlfriend to girlfriend, we need to view this not as something that’s holding us back and weighing us down. It’s not some burden to bear. Baggage is just the accumulation of knowledge gleaned from prior experience. Learn from your past and know that it’s okay to have one. Recognizing one’s own faults is the first step in being able to accept another’s. Everyone’s got some kind of baggage and accepting only perfection will lead to a lifetime of unfulfilled expectations. As I stated before, relationships are about growing. Instead of prefacing a conversation with “Welcome to my baggage” while you’re at Cipriani with some new hot cassanova, why not try “Hey—I’m a real person, with real issues and if we’re going to be in this together, you have to take me, the good and the bad. . . .and I have to take you too.”
Only try not and let that come out on the first date because no one is into that kind of talk right away.

Last 5 posts by Brandy

• Hell House - November 9th, 2007
• 36 going on 11 - October 9th, 2007
• College was a good time. - September 25th, 2007
• I'm the easiet girl ever to break up with - September 18th, 2007
• Christmas Lights - August 28th, 2007