'No Strings Attached' and the head banging dilemma

In this post, I'm gonna talk about sex and how much I would like it. So I'm betting this post will raise a few eyebrows. But c'mon people, I'm 28 years old and anyone my age who wasn't accidentally abandoned in the forest and living in isolation for the past 20 years would know what it's all about. And even in the forest, you'd eventually see animal humping each other sometime.

I watched this romantic comedy (i.e. romcom) called 'No Strings Attached' online recently.

I normally don't watch rom-coms coz' they all give a highly fluffed up idea of what love is all about. Guy and girl goes through a series of unfortunate events, culminating in guy and girl getting together in the end and living happy ever after. The movie almost always fails to show what happens after they're married, the headaches and heartaches of learning to cope with the other person's annoying behaviours and the REAL process of love, which would be learning to accept and appreciate the other person even through all their annoying behaviours. Plus romcoms make single people feel lonely and miserable. I personally find more fun watching any one of the 'Final Destination' or 'Saw' movies.

But for this movie, I thought the premise was little more interesting. The story goes like this. Girl and guy are old friends. Girl and guy one day decide to 'get it on'. But girl doesn't want a relationship. She freaks at the thought of a relationship. But she likes sex. Therefore girl insists that she and guy only romp and do none of the other romantic stuff, i.e. spooning, cuddling, staring each others eyes. So they become sex friends, otherwise known as f*ck buddies. Guy should be totally ecstatic since most guys enjoy sex and hate the emotional aspect of a relationship coz' they need to be all macho-like and all. But of course, this is a rom-com, and it wouldn't be romantic if guy decided to leave it at that. Nope, he has to fall for the girl and try to convince her to be with him, although she continues to resist. After the rom-com typical series of unfortunate events, girl realizes she loves guy, they get together and live happily ever after. The end. So now you don't need to watch the movie (there aren't any actual sex scenes in it anyway, so especially nothing to see for you guys).

So how would such a movie apply to my life. After all I'm a Christian girl and shouldn't even be thinking of sex until I marry my Mr. Right coz' premarital sex is SINFUL and God will send me the right man eventually as long as I remain patient and continue to serve him faithfully.

Sorry I need a moment.

So here's a slightly different take on my usual griping on my lack of love life. Yes, I would like to meet my so-called 'Mr. Right', enjoy a bit of fluffy romance and wind up married, which will hopefully be happily ever after. I'm a female, this desire is genetically written in my DNA. But these days I'm starting to question the reason why I want a guy.

Do I need a guy for emotional support? Not really. I already mentioned in my previous post that I hate inconveniencing people or making people feel sorry for me, and griping to my man about whatever crap is going on in my life doesn't really help the situatuon. In fact, a man is more likely to be the cause of why I need emotional support. I haven't been in a relationship in years, and I know for a fact that I have spent much less time crying like a baby OUT of a relationship than in one. Of course, I enjoy the time spent with that special someone. But I really hated the times he drove me nearly insane. Being single can be lonely, yes, but I sure as heck am more emotional stable.

Do I need a guy to support me? Not really. I have a job, I don't have a great pay, but it's enough for me to live a pretty comfy life.

Do I need a guy to have kids? Well, obviously I would (unless I go the way of in-vitro fertilization, in which case if I don't do proper research on the history of that sperm, I could end up with the spawn of a retard). But the problem is, I don't even really want kids. Not to say that I totally don't want them or wouldn't consider having them, and I can't say that 5 or 10 years down the line I'd start wishing for the pitter patter of little feet around the house. But right now, I have no desire to go through the 9 months of carrying a growing watermelon in my stomach, suffering the next few months of sleepless nights to feed the kid every few hours, dealing with a potential screamer/ super active kid, then having to put up with their wise cracks when he/ she becomes a teenager. If I do ever decide to have kids, it would be only under two conditions:

1) I am 100% sure that my husband will be actively loving and helping to take care of the kids. Or so help me God if I suffer from post natal depression and start having murderous thoughts.

2) I will not be working until the kid is at least 5 years old, so I can take care of the kid. Unless his or my parents are willing to take care of the kid, and even then, I have to stake out the parents-in-law first and see how many screws they have loose in their heads. I don't even trust me parents completely either... my mum no longer has the energy or patience for it, and my dad taking care of babies? Errrr.... ain't gonna happen. The first 5 years of a child's life are the most crucial, and I sure as heck am not letting some foreign maid take care of my kids for more than one third of his or her young life. So how many guys can afford to support a family on his salary alone these days with costs of everything shooting through the roof?

NOT MANY.

Concluding question. Do I really need a man?

Noooot really.

Having said that, I still really enjoy being with a guy. And as a certain song by Ms. Britney Spears goes, I'm not that innocent. I have 'messed around' with my previous bfs, although to what extent I'll leave that to your wildest imagination. And I enjoyed it. A lot . Really I did. Stop blushing, you know you do too.

So with all that in mind, the concept of romping with a guy while remaining purely friends, with no deep emotional connection as would be expected in an attached relationship, well, doesn't sound too bad. But of course, some of you reading this might be having your jaw dropped right now and ready to call my pastor to sit me down for a good long talk. Being a church-serving Christian girl, something like would more likely than not result in me being kicked out of whatever ministry I'm in. Maybe even kicked from the church.

I'm not about to defend that it's perfectly ok, but since I've been thinking about it here a some other potentially jaw dropping insides from the brain of Carol. Premarital sex is a sin, no doubt it says that in the Bible. I can perfectly understand why, since there are so many risks associated with it (STDs, unwanted babies, emotional distress, yadda yadda yadda). But why is there so much stigma attached to girls (or guys) who do it, as opposed to say.... working on a Sunday? Or a Saturday, which some say is technically the Sabbath Day. Coz' one of the 10 Commandments was not to work on the Sabbath Day but leave it as a day of rest. But no one prays for your repentance if you work on a Sunday or Saturday. It's perfectly fine. Pre-marital sex is not listed anywhere on the 10 Commandments, by the way. Adultery is, but that's not the same thing, although some wise guys would argue that premarital sex is akin to cheating on your future partner. Right. So what if I don't ever get married or I can't find my mysterious Mr. Right then, eh, wise guys?

And then there's this verse in 1 Corinthians 7:8-9 which says "Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do. But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion."

Which really blows my mind when I think about coz' it kinda saying if you really want intimacy and sex, then just go and get married to someone so you can bonk 'em silly. O_O

Obviously isn't as simple as that. I mean, if you're gonna be stuck with a person for the rest of your life, you'd at least wanna make pretty sure you know what you're getting into instead of being guided by the amount of blood that pumps into your southern regions. And I'm finding the older I get, the more picky I'm getting with my potential life partners. And I have a very strange dilemma when in comes to choosing men.

I still consider being with a Christian guy very important, hence I am very likely to reject a non-Christian guy (Unless he's really hot, has awesome character and lots of money. In which case there would be tons of other girls lining up for him and I wouldn't have a chance anyway) However, I'm not a very gung-ho, full steam ahead, totally-trust-in-God kind of Christian. I have a bit of a flailing faith, but not one I will give up on anytime soon. So when I do meet a Christian guy I like, but I think he's every bit as pathetic in his walk with God as I am, I feel a bit hesitant in going for him since I know we'll just be flailing around in our faith together and neither will grow spiritually. I kinda want a Christian who can and will challenge me spiritually and give me that push in the right direction, make me see and learn things about my faith I never knew before. BUT THEN, when I do find such a guy I admire.... I STILL am hesitant to make a move. Coz' then I think.... what the heck would I have to offer this guy? If my faith is pathetic and he is full steam ahead, wouldn't I just drag him down and discourage him? I knew the previous guy who had a thing for me had a REALLY 'lalang' character...he went along with everyone I said or did, and I knew I could push him around to my liking easily.... I couldn't stand him coz' I know I'm not highly dominating, but I can take on a dominating role around submissive people. But I DO NOT WANT to be in a relationship with a submissive man!

So that taught me that one of the things I'd really want in a guy is someone who is a leader and opinionated. And with such a guy I wouldn't mind taking on the role of 'supporting gf/ wife'. But again, with the flailing faith... I do question that if I ever did snag myself such a guy... would I really be the kind of support to that guy that I should be? So I'm also afraid of being with a man of strong Christian faith... simply because I'm afraid I'll bring him down.

So I probably won't take a Christian guy, I don't really like Christian guys of average faith and I'm afraid of bringing down a guy of strong Christian faith even though that's the guy I want. That just about eliminates all men in the world as the right partner for me. Plus, even if I do find someone 'perfect' for me, it's no use if he doesn't reciprocate the feelings. And yet even if I never get married for all these reasons, because the Bible says so and the church disapproves of it, I still can't enjoy intimacy or sex with a guy even though God also created humans with hormones.

Allow me to take another moment.

From emo to self-analysis to OK

For those who thought that girls only know how to drown their sorrows with girly bitching sessions, chocolate and shopping, here's the all new Facebook approved method:

I wanted to write this post yesterday coz' yesterday was an emo day and I wanted to bitch about it, but it got late and I didn't manage to finish it on time. So the emo post got postponed to today... but it ends a little more positively than I originally intended it to.

Anyway, the reason for my emo-ness was the thought that I am severely lacking in close friends. Not that the thought just occured to me, I of course have been aware of this for a long time and understand that the reason for is mostly my own doing. But what happened yesterday is that I was really excited about something and so I emailed a whole bunch of friends about the news, at least 40 of them, thinking that this would be such a cool thing that that I'd be swamped with responses from my friends wanting to join in the fun.

After 24 hours, I got 3 responses from the first group of about 10 friends I emailed, which was ok.... but from the other group of 30, there was not ONE response. Which I found quite strange, since I'm sure not at least some of them would have checked their emails. I did get one person from that group who responded to me through Facebook....one of the few people I consider a pretty good friend. But not one direct reply to the email. Then I was logged into Facebook and saw one of my friends had posted the same news on her profile, and she was practically swamped with responses.

So the lack of enthusiasm to my email could be due to a great deal of factors (they could have been too busy to reply, haven't seen the email, etc, etc), I just got the feeling that one of the more likely reasons was that the many people I shared this with just isn't close enough to me to give a damn about responding.

Hence I sad. Sad because it's like I meet all these people on a regular basis and it was like not even ONE person could bother to reply to me (even until today, which is 2 days later... zero responses from group 2). And I figured that the main reason for the lack of response was because I am not close to any of these people.

I usually hang out with my big group of friends in a group... and in a group, all talk is small talk. In other words, I never get down to talking with these people about personal things, sharing our 'heart', knowing the crap that is going on in each others lives, it's usually frivolous topics of discussion. I would define a 'close' friend as someone I sit down with one to one every now and then and chat about anything with, including personal topics, without feeling weird about it. There are very few people whom I actually do this with, and even with these few people, I rarely ever take the time to time to meet up with with them for one to one chats. And even with these few people, I don't actually talk about my personal life unless someone asks me something related to it, or somehow the discussion leads to it and I have an excuse to bitch about the crappy things going on in my life. I've been asked before if I had a BEST friend...which I would define a 'best friend' as someone I can call up any hour of the day, say I have a problem and I wanna talk about it and that person will listen to me as long as it takes without thinking it's weird, and vice versa. But to that question, I just kinda blinked for a while and said I don't have a best friend.

I've done a lot of self-analyzing to figure out why I've come to this state. I figure one reason is because a long time ago I did know people I considered my 'best friend'.... until I realized they didn't think the same of me, and I was left being ignored by them. This was one of those experiences that made me learn from an early age that trusting too much in people can result in them disappointing me, and I've said it before that I hate the feeling of being disappointed.

Another 2 reasons is that I hate inconveniencing people and I don't like people feeling sorry for me. I calling up a friend just because I want to talk about something crappy going on in my life is only going to result in one or the other. Either the person doesn't give a hoot about my problem and feels inconvenienced by my whining which is taking up his or her previous time. OR they will feel sorry for me but most likely they can't do anything about the problem anyway, so I would have just made them feel a bit crappy too without getting the problem solved and that really doesn't help anyone. I fail to see the point in either. Even in that FB thread, when I was asked to explain why I was emo, I gave one silly response which didn't answer the question. My typical deflective mechanism which means people won't feel inconvenienced or sorry for me, but they have no idea still what ticking in my brain.

So for the most part, I've been pretty ok being this way. But on occasion I do feel crappy about the way it is, and yesterday was one of those days. As much as I want to protect myself from being disappointed by people, the fact of the matter is I think everyone needs to be able to talk to someone about the tough, personal, emotionally inconveniencing topics every now and then. Even people I know who claim they are not a 'people person' enjoy the occasional long conversation with people they are very close to. Far as I'm concerned there's no such thing as a non-people person... just people who want to protect themselves from getting hurt by misplacing trust in the wrong people.

Anyway, I spent almost the whole day feeling kinda miserable about the depressing thought of having so few close friends, thinking about everything I was blabbering about above and thinking I should just forget about that 'cool' thing I wanted to do since the response was close to dead.

Fortunately, the good thing about me is that I've somehow or another mastered the art of picking myself up when I feel like crap. And after the whole self-analysis session, I figure that since my current state of lack of close friends is due to my own behaviour, why on earth can't I stop being miserable about it and just change my behaviour? If I want to talk to people, instead on waiting around and hoping someone would be ma 'friend' I oughtta get out there and talk to them first.

However, the first matter at hand was to deal with the lack of response to my email. So today I upped and called a whole bunch of people I emailed one by one to ask if they wanted to join this thing or not. And it turns out quite a few of them were interested, and just as I initially suspected (if my emo-ness hadn't taken over), some were just too busy to reply. So I now have a group of people to join this cool thing which I'm sure will be the bomb, and I was glad to report this on my earlier Facebook thread ....

By the way, if you're someone I know who actually took the time to read through my incessantly long waffling and suffer the same emo issues as me, just gimme a holler anytime so we can go out for coffee and bitch about life. ^_^