One Year Later - A Successful Resolution

I've heard the road is paved with good intentions.

But never underwear.

That's exactly what littered the concrete lanes of I-471 southbound this afternoon - little grubby bits of wet, dirty laundry smack dab on top of the dotted line between the left and middle lanes.

I thought about the dirty laundry and wondered who it belonged to, where it was warn. All those pieces of striped cotton and stonewashed denim and damp, dirty, white t-shirts, just abandoned in the roadway, left for someone else to claim.

Sometimes I kind of feel like a forgotten t-shirt that nobody cared enough about to turn around and pick up.

Unless you've been a long time reader of the blog, you probably haven't noticed a shift in my conversation. The fact is, I used to write a lot a lot about the aches and pains of being a single chick. I used to blog about my foibles and follies in dating, sometimes with especially revealing posts of my deepest concerns and pains and heartaches.

My silent New Year's resolution of 2007 was that I wasn't going to reveal those insecurities for all the world to see. I kind of eluded to the ban in this post about a year ago, and here's a look at the last time I really blogged about those uneasy disappointments of being single.

One year after the ban, I definitely have cultivated some healthy feelings about my sans-plus one status. This New Year's Eve, I remember thinking about how much I'm enjoying playing this game of Life according to my own rules - not having to compromise. Not having to stay in and take care of the kids while the rest of the world goes out to dinner, goes out the comedy club, goes out to the movies.

I caught three different flicks today, and each made me reflect on my singleness.

The first - the unofficial official movie of the single girls' movement - the epic film that uncovers the pathetic secrets of a woman living alone.

I love Bridget Jones' Diary. Bridg dreams of love - a little of the physical kind, but mostly she dreams of having a meaningful, caring relationship with a man whom she can trust.

That Hugh Grant character puts a kink in all that.

As much as I am in lust with HG (he fluctuates between number two and number three in my Top Five), the Colin Firth character is the real winner in the flick. Mark Darcy melts every woman's heart when he reveals just how much he cares about Bridget.

Mark Darcy: "I don't think you're an idiot at all. I mean, there are elements of the ridiculous about you. Your mother's pretty interesting. And you really are an appallingly bad public speaker. And, um, you tend to let whatever's in your head come out of your mouth without much consideration of the consequences... But the thing is, um, what I'm trying to say, very inarticulately, is that, um, in fact, perhaps despite appearances, I like you, very much. Just as you are."

Just as you are. How fucking wonderful is that?

I headed to Newport to see Charlie Wilson's War this afternoon and let me skip over the film's political and international implications and focus on this man's pathetic solitude. Charlie Wilson was a single Texas congressman who lived the heyday of his years without a steady companion. Sure, he was surrounded by a bevy of beautiful boobs and bums, but Wilson was conspicuously missing an emotional confidante, a partner with whom he could share his triumphs and tragedies.

I stuck around and saw Juno great flick and had my faith restored in the purity and beauty of true love.

Juno MacGuff: I think I'm, like, in love with you.
Paulie Bleeker: You mean as friends?
Juno MacGuff: No, I mean, like, for real. 'Cause you're, like, the coolest person I've ever met, and you don't even have to try, you know...
Paulie Bleeker: I try really hard, actually.

What a wonderful kind of love - a passion shared between two best friends.

I want to fall in love with someone just as they are, warts and all. And I'm certain I want someone to fall in love with all of me, too. I want someone to love it when I sing too loud around the house, or when I toss out sexual innuendo. I want to find a man who loves it when I dance around to OAR's Crazy Game of Poker.

I want to find a man who loves the essence of me - the good, the bad and the ugly. And I want to love a man for all that he is and isn't, too.

He's out there - the man who'll make me feel like a million dollar suit as opposed to a wet, dirty t-shirt left on the highway.

I guess that's one reason why I'm a hopeful romantic. You'll notice I didn't say hopeless. I've got a lot of hope that I'll find my one true love.

Until then, I intend on doing a lot of fun, kick ass stuff on my own.