Long List of Ex Lovers

Disclaimer:  No boys were hurt in the making of this post, ok maybe just one or two (I kid).

      I have dated every type of guy there is and loved just about as many of them.  I claim to be a cold hearted, love hating, and black soul bearing girl when it comes to romance, but truthfully I see the best in people. I have taken a flying leap of faith for guys more often than I care to admit.  With that in mind, I would like to introduce to you to my long list of ex-lovers (well some of the more memorable ones I should say).  I loved and lost and while some of them I had relationships with and some were boys I just couldn't make stick around they all have a story or better yet a song.  I hope you find my trials and tribulations an inspiration to keep kissing boys or girls or both to find your love story.  After all Taylor Swift got hers.

Continue to share your heart with people even if it has been broken.

-Amy Poehler, Harvard Speech

Fifteen: When you are 15 and somebody tells you they love you, you're going to believe them.  He was my first everything.  At 15 then 16 I thought he was it.   Baseball star and the boy who called me out on my not so black heart, the first boy I flew across a country for, and the first boy to break my heart.  From NM to FL he was my teenage love story that set the tone for years and years to come.  Back then I swore I was going to marry him someday but I realized some bigger dreams of mine.  Cause when you're 15 you give everything you have to boys who change their minds.

We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together:  This is just exhausting.  Everyone will date someone who you seem to constantly have in your life.  You dated, then became friends, talked about dating again, dated other people, are still friends, and then talk about dating again.  You have so much history and you've been there for each other through the best times and the worst, but eventually you wake up and realize your "relationship" is exhausting and gosh always so dramatic.  At this point, you have to just spare each others feelings and say you are never ever ever getting back together like ever.

Innocent: Every girl will at some point date a bad boy, mine was rock n roll dream.  Problem with bad boys is they are filled with trouble.  But I learned to just sit back and enjoy the music, to live with a certain amount of passion from him.  It was a brief moment shared, but I know I will always find him in certain towns on buses with bands.  Just know, your string of lights is still bright to me, Oh, who you are is not what you've been.  You're still an innocent.  It's okay, life is a tough crowd, 32, and still growin' up now, who you are is not what you did. You're still an innocent. Time turns flames to embers.  You'll have new Septembers, every one of us has messed up too. Minds change like the weather I hope you remember today is never too late to be brand new.

Begin Again: There I was all dressed in black staring out the window silently hoping no one would sit next to me when you stopped and asked if the seat was taken.  I took one look at you and knew this was going to be an interesting flight.  I was going to Chicago, first time back since moving and you were heading home.  You thought I was funny and said you'd never met a girl quite like me.  We talk about your soccer career and whiskey and our families like we were catching up over coffee.  You offer to get my bags for me and grab me a cab and you have no idea how nice that is.  I say goodbye and you kiss my cheek and just like that I watched it begin again.  I'd spent the last 8 months thinking all love ever does is break and burn and end but on that day on a plane, I watched it begin again.

Bad Blood:  You were the nice guy till you weren't.    My parents loved you, always a gentleman, held my hand, opened doors, and smiled at me like I was something more.  Smooth on TV and smooth with me.  Last time I saw you I thought we actually stood a chance.   Bandaids don't fix bullet holes, you love like that blood runs cold.  It used to be mad love so take a look, a look what you've done because baby now we got bad blood.  If you're coming my way just don't.

I’m just not interested in the things that won’t last forever.

-	John Mayer ( Interview: ‘Recovered Ego Addict’)

Clean:  You told my best friend you were in love with me so I took a chance on the boy who was supposed to be "the nice guy", it was snowing and I realized I was falling, then it was spring and I was sure of you.  You never let me hold the umbrella because when I did you ended up wet, I taught you that cerulean was a color and danced around your bedroom to Fleetwood Mac.  Summer came with one sided I love you's but with fireworks in July came hope with your arms wrapped around me and the pictures to prove it, until August when you said goodbye.  It was months and months of back and forth, you were all over me like a wine-stained dress I can't wear anymore.  Hung my head, as I lost the war and the sky, turned black like a perfect storm.  10 months sober I must admit just because you're clean don't mean you don't miss it.  

Dear John/ Wonderland:  Flashing lights and we took a wrong turn and we fell down a rabbit hole.  You held on tight to me because nothing is as it seems.  We found wonderland you and I got lost in it and life was never worse but never better.  I reached for you, but you were gone.  You search the world for something else that makes you feel like what we had, and in the end in Wonderland we both went mad.  It was the first day of my new life when you introduced yourself to me, then the next day you surprised me by remembering me.  Weeks passed with quick hellos and I never would've thought that a month later I would be making you fall in love with New York.  Serendipity, kisses on street corners, eating our way through NYC and conversations about everything we wanted out of life.  I showed you all the places that inspired me and little did you know you'd inspire me too.  I finally thought I had got it right.  I will miss our conversations and hell I'll miss you.  You call yourself a monster, but I know deep down you're just scared to try.  I should've listened to your warnings, should've never given you too much time, but I saw how good, good could be and ignored all the warning signs.  And you'll add my name to the long list of others who just don't understand and I'll look back and regret not listening when they said run as fast as you can.  You are an expert at "sorry" and keeping lines blurry.  (I'll see you in an airport someday)

You will kiss hundreds of frogs, you will cry millions of tears, and you will have thousands of adventures in the search of love.  Fight for love and love all the stupid boys even if just for a minute.  I promise you every jerk who breaks your heart will teach you a lesson about yourself and while you might lose the boy, I hope you find yourself, and I hope that just like for me that somehow that is everything.

If you gotta force it, just leave it alone. Relationships, friendships, ponytails.. Just leave it.

-Reyna Biddy xxx B

Thank you, Taylor Swift,  for writing exactly what all of us girls think and feel!

Dark and Twisty

Here’s the thing when I left Chicago I couldn’t admit that I was really leaving.  I all of a sudden felt this need to be logical and practical so quickly I pushed everything I loved to one side and gave it zero value because obviously the fact that I was throwing away money on rent and not finding full time employment that paid the bills trumped everything.   I convinced myself that Chicago was not for me and had a whole slew of reasons why in case anyone questioned my logic.  I had it worked down to a single speech I could give with little variation to anyone who asked or made me feel as though I needed to justify what I was doing.   I told people coming home was my sabbatical, wouldn’t last longer than a year and I just needed a moment to myself to figure out what I wanted out of life.  The next thing I knew I was having my last meal in Chicago with my best friend then standing in an airport filled with the sense that I wasn't making the right decision and just waiting for a sign to not go, I needed a grand gesture.  It never came and I boarded that plane home.  Unfortunately I probably should’ve bought a ticket to Bali if clearing my head was really what I wanted.  Truth be told I know exactly what I want, everything.  And now every time I give my little speech to people shocked by my return home I feel a tinge of pain.  Leaving Chicago was the worst and best thing I ever did, because I realized I should’ve stayed and ultimately I have to stop running because in the words of Holly Golightly: no matter how far you run, you always run into yourself.   One month after leaving, I was faced with the chance to go back, I turned it down because yet again when practicality was weighed it didn't add up.  I would sell my soul to get out of New Mexico again but something has me wondering should I take the leap?  A year ago I was planning moves to NYC, maybe Paris, and then settled on Chicago without even a second thought so why now am I so concerned with what is and is not “practical”?  I am the opposite of practical by any definition; I wear ball gowns to brunch and can justify $400 shoes  For the first time in my life I can’t trust my heart, and I am a lead with your heart and tell your head to figure it out kind of person.   So the biggest question here is what happened in a year that messed me up so much? 

Claudia Schiffer in Look at Claudia for Vogue Italia, March 2009 by Patrick Demarchelier Styled by Patti Wilson

I am not sure if somewhere along the way I lost my unending self-confidence and belief that I was made for something larger, maybe I let the practical people in my life get into my head, maybe somewhere along the way I was told too many times that I have my head way too far up in the clouds.  I think perhaps I did the unthinkable and grew up and forgot those childish fantasies filled with whimsy and courage.  I think I forgot fairytales exist and like my brother said became colder than Chicago.  I have always been a little dark and twisty inside but I worry the dark over came all the glitter and gold. 

I refuse to settle, for a life less than extraordinary, for a man who isn’t ride or die, for a city who is never setting a higher standard, and for a job that doesn’t evoke passion every single day.   I will find that girl who was glitter and gold and fancy full of whimsy.  And I won’t find her here.  So here’s to throwing caution into the wind, saying yes, and learning how to believe in a world where I can have it all again.  I can tell I am on the brink of something extraordinary, I can feel it in my bones and in my heart. 

XXX

B

Ps.  To my littlest Knicks I know I said you would be in my next post but it took a turn and I promise on French fries and Red wine you will get your post! Love you