Dec. 2, 2002
How to Get Over Your Ex

Like grief, there are several steps that must be taken if you want to get over your ex.  Everyone knows the five stages of grief, of course.  They are:  denial, anger, um… OK, I forget what they are, but you end up with acceptance, I think.  Anyway, there are five stages of getting over an ex-boyfriend, too.  Here they are, neatly laid out for your reference, should you ever need them. 

1)      Analysis

First, you count up all the ways in which you were not compatible and think about how the two of you never could have pulled off living together, let alone marriage.  (You are determined to find this comforting even though you don't want to get married anyway.)  You realize how lucky it is that the break-up happened now and not two years from now.  And just think how much free time you’ll have!  You pat yourself on the back for how far you’ve come.  You cried over your last boyfriend for months, but look at you now!  So healthy!  So mature!  You’ve finally got your old relationship neuroses licked. 

2)      Self-Pity

After the brief but empowering week of phase 1, you sink slowly into the heart of phase 2.  You cry over movies and TV shows that involve happy couples, yet you can’t stop watching them.  You cry over waking up alone.  You run to the bathroom at work, mortified because something reminded you of your boyfriend and you have to go cry, right now.  If you have any nasty habits, like overeating, drinking, drugs, sex with strangers, etc., now is the time to bust them out.  This phase, unfortunately, lasts for quite a while.  Months.  It totally sucks.  You vow to remember how much it sucks so that, next time, you won’t let first kisses and romantic dates trick you into getting involved in a relationship because it always leads to this in the end.  Also:

a)      Call all of your ex-boyfriends and ask them to please tell you what is wrong with you because you would just like to know.  Refuse to get off the phone with them until they give you something you can work with.

b)      Call all of your friends who are involved in blissfully happy relationships and ask them to tell you the bedtime fairytale story about how there’s nothing wrong with you and you just haven’t met the right person yet.

IMPORTANT:  do not mix up a and b.  Your friends may take advantage of the opportunity to tell you about some little thing that’s always bugged them about you, and asking ex-boyfriends for bedtime stories only brings out their sadistic side (i.e. "Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess.  Then there was this guy walking down the street.  They both died.  The end"). 

3)      Moving On – Baby Steps

You snap out of phase 2 as though waking from a long coma.  You feel great!  You buy yourself a couple of cute outfits and go into vixen mode, flirting madly with every guy who crosses your path.  This phase is sadly short-lived, as you soon realize that every guy who crosses your path is in a relationship except for two, and you’ve already dated them.  You vow to find a way to meet new guys, which somehow leads to phase 4: 

4)      Self-Reinvention

Every women’s magazine on the planet will give you the same advice, and it is this:  "If you are going to change your look drastically with a new haircut or hair color, for the love of God, don’t do it right after a break-up!"  Despite this very sound advice, you will drastically change your hair during this phase.  You can listen to the advice all you want; it won’t take.  Self-reinvention is an important step in the process, and you can’t skip it just because you know in your heart that you’re about to do something stupid that you’ll have to live with for at least the next six months.  So go ahead.  Get the purple hair dye.  Do it yourself.  Get it all over the sink.  Realize that you look like you dipped your hair in ink, which is basically what you did do.  Catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror at work the next day and realize the following:

a)      You are going to have to buy all new cosmetics because the colors that looked so good with your natural hair color are not working with the purple.

b)      Because you did it yourself, with no help, professional or otherwise, your hair color is rather patchy and uneven.  You tell yourself that you look tough, like a riot grrl.  You despair as you realize just how long it’s been since it was cool to look like a riot grrl.  You realize your purple hair is not making you look a single second younger than you are.  You may be making misguided fashion choices in a lame attempt to get over your ex, but you’re an adult now.  There’s just no getting around it.

c)      Because you gained so much weight during phase 2, you now look like the fat girl who has dyed her hair in a sad attempt to distract attention from her weight.  You haven’t been the fat girl in a long time.  It’s almost nostalgic.  Decide to eat pizza and ice cream for dinner since the damage has already been done. 

5)      Acceptance

When your ex calls and asks if you want to have dinner, realize that you'd actually quite like to see him.  Accept.  Meet him at the place where you had your very first date.  Smile when you realize that you hadn’t even recognized the significance of the location when you planned to meet there.  Be glad to see him.  Realize he’s glad to see you.  Be genuinely happy for him when he tells you about his plans.  Realize he’s happy for you, too.  Make plans to get together again soon.  Mean it.  Drive away with a new friend for life (and someone you can call when your next boyfriend dumps you and you need to know what’s wrong with you.)  Smile with just a hint of a sigh.  You did it!  Give yourself a high-five.  Realize it’s depressing to have to give yourself a high-five.  But go ahead and give yourself a high-five anyway, and take a few minutes to enjoy your moment of triumph before you have to launch into the next tedious steps of your dating life:  the "How to Have More On Your Mind Than Boys" process, the "How to Prepare for Dying Alone" process and the "How to Find a New Boyfriend So As Not to Die Alone" process.  In fact, why don’t you just skip ‘em altogether?  Fuck it.  Go see a movie. 

Lest you think I’ve been down in the dumps lately, everything above is old news, OK?  Now it’s the holidays, and I’m excited because I love this time of a year, no matter how much of a pain in the butt it might be.  I love watching the little kids in the mall jump up and down in line for Santa, realizing that all of this Christmas magic is just for them.  I love the way desserts just magically appear on the break table at work every day.  I love the way everything’s all sparkly and obnoxious and bright.  Call me tacky, but I can’t get enough.   

Last week was Thanksgiving, a holiday I spent happily at the Petersons’ house, eating mountains of food (just when I would think I was finished eating, more would appear!), playing some guitar, and watching approximately 10 hours of reruns of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  I’ve been the stray at many a Thanksgiving dinner (Fredericksburg is a 10-hour drive, and I always figure I’ll see my family in a month at Christmas anyway), and it doesn’t get much better than that!  It put me in the mood to count my blessings (which some people tell me is the point of Thanksgiving, rather than turkey and rolls), so here’s my list of what I’m thankful for: 

1)      My voice.  Sounds egotistical, right?  But seriously, I’m thankful for it.  I take it for granted most of the time.  I spend all my time with other musicians, trying to figure out how to be better at what I do, and I forget that there are people who can’t do it nearly as easily as I can.  I’m thankful that I inherited my mother’s voice:  strong and clear, with miles of range.  I’m thankful that I’ve had excellent teachers all my life who have taught me that singing is more listening than anything else.  When I sing a caroling gig with friends who are also excellent singers and our voices lift into the sky and little children coming around the corner stare at us like it’s magic, I’m thankful.  Not everyone can do what I do, and I forget that.  People tell me, "I wish I could sing like that," and I used to shrug it off, say, "Oh, anyone can sing, you just have to practice" (which is true, really), but now I just say, "Thank you" and let the words sink in.  In the past couple of years, I’ve finally learned to take a compliment, and I’m thankful for that, too. 

2)      My friends.  This one’s more obvious to me because I never take my friends for granted.  I didn’t make friends easily when I was a kid, and each one still feels like a miracle.  That first shock of recognition when you realize that you’re talking to a kindred spirit (just because you both had the same lunchbox when you were kids or because you both remember some obscure 80’s song).  The subsequent "crush" phase when you want to invite each other everywhere you go.  The deeper bonding phase when you both ditch your "funny and cool" acts and share all your deep, dark secrets.  The realization that you’re going to have to find a place for your birthday party that’ll hold 100 people because you’ve somehow managed to assemble such a magnificent collection of awesome friends.  Yeah.  I’m a lucky girl. 

3)      My family.  Kind of the same as the friends, but not quite.  I come from them.  They are part of me.  Friends you can choose, but you don’t get to choose your family.  For that reason, my family makes me feel even luckier than my friends do.  Of all the people in the world to belong to, I got Fletchers and Smiths.  Jackpot! 

4)      My job.  Those of you who have heard me complain about my job almost constantly for the past six months are laughing, but actually, I’m thankful for the job I have.  I saw a woman cleaning the brass on the door of the Bank of America building tonight, and I shuddered in sympathy.  When I worked at The Depot (a campus eatery) in college, I had to polish the brass.  It took forever, and the cleaning stuff smelled terrible.  I’m thankful that my current job does not involve brass cleaning.  I’m also thankful that it doesn’t involve picking up trash, using tools, wearing a uniform, driving a truck, or caring for animals.  It’s easy to complain about my job – complaining is my superpower, after all – but I’ve actually got it really good.  Plenty of people don’t even have the option of a boring day job with a steady paycheck (why you need a college degree to answer a phone and do data entry is beyond me, but there it is), and I do.  Lucky.  Thankful. 

5)      Music.  Kind of like saying "air," but still.  Can you imagine the world without it?  Go on, try.  

In closing, I’ll sing you the chorus from my Thanksgiving song: 

I know the rain’ll come down.  I’m thankful for it.
I know the sun’ll shine on.  I’m thankful for it.
I know the winter is long.  I’m thankful for it.
I know the summer will come.  I’m thankful, I’m thankful.

What’s in my stereo at home: