Facebook Is For Stalkers

I have a confession. I am a terrible procrastinator. There is not a project, deadline, or appointment that I cannot justify putting off. Homework? Nah, it’s time to reorganize my junk drawer. I have to be at work in an hour? Sounds like a great time to alphabetize my CDs. However, there is nothing, absolutely nothing, that sucks up my time like the internet. I can burn up some serious hours on my computer. Online arcade games, random personality tests, Youtube. Yeah, I do it all. Out of the millions of websites out there though, one website claims more of my time than all the others put together. Facebook, ladies, is my own personal black hole. I’ve spent enough time on FB that I ought to be compensated ….. Or have my computer taken away.

Now, I know I may have a problem, but I am not the only one. We all do it. Facebook is addictive. We start off slowly. We update our status, check our friend’s profiles, maybe a video or two. Next thing we know we are looking at photos of our college roommate’s best friend’s wedding. Why? How did we get here? Do we really care about these people? Do we even actually KNOW these people? Did I really just spend two hours on this website? Shit, I’m late for work.

If we are not reading about the lives of people we barely know, then we can be found looking at the pages of people we do know. Close friends, family members, and …. Um, I don’t know …. Ex-boyfriends, maybe? It’s hard not to take the occasional peak, right? We didn’t really leave them on our friends’ list just to send happy birthday messages. There is always going to be a part of us that is curious of what they are up to. We can’t help it. If you love someone there will always be a connection there. We may hate the bastards, but we still want to know what they are up to. Thank God Facebook is here to help us with that. However, even though it’s easy for us to check up on our exes; is it healthy for us?

Moving on after a break-up can be very difficult; especially if we weren’t the ones who wanted to split up. It’s easy to get stuck in the past. It’s even easier when we can summon up our ex with the click of a mouse. I am just as guilty of this as anyone else. When the Bartender disappeared suddenly from my life I was pretty crushed. I tried to comfort myself with thoughts of him falling off of a cliff or wandering around with serious head trauma that had caused amnesia. Facebook ruined the fantasy for me though. The Bartender had recently signed up on FB and was in my friend list. If he wasn’t going to tell me where he went, perhaps his profile would.

Looking back, I think deep down I knew that checking his profile was a bad idea. I knew there was nothing on there that was going to make me happy or understand why he pulled such a dick move. But I went and did it anyway … again and again. Just as my inner voice had warned; there was nothing good written on his account. No posts about him missing me, no comments from friends asking how he could do such a thing to the best girlfriend he’s ever had, no pictures of him crying his eyes out. Nada. Nothing. Zip. There were, however, posts about him having a great time at Six Flags just days after he went missing. Seriously?!? I’m home, moping on my couch, surrounded by tear-stained tissues and Chinese take-out, and Houdini is off riding Superman? What the fuck?

There were pictures too. You guessed it …. I looked. My favorites must have been from the Fourth of July party he had thrown when I was still under the impression that we were dating. No …. I was not invited. In each and every picture the Bartender looked quite happy and content. Look – there he is smiling with a beer. Look – there is the Bartender laughing with friends. Wait a minute – there is the Bartender with his crazy ex-girlfriend he swore he couldn’t stand. Move out of the way …. I’m going to be sick.

Although I can blame the Bartender for many things, I can’t not blame him for my feeling terrible each time I looked at his profile. I knew I shouldn’t have, but I did it anyway. All he was doing was moving forward while I was remaining in the past. Here I am, a reasonably sane adult, willingly torturing myself. And I know I’m not the only one. Many of my girlfriends have done the same thing. We’ve sat on the phone late at night trying to decipher what each status update means. When he says he’s bored does that mean he is bored because life sucks without me? No, ladies, sadly it means he is bored because it is the All-Star break and there are no sports on TV. Guys are simple. They are not sending hidden messages to us via social networking sites.

Eventually, I stopped checking the Bartender’s profile. It came to me mid-click. I needed to stop clinging to a relationship that was over. The Bartender wasn’t checking my profile trying to see what I was up to. He was off living his life. Well, that’s exactly what we need to do ladies. Even though online stalking seems like a harmless pastime, someone is getting hurt. That someone is us. Let’s start using our computers for what God intended; finding awesome shoe sales. Or great concert tickets. Or the next bestseller that is coming out. Anything that makes us feel good and makes us appreciate ourselves for the awesome people we are.

That’s exactly what I did in the end. I went to the Bartender’s profile one last time … to delete him. I’m not going to lie; it was hard. It was also empowering though. This time it was me in the driver’s seat. I was making the decision to let go and, in the end, I’m glad I did. You’ll be glad to. Our future loves are out there ladies, we just need to get off the computer and go find them.

If He Doesn't Own a Car, He Doesn't Deserve You

So here is a little heads up ladies …. If the man you are interested in does not possess a vehicle you need to run away. Fast. Like you are at a sample sale fast. This relationship is not going to end well, but it will end. Most likely with him suddenly disappearing and you broken hearted. Do I sound like I am writing from experience? Good guess. I am.

Let’s call this mistake The Bartender. I had known the Bartender for a while. He had come into my bar randomly here and there. And to be honest, I thought he was an asshole when I met him. First impressions are always right, remember that. However, he was hot. Tall, nice body, all-American hot. I should have just kept him as occasional eye candy that I enjoyed flirting with. But noooooo …. I never make the right decision. I decided to ask him out. Now remember, this is right after the Lump left me, so I was trying to validate my appeal to the opposite sex. He said yes to the invite and we made plans for the next week.

It’s funny, but as we look back on our lives, it’s amazing how certain situations that seem so small at the time end up being monumental occasions, for better or worse. This was definitely in the worse category. I should have never pursued this relationship. It had heartbreak written all over it. Helen Keller could have seen the signs it was so glaringly obvious.

Our first, I guess you would call it, date was on a Tuesday. Bartenders have random days off and because we have the same job this was an appropriate time to meet up. We decided to get together at the bar I work at. I had spent the day at the mall buying new clothes for this monumental occasion. I was looking good and showing a little glimmer of the self esteem that I had lost with the Lump. I walked into my bar and there he was …. With his roommate. Hmmmm …. Perhaps this wasn’t a date at all. Had I misunderstood our conversation? Maybe it was a group date? Should I have brought a friend too? Is he scared to leave his house alone? Does he not want to be alone with me? Am I that intimidating? I am pretty tall when I’m wearing heels.

Being a rather laid back chick (and under the spell of his hotness) I decided to go along with the extra company and enjoy the night. Now, I’m not sure at what point the answer to my burning question came up, but the answer to the tagalong was that the Bartender did not own a car. I should have lost his number then and there. This is a warning sign ladies! Listen closely. No car? At 30? Really? I could understand if we lived in a large metropolis with excellent public transportation. I lived in Boston and I never owned a car the entire time. However, we both live in a moderate sized city in New England. Our public transportation is spotty and generally a pain in the ass. Owning a car is a necessity.

Now please don’t think that I am a superficial bitch who rates people on the possessions they own. That is not the case. It was not WHAT kind of car he had; it was the fact that he DIDN’T have a car. I didn’t realize it at the time but this is a major sign of instability. Missing certain key elements that make up a normal adult life does not bode well for a healthy relationship. If a man is not functioning in his every day life, he is not going to be a good boyfriend. Simple as that.

At the time I wrote off his lack of transportation as a minor flaw in an otherwise amazing person. I was proud of myself for seeing someone for who they were on the inside and not judging them for the things they owned. Well, I’m telling you now, judge away!! My willingness to overlook such huge warning signs led to my heartache at the end. I can’t remember exactly why the Bartender didn’t have a car. It had something to do with some youthful discretion that had continued to haunt him years later. To be honest, he told me the story a few times but I never really listened. The fact that his past behavior contributed to his walking everywhere should have also clued me. Again, I was impressed by my ability to overlook someone’s past. We all make mistakes, right? Who was I to judge what someone did when they were 21. I am a Buddhist for chrissakes. Well, I repeat, JUDGE!!!

When a man is having turmoil or major disruptions going on in their life they are just not good candidates for dating. The Bartender seemed sweet and funny but in the end his personal issues were the demise of our relationship. Unstable men make rash decisions and quickly change course. They don’t have a life rhythm so they don’t see anything wrong with continual change and upheaval. In my situation, the Bartender just disappeared one day. Things seemed fine, we were hanging out having a blast, and then … nothing. Not. One. Word. No phone call to end things. No text message telling me I should make alternate plans for the Fourth of July. No email mentioning that he was about to fall off the face of the earth. I was so confused and thrown off by this behavior. I think I would have accepted smoke signals as an adequate form of communication. That’s how desperate I was for some kind of answer.

There may be nothing more confusing than when the person you are dating suddenly disappears. To add insult to this very painful injury, I found out from a mutual friend’s Facebook posting that he was hosting a Fourth of July party at his house. Ouch!! Really? I guess he didn’t die suddenly in a freak accident or wander off into the woods. Nope, he had just moved on. In the blink of an eye he had gone from loving boyfriend to useless jerk. As most things in his life, he saw me as another transient item. Enjoyable at the time; but no real commitment on his part. And that’s where the heartache comes in.

No one likes to be broken up with. There are thousands of sad love songs to prove this point. It’s a painful ordeal to go through even in the best situations. But when the person you have fallen in love with suddenly stops being in your life, the heartache doubles. Girls think. A lot. We think about what we did, what the guy did, what we could have said, what we shouldn’t have said. Hell, we wonder if we put on the wrong radio station and that in itself caused the jerk to leave. All I had were my thoughts and a phone that seemed to not want to ring. I blamed myself, I blamed him, I cried (a lot), I got mad, I told myself I didn’t care, but in the end all I felt was utter loss and confusion.

I never did get a reason as to why he left without a word. A few weeks after the Great Disappearance of 2009 I received a text message saying something about how he just wasn’t ready for a relationship. Too little, too late buddy. At that point it almost felt like a slap in the face. I had been doing my best to forget how much time I had wasted on this loser and all of a sudden he decides to resurface. With a shitty explanation to boot. I didn’t respond. I knew there was nothing to say. He wasn’t going to give me any answer that would have helped eased my pain. There are no magical words to erase behavior like that. Well, perhaps an all expense paid vacation to the Caribbean. But if this guy couldn’t even afford a used Geo, I guess island hopping in the tropics is pretty much out of the question.

So lovely ladies, here is the moral to the story. Do not date a man who does not own a car, have a stable living situation, or a form of employment. These men are toxic and must be avoided. You are not being a snotty bitch; you are protecting your valuable heart. Sure, they may be funny and hot like the Bartender, but they are not going to be good for you. Smile, enjoy the flirting, but lose their number. You deserve more. You deserve a man who is going to be upfront and honest with you. You deserve to be respected. You deserve true love.