Houston, We Have a Problem

Email Buddy Eric and I were chatting online yesterday. He'd sent me this article called "Why the Smartest People Have the Most Trouble Dating," or something like that. He prefaced the email with the statement, "Not that I think you have any trouble in this department."

Yeah, right... Wait. Does he mean he doesn't think I'm smart, or does he mean that he doesn't think I have trouble with dating?

Anyway, the second of the reasons the article gave for this problem is that smart people think they deserve love just because of their accomplishments. I emailed Eric back and told him that I thought I deserved love just because I'm hot. Ha ha.


So, the Boy is cooking dinner for a girl tonight. I felt a brief glow of pride for having raised such a gentleman before he gave me a crooked smile and told me that this girl’s boyfriend just cheated on her, and he wanted to give her a good night. I blinked. The Boy is trying to move in on some chick who's just had her ego walloped.

Before I let myself get started in on the whole “that’s just as sleazy as Ben Affleck asking J-Lo to marry him before the ink on her last marriage license was dry and please don't be that guy” speech, I bit my tongue and said, “That’s nice of you.”

He’s at that age when you have to let them be their own person and make their own mistakes. If this is the worst he does, I think I did an okay job. But, boy, it’s hard to let go.


I think I must come off as a sensitive person people can talk to.

I have no idea where people would get that idea either.

Here’s what happened:

I was talking with a co-worker/friend the other day. We hadn’t seen each other for a while, and we’re both terribly busy. He supervises this huge department, and he’s a really strong, gruff man. You have to be when you’re in charge of that many people, right?

I get a kick out of verbally sparring with him, and we have our days where we'll just email back and forth before daily demands pull us back into the real world.

So, I ask him to take some time off to go with me to take care of something for this project we’re working on together. “We can grab a bite on our way. Get you away from the hustle and bustle of the office.”

Then, I realize that he may have taken that as me asking him out. Ridiculous. I know this. You know this. But does he?

So, I do what I always do when I’m worried about blurring lines. I ask him how he and his girl are doing. Okay, this may also send the wrong message, but it always makes me feel better. And he tells me they’re good, and then he tells me something personal. Not personal, like, TMI. Personal, like, these are my feelings.

Now when someone flips open their latest issue for me, and I don't already know the person really, really well, my mind goes completely blank. And this is not the first time it’s happened. Recently, another man told me he and his wife were having problems. Another told me he regularly cheated on his wife. Another told me he thought his wife was cheating on him.

See what I mean? What kind of vibe am I giving off that people think I know what the heck I’m talking about? Or that I’d know what to say? Or that I’d know what they should do? Well, except the guy who keeps cheating. Him I’d like to tell to either keep it in his pants or cut his wife loose so she has a shot at something real with someone who loves her. I mean, holy crap! I’m just as clueless as the next person when it comes to relationships.

It’s not that I don’t care. I do. I just don’t immediately know what to do with all these problems. I’m really more into my particular brand of logic than I am into the sensitive stuff. I need to think about the person I know. I need to think about the situation. I can’t just spew out advice willy-nilly. I mean, what if I’m wrong?

So, getting back to my story, the big guy has told me his feelings, and I’m stunned into silence for a second before I say something flip and jokey. Yeah, I’m graceful like that.

We go our separate ways, and then it hits me what I just did. But I tell myself to just let it go. Then, five minutes later, I find myself calling him on his cell. He doesn’t pick up. I hang up without leaving a message.

There, a clear sign that I shouldn’t worry about it. It’s nothing. He’s already forgotten about it.

Two hours later I get an email from him thanking me for taking care of something for him.

There, a clear sign that he forgives me for being a butt head. I'll just put it out of my mind...

Five minutes later, I find myself emailing him back:

“Hey, I tried to call you but figured that what I had to say was completely inappropriate. But since you've come to expect "inappropriate" from me,..”

And I wrote that I was sorry I'd brushed him off and that he didn’t deserve that. And then I wrote that I understood where he was coming from and why.

And I do.

I mean, I’ve got problems.

We all have problems.

And whether we feel qualified to give advice or if we just listen when someone reaches out to us, it’s kind of our responsibility to look out for the people who trust us with their problems, too.