What Breaking Up Means

Breakups are sad. Not so much the act of breaking up but more so the 'thought' of what a breakup actually means. It means you no longer have free unlimited access to each other. You can't sit close and hold their hand, you can't walk around naked in front of each other and don't even think about grabbing their nether regions. You have been denied all access to their body. Zilch. 

It's kind of sad isn't it? How you used to curl up in bed together semi-naked after sex or used to shower together butt-naked before sex and then all of a sudden, it dawns on you, hey you will never ever see them naked again because you won't be ever having sex with them again. Then you start forgetting what their body looked like unclothed. You try to conjure up the memory but nothing - and you can't help but wonder why you two weren't naked more often and had sex more often when you were together.

Now you have to think twice when your hands accidentally touch as you walk. Physical distance is what makes a breakup sad because physical distance is just another neon-lit billboard sign that says emotional distance. You're just two people sitting next to each other with a ten metre pole in-between and it's not their genitals. 

We use physical distance to say a lot of things after a breakup. We tell them, you're no longer the closest person in my life any more. We use physical space to indicate how we've grown apart and moved on. We use distance to keep all the intimate and hurtful times shared with each other at bay. We restrict all physical access to say, hey, you can't do that any more, there are no more privileges in whatever post-breakup relationship we have now, yep, that means, you don't even get to touch a single strand of my hair. 

That's somewhat sad. But that's what breaking up means - it means you're excluded from the exclusive. 

Don't Delay It, Get Hitched

So after reading Bettina Ardnt's (who I have interviewed) article in the Sydney Morning Herald, Why Women Lose the Dating Game  and then following up on Dalrock's Thoughts from a Happily Married Father on a Post-Feminist World. I've come to realise getting hitched is upon us twenty-something-year-olds like a tonne of bricks.

It seems to me, the pressure is building at a rapid rate as most of my friends reach the quarter mark. We're all anxiously waiting and tapping our fingers for the first one in the group to break the seal. And whoever does the deed first has the ability to trigger a whole chain reaction for the rest of us to get married. It's almost like a fireball, the fuel is already there, you just need a spark and off it goes, shooting through the social circle gaining momentum and persuasive pressure power. It's awfully creepy strange how these things work - all it takes is one person to get engaged and shortly everyone around you is too. Who said one person can't make a difference? I call this Herd Mentality Peer Pressure or whatever you would like to call it.

We all know it, every one of us females in our twenties, whether you're in a settled long-term relationship or still fucking floating around like drift wood - marriage is upon us - there is NO time to lose. Any logical woman knows leaving it until you're 30 to get married is a little late - like Dalrock and Ardnt says, it is a very competitive market for women. Men? They don't seem to have a problem as they get older, apparently and I truly believe this, women of all ages throw themselves at 30 something-year-old-men. But perhaps, it's a little short-sighted to think men in their 30s are spoilt for choice and have all the time in the world to find a wife. I think the same rules apply to men as it does to women when seeking a life-time (well as long as it can be) partner.

If we look at the belief that choices create misery, we can see how women in their 20s play the field because they think they've got it all - the youth, the looks, the metabolism - to pick and choose their men. Similarly, we can see how men in their 30s play the field thinking they're the bomb - the money, career, the experience - to pick and choose their women.

But the more glitter and gold there is, the more blinded we are and the less chances of actually settling down to tie the knot. Between 30 to 40 is probably a time most men mistake for a decade of pleasure and self-indulgence and they often wile it away on a string of eligible women ranging from the 20s to the 30s. But they're not aware that similarly, how women should be on the look-out for a hubby at an early age,  men should really be doing the same thing. Because when men hit 40, the reality hits home, there is a new bunch of 30 something-year-old-men in their prime to take over the dating scene. Like the animal kingdom, the old alpha male gets exiled and not left with many choices but to nomad alone.

So really, it's all relative isn't it? Women in their 20s are in their prime and fish in an ocean of men. Men in their 30s are in their prime and shop in a mall of women. But surely, time doesn't pause, and eventually prime time comes to an end. What then?

Remember boys and girls, it can ALWAYS BE TOO LATE, don't delay it, get hitched.