What would your ex- say about you?

Maybe I’ve just been watching too many episodes of Sex and the City but then, I’ve also been pondering on committment-phobias a lot recently.

The last episode I watched ended with Mr.Big (Carrie Bradshaw’s grand love) getting engaged to someone else and Carrie musing:

Maybe I hadn’t broken him in at all. Maybe he hadn’t broken me in.

Maybe some women are meant to run wild until they meet someone equally wild to run with them.

Could that be true I wondered? A comment on my last post makes me think,

What would the people we’ve dated say about us?

I’ve asked myself this a hundred times over. Of course. We bother about the opinions of practically EVERYONE on the planet. How about the opinions of those we’ve loved (or thought we did), those we’ve leaned on and held, those who have lived through moments of love and hatred and deep emotion and passion with us?

I really wish I knew the answer to that. I know this is probably a trick question so it is highly doubtful that one would get the ‘right answer’ from an ex- but it bears thinking about anyway. I always thought the men I’ve dated would say that I was funny, intelligent, hyperactive and overemotional.

But what if they feared losing me just as I’ve feared losing them? What if my individuality, my stubborness and temper threatened them as their flightiness and flirtatiousness has threatened me? What if, when we broke up and I thought I was letting them go, in essence, they were the ones letting me go off flying since they sensed I couldn’t be tied down?

The big love of my life (also best friend and longest running relationship ever) once said that he knew I loved him but also that he could never tell, when I woke up in the morning, what mood I’d be in and what I’d decide to do. I always thought of myself as stable and loyal. Was I, really? Or perhaps….just maybe….did the men I’ve loved know me better than I knew myself?

And if that be the case, what happens next? I never knew I was meant to be an ‘independant flier’ but when I think about it, everyone I’ve ever been close to has settled down, in relationships, marriage and jobs. While my life remains even more of a nomadic hippy journey than ever.

When you realise the road isn’t moving but you are, where do you go?