As most of you have read on here, or heard my stand up, or happen to be my friend, or hopefully all three, I have a long trail of men I have left bloody and heartbroken. I think I have dated most archetypes of guys and had some really horrible dates that typically ended in me saying, “ugh. I need some wings.”
Last night, I had my fifth installment of Comedy on Draught at Three Taverns Brewery and the theme was dating, relationships and heartbreak. It really got me thinking about all of my dating experiences and relationships and what they have taught me. Since 2014, I have worked really hard to develop my craft as a stand up comic and it completely shifted my thinking.
Most of my teen and young adult life, all I wanted was to be liked by boys. I wanted to like what they liked, I wanted to be pretty enough, and I wanted to be fun enough. I thought I was independent and I thought I was in control. My dating body count was getting high from having relationships/ “continuous-monogamous dating with no label” consistently shorter than 6 months. I had my fill of first and only dates. But after taking some time away from dating and taking more time to focus on stand up, I finally began to know I was independent, know I was in control and that if some dumb guy didn’t like me for me, he could kiss my grits.
The more time and energy I put into stand up, the less time I had outside of it and work and I was pretty happy about it… most of the time. Anytime I felt down about not having a date to a wedding or wishing I would get cast on the Bachelor (yes, I did audition), I remembered that there was someone even better than I could imagine out there for me. I reminded myself that I needed to take RuPaul’s advice:
IF YOU CAN’T LOVE YOURSELF,
HOW IN THE HELL CAN YOU LOVE SOMEBODY ELSE?
I still have work to do but I felt ready this past winter. I dated a cool, fun, ADVENTURE DUDE! But I was an accessory to his social life, I was his award show audience filler. I did my usual routine of 2 months of realizing he wasn’t right for me, and ended it.
I got back on Bumble, the dating app that requires women to initiate contact within 24 hours or else the match was deleted forever. I was hopeful but not invested.
Almost 7 months ago, I matched with a really handsome guy, we had really good conversation and subsequently went to sushi. It was so nice and easy but I didn’t know what I was in for.
I didn’t know he would take me to Fox Brother’s for my birthday wings.
I didn’t know he would be there for me during my highs and supporting me at my lows.
I didn’t know how I could feel this way about someone.
To many, 6 months is a very short about of time and this all seems silly. To me, being with this caring man over six months means that my years of pickiness and years of dealing with the “game”, brought me to this point.
To celebrate our 6 months together, this caring gentleman planned a dinner (and rock climbing the next day) for us.
I had no idea where we were going for dinner because he and I have always been culinary curious. He kept dropping hints and I asked, “Are we going to Fogo De Chao?” (based on previous conversations about how I had never been.)
“Yes. You guessed it.” I was little taken a back about his prompted answer and mad that we had a late lunch but I was ready to hop aboard the meat train when our Uber arrived. He made sure our driver didn’t spill the beans about exactly where we were going. The driver takes us a way I hadn’t been before but I knew we were near Little 5 Points. This isn’t near Fogo De Chao… We pull down a residential street and we get out of the car to walk.
We walk up to Fox Brothers BBQ where he took me for my birthday. Where he told me he knew he wanted to be with me. Where he found out that I was special. That he thought about taking me to a foodie place but he wanted to take me somewhere special to him.
Wings mean a lot to me. But what means the most to me is someone truly cares about me and would rather eat wings with me than be at a ~hot~ restaurant.
I didn’t know that I could be so overwhelmed by eating smoked chicken wings with someone.
I truly believe what I have said before about eating wings with someone is really personal, and I feel incredibly fortunate that I have someone to eat them with.
Annie Lockwood 