Unspoken Expectations

"It's not real if you don't feel it.
Unspoken expectations;
Ideals you used to play with."
 -Cyndi Lauper, "Goonies 'R' Good Enough"

One of the great ironies of our time, I think, is that we have more methods of communication now than we've ever had as a society (cell phones, social media, FarmersOnly.com), and yet we, collectively speaking, often seem to be utterly terrible at communicating. And I think this issue contributes to a great deal of the misunderstanding and misery we single adults deal with on a near-constant basis.

For example, many people feel more comfortable texting rather than holding an actual, face-to-face conversation. For a second example, I've actually had more than one singles ward bishop tell me that multiple young ladies in the ward felt they had no other recourse but to employ the help of bishopric members to, in turn, talk to a number of young men in the ward whose romantic intentions were bothering these young ladies. The message to be delivered was, "Leave me alone." This kind of turned the bishopric members into bouncers or goons hired by the mafia. Yet in the vast majority of these cases, no actual stalking was in any way involved; these young ladies just couldn't tell these men, who were for the most part honestly trying to make their intentions known, a direct "thanks, but no thanks" or some other clear message that they weren't interested.

This baffles me. But then again, I don't get calculus, either.

Unspoken expectations—the stuff we really want out of dating—can be frustrating if they are not made clear.

I had a conversation with one of my brothers recently in which he mentioned that a mutual female friend of ours, whom I've met in person maybe twice, wondered why I hadn't asked her out on a date. Well, for one thing, this nice young lady and I have had about three minutes total of actual conversation time. For another, I had gleaned absolutely no inkling from her that she was interested in more than polite conversation. (We men are terrible at distinguishing between someone who is being polite and someone who is actually interested in getting to know us better. This is an unspoken expectation I'm getting out there now.)

As the Peruvians would say (and this is a phrase definitely lost in translation): "No me llamó la atención."

There is nothing at all wrong, ladies, with saying something right to the point, such as: "I think it would be fun if we went out sometime and did (activity)." This is not even you actually asking the guy out, but it is making an unspoken expectation, well, spoken. I have had someone tell me this phrase, or something akin to it, only once in my decades of dating, and honestly I was pleasantly surprised by it. I called her a week or so later for a date, knowing with confidence that she was at least interested already even if she already had plans that week. It didn't work out for us, but I appreciated the honesty and the tactic she employed.

If it turns out that the guy is just not interested when you've been direct like this, well, you've had maybe five to 10 seconds of an uncomfortable moment, and then you can both move on, without wondering about any ifs and not second-guessing anything.

When you're in an actual relationship, well, I think expectations about how you'd like to be treated or things that would make you happy (some would say your "love language") need to be made known.

Two of my relationships in the past few years ended with an "exit interview" in which, in part, the person I had been dating had mentioned things she expected to happen in the relationship—actual specific actions or deeds she'd hoped I would do (you should've done this and this, and I would've appreciated it more if you hadn't done this other thing)—and yet these things were never mentioned until this last time. On both occasions, I asked her for another chance to do those things she had wished I'd been doing all along; and on both occasions, the reply was "no."

In other words, you can't get mad at someone for doing or not doing something important when you don't actually, audibly, clearly tell that person why that thing or things matter to you.

For example, she says: "Golly, there's a lot of dishes in the sink today."
He says: "Yeah, there are!" and continues playing Halo.

A better way to express what you're really trying to say would be the direct approach:

She says: "The dishes are really piling up today, and it's your turn to wash them, Joe."
He (clicking his heels together like one of the Von Trapp children in The Sound of Music): "You're right! Hail Hydra!" (He salutes her, military style.) Also, my name is Walter. (He then does the dishes. Ideally.)

Say what you mean. Don't drop hints. Don't drop no eaves, as Samwise Gamgee would say. I think this is a thing that would help us all.

That's just the opinion of one guy blogging at McDonald's because his home Internet has been down since Monday. I'm here all week, folks!

Out of the Mouth of Babes

"All the broken hearts in the world still beat;
"Let's not make it harder than it has to be.
Ooh it's all the same thing;
Girls chase boys chase girls."
 -Ingrid Michaelson, "Girls Chase Boys"

I'm gonna get a little candid tonight, folks. But the older I get and the more I try out that singleness thing, the less I really care about being vulnerable like this. So, here goes.

I took my niece out to dinner the other night for her birthday. Maybe you read about it on my award-winning blog.

At one point during the course of the evening, she took the conversation in a rather unexpected direction.

Niece: "How is that girl you brought to family dinner?"
Me (marveling at this girl's candidness and excellent memory, but also stumped for an answer): "She's doing fine, I guess. We're not dating anymore."
Niece: ". . . (Name) is not your girlfriend?"
Me (still in awe of this kid's memory): "No, not for a while now."
After a brief pause, she asked the $64,000 question that she had been leading up to:
Niece: "You should ask her to marry you."
Me (after what seemed like five minutes, but which in reality was only about 10 seconds): ". . . I wanted to. But she didn't want to. That's just the way it goes sometimes."

Later that night, reflecting on this conversation, I had a well-know scripture come to mind:

"And a little child shall lead them" (Isaiah 11:6).

It's amazing how simply a child can see life. To be honest, she makes a great point. The whole miserable process is really very simple in its essence. But we're the ones who make things much, much harder than they have to be.

Life gets in the way in so many ways. Imperfect people make mistakes they don't necessarily intend to make, like being selfish, communicating poorly, keeping their eyes wide open to others' faults while keeping their eyes half-shut to their own, being "nice" over being direct, and a number of other errors. I know because I've inadvertently done them all, and I've felt the sting when others have done the same to me.

This is the point at which the gals will say, "Men are problem, because they do this, and this, and they don't do this," while many of the men (believe you me) feel the same way about the ladies.

If you find yourself in this situation, let me suggest a new strategy: Rather than making it all about someone else, take a good, hard look at yourself. Take charge of the things you can control, and do not worry about the free agency of another. Be your best self. If you're not finding the Captain Moroni or the Rebekah you seek, ask yourself if you are being the Mrs. Captain Moroni or the Isaac that type of person would attract. If you are struggling with a favorite sin or bad habit, pray to overcome it, work as if it all depended on you, and then work on the next thing.

President Spencer W. Kimball taught:

"You might take a careful inventory of your habits, your speech, your appearance, your weight, . . . and your eccentricities. . . . Take each item and analyze it. What do you like in others? What personality traits please you in others? Are your dresses too short, too long, too revealing, too old-fashioned? Does your weight drive off possible suitors? Do you laugh raucously? Are you too selfish? Are you interested only in your own interests or do you project yourself into the lives of others? . . . What do you do to make yourself desirable? Do you overdo or underdo? Too much makeup or too little? Scrupulously clean both physically and morally? What are your eccentricities, if any? I think nearly all people have some. If so, then go to work. Classify them, weigh them, corral them, and eliminate one at a time."

Sooner or later, because "intelligence cleaveth unto intelligence," someone else, using his or her own free agency, will choose to be around you and may even decide to stay, because you're both at the same spot on the straight and narrow, working on the same goals and striving to improve those imperfections.

It's just my two cents on the matter. For an expert's opinion, though, go and see your nearest niece or nephew. It may cost you dinner, but it's an investment well worth making.

Highway to the Stranger Zone

You unlock this door with a text message, maybe an e-mail. Beyond it is another dimension: a dimension of being out of sight, out of mind. You're being dumped into a land of both shadow and forgetfulness. You've just crossed over into the Stranger Zone.

We've all heard of the Friend Zone, haven't we? Well, most of us have . . . right?

The thing is, it doesn't really exist. Not in my experience, it doesn't. It's possible, but it's quite improbable.

You don't have to go on very many dates with someone to get friend zoned. Heck, you don't even have to have gone out on a date with someone to get friend zoned. I've seen it happen. I've also seen people hire a friend or a member of the bishopric to deliver that message second hand. Maybe hired goons with brass knuckles named Vito (the goons, not the brass knuckles), I dunno.

The Friend Zone is what you get for having the "let's just be friends" talk with someone in whom you are interested romantically, right after they put your heart into a blender, mix in Chlorox bleach, leave it in the fridge for four weeks, forget about it, pull it back out covered in freezer burn, duct tape the pieces back together, and then mail it to you by carrier pigeon.

Consider this sample conversation:

Girl: I think we should break up.
Boy (feverishly checking his pockets for a receipt for the engagement ring he purchased earlier that day): Wonderful! Who needs a heart, after all? As long as we can still be friends!
Girl (while checking her Pokémon Go stats on her phone): Sure, friends.
Boy: Great! That way, I can still go with you to the movies every Tuesday. As friends!
Girl: No.
Boy: Well, at least (using air quotes) "AS FRIENDS" (meanwhile, several anxious people in the restaurant turn their heads in concern, and the manager calls for security) I can still see all your Facebook posts when you rebound within a few weeks and find a better-looking, independently wealthy guy! One with big muscles!
Girl (almost cutting him off): AND a jeep!

I don't mean to say by this that the only alternative to the Friend Zone is any kind of Enemy Zone. I'm not going to do anything rash like gun the engine and run over someone who once dumped me if I see her crossing the street, for example. But I'm really not going to be part of her life in any way, shape, or form ever again. I call it the Stranger Zone.

Nine out of 10 times this is the case, anyway. With that tenth person, your interaction tends to be limited to very casual conversation; "hi"s and "hello"s and not much more.

This is not necessarily a bad thing. I'll use a Book of Mormon example here, and it is simply that Nephi and his family reached a point in time at which it was no longer safe for them to remain near Laman and Lemuel. Namely, they would be murdered savagely. Following Lehi's death, they packed up their stuff and put a great deal of distance between themselves and their brethren. Nephi and friends still loved their brethren, cared for them, and forgave them, but they needed space.

Likewise, it can be "unsafe" for you and your heart, your emotional and spiritual well-being, to be around someone who has caused you pain or to whom you've caused pain, and making a clean break is not a bad or wrong option.

My problem with the "let's just be friends" talk, which ends up being the Stranger Zone anyway, is that people mostly don't really mean to continue to be your friend if they're rejecting you.

I once upon a time went out with a girl in my ward a few times. I thought we had a pretty good time together, and my thinking moved into the "I'd like to get to know you better" conversation in my head.

Ha ha! I have delusions of grandeur sometimes, huh? Assuming anything else was going to happen was my first mistake. I called this person after a couple of weeks had gone by, after I neither saw her at church (it's a big ward) nor received any kind of ping pong/positive contact. She did not answer, so I left a voicemail. More time passed. I called and left another voicemail. Then I heard nothing back a second time. Ultimately, and in a final effort, in case her preferred method of communication was text, I sent a text message, my "third call, that's all," and finally received a reply, in which I was told, in summation: "I see us being only friends for now."

Naturally, this is not what she really meant. I don't blame her; it's never what anyone means. It's just the way our culture has conditioned us to act, as if getting to still be friends with someone who has crushed you like a gnat is some sort of consolation prize, like going on "Jeopardy!" and finishing the game with a negative dollar amount but still getting the chance to embarrass yourself of national TV and earning a gift card to Texas Roadhouse.

I finally saw this girl at the church the very next Sunday after the aforementioned text, and she avoided/walked right past me without saying a word. You know, like "friends" would do.

I also think of the time when cruel fate placed me and a date in theater seats that were directly a row behind my ex and her now-husband. It had not yet been a year since our breakup, and in that time, she had somehow recovered from this "difficult" breakup by finding this other guy, marrying him, and, at the time of this encounter, was already showing a baby bump. And there they were there in front of me, cuddling throughout the duration of the show.

It was torture.

Nevertheless, I did not make actual verbal or eye contact with this couple of front of me because they never turned around; had they done so, I would have smiled and said hello, and then I would have let them get on with their lives. I also paid attention to the show on stage more than I've ever paid attention to any musical ever. It is possible to be in the Stranger Zone while still being polite and still being a good person.

DISCLAIMER: Before the hate mail pours in, yes, ladies, I realize that we guys do stupid, unintentionally hurtful things, too. It's a recessive gene on the Y chromosome, actually. I accept dumb things I may have done wrong, too, because I'm learning as I'm going along, just as you are. I know only my experience and how certain events have affected me; I don't know anyone else's thoughts or motivations.

Basically, what I'm saying (to anyone who cares to listen? to the chair Neil Diamond is so fond of talking to? screaming out my window like Bastian at the end of The Neverending Story?) is: Don't send someone to the Friend Zone if you don't really intend to be that person's friend from that point forward. It's okay to accept the Stranger Zone. And in many cases, it's better for both people that it be that way.

Atrophy and the Heart

Years ago, I suffered one of the worst injuries of my life: tearing one of my pectoral muscles. Unless you're unusually or morbidly curious about what that feels like and want to try it out, please take my word for it: It is not something you want to experience for yourself. Ever.

In sports, tearing your pectoral muscle is considered to be a "season-ending injury." It was a long and a painful rehabilitation, just as it would be for any athlete, taking several months before I felt close to "normal" again or before I could resume some of the activities I had previously enjoyed taking part in, such as sports or dancing.

Never having experienced anything like this before, I wasn't entirely sure how to proceed with my day-to-day life in the meantime. Since my right muscle had been injured, I ended up doing a lot of simple tasks by using my left hand, arm, and shoulder only. Often, these were rather basic daily tasks like holding onto the steering wheel of my car and shifting gears or picking up dishes in the kitchen.

After going on like this for some time, both my orthopedic doctor and a friend who was studying medicine talked to me about a word I had heard but had not understood the meaning of before: atrophy.

Atrophy, they told me, means that a muscle will weaken and will become harder to rehabilitate the longer it goes unused. Sooner or later, I would have to use it again and exercise, no matter how scary this prospect was nor how much pain I was in. Otherwise, I would either make the healing process even more difficult, or I would lose the use of it altogether.

Physical therapy was hard work. Anyone who has had to go through it for any injury knows exactly what I am talking about. At first, it felt strange to perform exercises with a muscle I hadn't used for anything other than combing my hair or shaving for months. I can't do this, I thought more than once. It hurts way too much. It was, indeed, painful, albeit a new kind of painful, and a different kind of painful than my injury had been.

The more I went to physical therapy, however, and the more I completed all of my therapist's instructions, I got better. It was painful, as I mentioned, and it took a great deal of effort on my part. It also took time and required a great deal of patience. It was subtle, but it happened. Eventually, I could do the things I once had enjoyed doing before my injury.

Now, I move on to where I'm going with this with an analogy. I think that the heart, the body's strongest muscle, can atrophy, as well. And not being a cardiologist, I can speak only figuratively. But many of the same principles apply.

In matters of dating, the heart, too, can be injured. Sometimes, the injury hurts way more than we ever imagined it possibly could. We wonder what we could have possibly done to feel the amount of pain that we feel, and we even stop using it altogether. Not only that, but, whether by choice or inadvertently, we numb ourselves to anyone or anything that could make us even begin to feel those emotions again.

The longer we go on this way, the harder it is to heal. Some even close themselves off to that mere possibility completely. I once dated a girl whose particular heart injury was grieving over the death of someone in her immediate family. Now don't get me wrong; I'm not saying in any way that she wasn't right to feel this way nor is it important to grieve and to deal with loss, and I understand that everyone heals in their own way. But this wound, years in the past, had completely consumed her past as well as her present and future. When this family member was buried, her heart was buried in the ground along with it. To the best of my knowledge, it is still there.

I hope and pray that she will, someday, open her heart again to loving another human being as she had loved this family member. I really do. I could not be the person to reawaken that desire in her. But as I wrote about my aforementioned injury, opening up the heart again, a little at a time, is the only way for healing to take place.

Consider Miss Havisham, she of Charles Dickens's book Great Expectations. Jilted on her wedding day as a young bride, her entire life figuratively ended on that day, too, as she became a recluse and a shut-in and a despiser of all men and mankind. In the end, it destroyed her—both spiritually as well as physically. I was reminded of her sad story when I recently watched a recent BBC adaptation of the tale. Hopefully, it is a lesson to us all about the negative consequences of harboring ill will, anger, spite, and remorse.

I don't pretend to be an expert on this subject nor to possess any special insight. I know only my own experience, thoughts, and intentions. Likewise, I can't judge anyone else, and I don't know their experiences, thoughts, and intentions; I can only share what I have observed and, consequently, how those things have made me feel or how impacted me personally.

Very recently, my heart was again injured deeply. So was hers. When I met and began dating this person, the thought occurred to me: This is either going to be wonderful, or it's going to hurt like the Dickens. (No pun intended.)

Both possibilities occurred. For a time, it was wonderful. Right now, though, it hurts a lot. People aren't perfect, and I have made my mistakes. I have challenges I still need to overcome, although some, particularly physical challenges, I have no control over, and the only thing that remains in my power of agency is to deal with them the only way I know how—one difficult day at a time.

Rather than pointing fingers or casting blame, however, I choose to take a moment, albeit a brief one, to grieve—and then I will move on. My prayers will be only to let in forgiveness and healing, in all of their forms. I will take the positive things I have learned from this person, my mistakes and the lessons I have learned from them, and I will use them to make myself a better person, too. I will keep my eyes, my ears, and, above all, my heart open to the possibility of good things and of good people to come. Were I to keep them closed, I could miss out on something good. And that would be a tragedy easily preventable.

It's the only way to heal.