A matter of Chemistry

Starting a relationship is akin to lighting up a barbecue – you need a spark and then it takes a lot of luck or a good level of experience. Whether you got one or the other, you still have to hope that it won’t rain.

Every time that I’ve been single, I experience some of those quick starts and the even quicker burn-outs that accompanies almost each of them. No matter the enthusiasm shown at the beginning, it seems that something had to go wrong after a few days. Obviously, natural selection also applies to love stories.

As I was finally recovering from my last break-up and slowly embracing my brand new single life by dating enough guys to allow my best friend to regularly call me a slut, it crossed my mind that I was experiencing one of the busiest period of my dating life. Some of my recent dates were really exciting and we’ve shared some great moments but none of the guys made it up to the subsequent date.

Last night, whilst changing the sheets, I couldn’t help but wonder why some promising stories never last more than a few dates. Why do some people (obviously into each other at first) lose it after a few days? What leads a crush to crash?

My fuck-buddy once told me that experience brings wisdom (in the bedroom, he meant). According to me, as far as relationships are concerned – experience brings fear. We are still healing the wounds left by our previous stories and cannot help but be more cautious about the new ones. Our fears lead us to make a wrong interpretation of everything that is said and, most of the time, to run away as soon as feelings are shown. We create our own scale in which to interpret the different ways to express our feelings. “I like you”, “I like you a lot”, “I like you very much” and “I love you” (to be used carefully) are the milestones we commonly use. However, because our pace is rarely the same as our partner’s, a simple “I like you” can be [mis]understood to mean “Marry me” and cause a story to prematurely end.

I once dated an extremely attractive and eligible guy and our first date was one of the best I ever had. We spent a great night out followed by some awesome sex. We even decided to spend the rest of the day in bed watching TV and having more sex. We seemed genuinely attracted to each other and it even crossed my mind that this guy could be boyfriend material. On our second date, we planned to have dinner in a nice Korean BBQ restaurant close to my place. After half an hour of remembering how good our first date was, it suddenly occurred to both of us that we had nothing else to say. An hour later, we were both bored to death and quite embarrassed by the long periods of silence that punctuated our date. We skipped dessert (for those of you who know me, dessert is a big affair) and called it a night.

Needless to say, I never saw the need to call that guy again.

Whether it is a matter of (a) adopting the right communication method, (b) getting past the physical attraction or (c) simply a question of good taste, brand new relationships are like birds in a nest. They require delicate treatment and attention. We can be frustrated about it but in the end, there’s probably something good in the fact that, in the matter of relationships, Darwin’s theory applies.

*Darwin’s theory – thru’ the process of natural selection, only the fittest make it