This story is about someone I know.  Not me.  Just so we're clear that my references are not from my own personal experiences...because my life is perfect and moving in a fabulous-bump free-direction.

So there's this girl I know who read a book about ten years ago called "He's Just Not That in to You," and it changed her life.  For one thing it gave her and her friends some a common language to use when we they were watching their friends in situation that had red flags all over them.

"Wellllll, he called me last night at 10:30 pm and said he was going to stop by," and those friends could say, "________________, if he's not calling in during the day, you gotta lose him.  Move on," and they could say that because it was from the book.

And this went on for years and those girls would laugh and joke, "Ha! Won't it be funny when we are 30 and married with kids and we can reminisce about the pains of dating back then."  And when those girls were 30, they pulled the book out again to reference it...and when they were 35 and needed a dose of reality, they weepily pulled the book out again.

Then one of the girls, let's call her Sadie, went out with a guy whose resume was the best she had seen to date:
Tall
Dark
Strong
Very Handsome
Cowboy
Funny
Very intelligent
Incredibly successful


And best of all, HE pursued HER hard...out of nowhere and he promised her the world.  And in her fairy tale brain she thought, "This doesn't happen.  It can't work out this perfectly...but what if it just did?  Did I just find everything I was looking for and more...in cowboy boots?"  And so, like all girls do, she had everything worked out in her brain.  She thought she had FINALLY met her match because he was the whole package and in her head Sadie had bought her own pair of boots, packed up her house and headed east to live with him in his home, in his great state.  Some people thought, "Sadie, sloooowww down Sister," and some thought, "Of course her head is going all these places because that's what girls do," while others said, "Oh my gosh Sadie.  He's totally your match."

And if this were a fairy tale about Sadie that's where it would end.  A beach girl turned cowgirl living happily ever after with her cowboy.


But this isn't a fairy tale...

He pulled way back so she pulled back so he pulled forward, but just a bit, and he'd ask about her day but didn't seem to care about her response and he's go on and on about himself and he'd only text instead of call and she'd drink wine and send a stupid text that nobody would reply to...and he wouldn't reply and her friends, who were the best people in the world, would try with the kindest words possible, treating her with the "kid gloves" she needed at the time to guide her in the right direction.

And she would bring out the quotes from that mother-fucking book to remind herself what she already knew...


And she would cry, not because of him, but because why is it still hard?  And how did she think she got SO close and find a guy that she wanted to spend more than fifteen minutes around only to have it not go her way...again.

When does the fairy tale happen?

Because I am a fully pulled together woman, I'll give my friend Sadie some advice:
Good for you for opening your heart.
Good for you for being yourself.
Perhaps you could have used a little more patience and sent one less text but you know, at the end of the day, that although it was close-so close, it wasn't enough.
So, pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and keep doing you.

Someday you'll get your fairy tale...and it won't be perfect but it will be yours and it will be your favorite story.