How is it possible that after all that I’ve been through and all that I’ve learned I still find myself attracted to unavailable men?

Do you live on the International Space Station? Do you have a beautiful girlfriend you adore to pieces? Do you have emotional issues that have turned you into a commitment-phobe? Are you totally not into me?

Then I, Eleni Zoe, being of sound body and kind of sound mind, hereby declare that I probably have had, currently have, or will have a crush on you.

My therapist once said I was attracted to this type of man because I want to change the story of my father. My father who was unavailable to me because he was dead. Yes, this human brain somehow believed that by getting an unavailable man (in whatever form) to be available, I would finally get daddy closure. My therapist called this maladaptive behaviour (or its street name: batshit insane) and suggested instead I grieve my father, forgive him, accept the past and let go.

It took over a year. And it was hard. But then it was good. All was very good until, of course, I tripped and fell into another inappropriate crush.

This one came out of nowhere. I agreed to go for a quick drink with family friends, just to get out of the house and practice facing my fears. When I arrived I noticed a face I’d never seen before.  Introductions were made swiftly but I didn’t retain his name because I was too busy worrying if I had lipstick on my teeth. Warning: Red lipstick will cause unintended rudeness. I didn’t seek to talk to him. But at some point I realized that every time I brought up a topic, he was the one who would respond. And when he spoke up, I was the first to laugh. In my head, I was pumping my fist to my chest and telling him: You and I, dude. We get each other. Across the table high-five. And since you can’t hear me, let’s psychic high-five too! 

Bam!

It was all picture perfect after that. I snuck glances at him wishing it was morning and I could hide them all behind my sunglasses.  It was dark, so I had to settle for quick peeks camouflaged (I hoped) by my blinks.

And then, one week, a dozen conversations and one rising-rising-rising crush later, I discover he has a girlfriend.

How did I miss this key piece of information?  Why wasn’t this key piece of information tattooed across his forehead? As I’ve always decreed, single people should be the ones who wear rings. It is more important for us to be able to tell each other apart from the coupled. Besides, rings would definitely decrease the rate of my disappointments.

Because I know my history, because I know that nothing good comes from pining after someone who has no interest in being pined, because I know I have the tendency to indulge in these inappropriate crushes, I began the arduous process of shutting the crush down.  All systems a’ go. Mental shutdown. Emotional shutdown. Physical shutdown. Social media shutdown. Check. Check. Check and check.

I stopped talking to him. I blocked his newsfeed. When friends asked about him, I swatted their questions away with my hand and changed the subject.

This morning I knew I had one last thing to do before I pulled out the plug completely. Today I had to write about it because this crush has completed the trifecta of inappropriate crushes. 2010′s crush was emotionally unavailable. 2011′s crush was unavailable because we didn’t live in the same country. 2012′s crush is unavailable because he’s available to someone else.

I had to write about this crush because it’s one thing talking about letting go and changing our maladptive behaviours and it’s quite another actually letting them go and then changing them.

So this is it, the last act of letting go. When I hit publish, this inappropriate crush will effectively be over.

A couple of weeks ago I asked you to fill out a survey so I could better understand the reasons you stick around. While reading your answers I realized that I sometimes write as if you’ve known me forever. Many of you are confused about what I do, where I’m from, and feel like some of my posts are vague because of these gaps in knowledge.

I get it. We all need certain facts about a person to ground them in our minds. I also ardently believe that we all need certain facts to ground ourselves in our own minds.

But, I don’t really know where to ground myself.

I don’t really belong anywhere.

If there is one sentence that could ever succinctly describe the story of my life it would be that one. It’s probably no coincidence that I migrated toward a degree in Social Psychology, which is the study of the way people function (or in my case, dysfunction) in groups. It’s probably no coincidence that no matter what I do, I struggle to fit in and it’s probably no coincidence that when I lose a friendship, I mourn that friendship like a death in the family. It’s also not a coincidence that I search for romantic love harder than other people. For me, love isn’t about validating my self-worth. (At least, it hasn’t been for a long time.)

I think my search for love has been about fulfilling this need to belong. Somewhere. Even if it’s as abstract as someone’s heart.

I hope that the following “facts” help ground me in your minds.

#1

I am a national of both Greece and South Africa. I am a South African national because I was born there. I am a Greek national because my parents are both Greek. I do not feel Greek and I do not feel South African.  In Greece, I am not Greek. Yet, when I lived in South Africa, I was not South-African. Try drawing that Venn Diagram.

#2

I was educated in South Africa, Greece and England. But my education in Greece was in an International School and I am a holder of an American High School Diploma. I completed my undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in England. As a result, my English is a hybrid of South African English, British English and American English. I speak Greek well but not well enough to pass as a *real* Greek. South Africans think I sound American. Americans think I sound British. Brits are all: “Is that an Australian/New Zealand accent?”

#3

I am 31 years old. I spent 12 years in South Africa, six years in England and 13 years in Greece. And those years weren’t consecutive. As a result, I have had trouble keeping and maintaining a core group of friends.  I do have a few best friends but they need passports to visit me.  I am also an Introvert. This means I don’t make friends easily to begin with. Add Agoraphobia to that mix and you pretty much have a recipe for the world’s loneliest, but probably most stylish, hermit. Score!

#4

Regardless of the above, I will always belong with my family. We are bound by blood, love, and in the face of my father’s early death: a shared tragedy. But even within my immediate family, our experiences growing up have been so different that I still feel different. The age, cultural and language difference I have with my mother. My brother and sister spent twenty years in South Africa, significantly longer than I did, that makes me feel that I missed out on really knowing them.

Sometimes over lunch, the three of them reminisce about the past while I sit quietly in my chair, playing with my food, wishing my heart could be bigger. Maybe then I could find some room to fit in. But because a bigger heart would probably cause cardiac arrest, I wish for a separate heart –in another body– that would beat beat beat like mine. Beats I would follow to find home.

• Jon Stewart succinctly explains the outcomes of the Greek elections. This is also the reason I’ve been so quiet this week. I JUST CAN’T DEAL.

• 15 Powerful Things Happy People do Differently.  While reading this I realized that I have taught myself to think, do and act in this way. And you can too. You won’t be happy all the time, but you will be sad less often.

• Can a fictional character take you over?  Did you know that sometimes we change our behaviour to fit the behaviour of a fictional character? I agree. I often find myself using expressions of various TV characters. And when I’m reading a really good book, I often, begin to think in the protagonist’s way.

• An 800-pound woman gets engaged and fitted for a wedding dress and all single everywhere are like: “WTF? And I’m still single?” Although I think the appropriate question is: How can a body handle 30,000 calories a day and not explode Monty Python style?

• I’ve joined a new blogging collective called Pooping Rainbows. All the other bloggers are amazing and I urge you to check it out as soon as you can.

• Finally, a photo of Diego. Isn’t he adorable?

When I first got The Agoraphobia, or rather once I’d been in it for a while and progress was so slow that I couldn’t see past the end of my street, I’d pretty much given up on some dreams I’d always thought I’d live one day, even though I wasn’t actively pursuing them.

To illustrate my point, over the last year I’d given up on finding love, getting married and having children. I gave up on travelling. I resigned myself to a small, but dignified life. We can’t have everything we want, I thought, I’ll adjust my expectations and I’ll be happy with what I do have.

I even found ways to twist my own attitudes to suit this new reality. I never really wanted children. And I never thought about marriage until I hit my late 20s and even now I don’t care much for weddings. I can travel through books AND it’s faster, safer and cheaper.

But what I found when I resigned myself to a smaller life than what I’d previously expected, small, but dignified got claustrophobic.

One late afternoon, a few weeks ago, I was doing my third load of laundry. As I was separating colours from whites, I had a paralyzing thought:

There will never be a moment in my life where all the laundry will be done. There will always be dirty clothes in the hamper. And I will always be sorting, washing, hanging up, ironing, putting clothes back into the closet and by the time I’m done putting everything back into the closet, I have to start the process all over again.

I groaned and was very close to having a full-blown tantrum. The kind where I’d be all, “Nooooo, I don’t want to wash my clothes. I just want them to be clean! I just want them to appear in my closet –like magic- lavender infused and folded crisply. Is that too much to ask?”

But I’m an adult. And my brain is fully formed. And I have almost mastered emotional control.

Instead of sitting in a pile of leggings (How many leggings can one person own?) and banging my fists on the floor, I took a few deep breaths and almost immediately, I had another thought.

If I was an item of clothing –a dress- I would go through this process (new, clean, worn, dirty, hamper, sort, wash, hang up, dry, iron, fold, back into closet almost like new, clean, worn, dirty and so on) over and over again. 

A few days later, while baby-sitting my nephews, I had a whisper of a thought that was soft I would have barely heard it, had it not have been for the few seconds of silence the kids gave me between their playful screaming. It was this: I wonder if my kids will be this cute?

Maybe, I’m like the worn dress: the one that’s been sitting in the hamper for weeks and weeks because it’s hand wash only. Or maybe I’m like the dress hanging in the closet, unworn for years because it’s not in fashion at the moment. Maybe, I’m a dress that doesn’t fit quite right, maybe I’m too big or maybe I’m too small.

It doesn’t mean that the dress won’t eventually be worn again. It will. One day soon, it’ll be worn again. With heels. To a party. Where it will meet a cute tie. Dress and Tie will fall in love and eventually, definitely, maybe, have cute Dress-Tie babies.

Tomorrow, I have to wake up, walk the hundred meters to the school opposite my house with my National I.D card in tow and place my vote in Greece’s parliamentary elections.

I’ve got one day left to decide between 32 parties. (Well, not 32 exactly. I’ve already vetoed the communists and the fascists. It’s 2012, people, can we get a grip on reality please?) Anyway, so between the rest of the non-extremists I’m at a loss.

Do I cast my vote for one of the two leading political parties? Do I cast my vote for smaller factions of those parties? Do I vote for an independent? Do I vote on principle? Do I vote on practicality? Do I use my vote as punishment for the past? Or do I use it as a symbol of hope for the future? I could throw away all my values, and ideals and use my vote like a sheep and vote for the  party who is more likely to win. Or should I vote like a caged bird, wings clipped, freedom a distant memory, and drop a blank vote in the election box? A blank vote could be viewed as sticking it to The Man.

Due to these circumstances, I’e been more thoughtful than usual. Thankfully, the internet was around to distract me.

•  Some dude’s CD player is not working. He needs a translator to translate the Japanese manual. Hilarity ensues. 

• Jenn finds haunted money and then tries to save a family of ducks.

• I need this awesome T  in my life pronto.

• Jamie recommended I watch Veep. I snort-laughed through the first two episodes. It kind of fills the gigantic gap in my heart from when The West Wing and Arrested Development ended. Almost. 

• 5 Pieces of Dating Advice You Should Never Take Number One is the best advice you should never take. And the last line pretty much nails the sentiment. “COULD YOU REALLY HAVE A BABY WITH SOMEONE WHO CAN’T DEAL WITH SOMETHING AS SIMPLE AS AN ON-TIME TEXT?”

Last week, Linda asked if I would vlog for the Totes Awesome Channel. And I did! The question was: If I were a celebrity what would be on my rider? (Did I use that word correctly? It’s a noun, right?) Basically, a rider is a list of stuff that celebrities request when they’re performing. If you have about four-ish minutes to spare, you can watch my response right here.

I’ve come to the conclusion that to really understand a person,  all you need to do is ask them one simple question.  I came to this conclusion when Pinelopi told me about a conversation she had with some of her friends and family.

Friend: She made me wait for two hours! Can you believe it?”
Pinelopi: Actually, I can’t. Was it really two hours?
Friend: OK, so maybe it was like half an hour.

Then, for funsies, everyone at the table answered this hypothetical scenario:

A friend is half an hour late to meet you. How would you HONESTLY  re-tell this boring story to someone else?

These are the responses they collected.

“I wouldn’t even mention it to someone else.”
“She had me waiting for exactly fifteen minutes and thirty-four seconds.”
“I had to wait half a bloody hour.”
“She was two hours late!”
“I waited for her for four hours like a total loser!”
“You don’t understand! She totally stood me up!”

There are two ways I would re-tell this story and it would depend on whether I was channeling my nature or my nurture.

If I was channelling my South African upbringing and talking to another Antipodean, I would round-up my specificity to 16 minutes. I would know that 16 minutes is considered late in that culture. If, however, I was channelling my Greek genes and talking to a Greek person I would have to be hyperbolic and round it up to the closest hour for the person to comprehend that lateness was involved. In both scenarios, I would also probably give an account of the way all of this made me feel.

I think my answer to this question is completely characteristic of me. Nuanced? Check. Annoyingly reasonable? Check? But also dramatic so that I make sure the other person understands the exact hue of my pain? Check.

Pinelopi would also probably round-up to the nearest hour. She has drama-queen tendencies.

Danai, the resident psychologist in my group of friends, would be specific. She would also offer a reason for the late person’s behaviour. “‘I can’t blame her for being 16 minutes late, her mother never bought her that Swatch watch she wanted when she was five years old.”

Maria would round-up to twenty minutes. But she would blame herself for the person’s tardiness.  ”It’s my fault. I must have given her the wrong time.”

Alexia wouldn’t mention any time. She might tell me her friend was late. But she would definitely tell me that while she was waiting she made friends with the most ethereal lady-bug you ever did see and named her Aurelia. She would insist  The Universe put Aurelia in her path as a sign of sorts.

My brother wouldn’t even mention something like this.

My sister wouldn’t mention it because she would be the person who was late.

I don’t mean to brag but I’m pretty sure I’ve just created the world’s easiest and fastest personality test.

Your turn. A friend is half an hour late to meet you. How would you HONESTLY  re-tell this (boring) story to someone else?

• The Scale of the Universe: When I went left, I felt tiny. But when I went right, I felt big.  If you need to put life into perspective, check it out.

• 50 People You Wish You Knew In Real Life.  If you don’t feel like you might die from laughing so hard, I don’t think we could be friends.

• Text-Only Instagram. I am guilty of most of these.

• I need this.

• I really, really, really want this pom-pom scarf.

• This the best ‘No Make-up’ make-up tutorial ever.

• The top of my To-do List. “Don’t ignore your dreams; don’t work too much; say what you think; cultivate friendships; be happy.”

The other day on Twitter, a bunch of us had a whirlwind of a conversation about blogging. (Heather posted about it here.) Boy, did I have a lot of thoughts on the matter. The next morning I couldn’t help but accept that while I have a lot of thoughts, none of those thoughts produce action-filled behaviour.

While I got a ton out of that conversation and it was good to know that others feel the way I feel, I still feel lost.

See, over the last few months, I’ve tried to make subtle changes to my blog in an effort to make it more fun for me and more fun for you. Personally, I have fun when there is communication, debate and feedback. But I feel like the changes I’ve made don’t seem to have made much of a difference. Then I realized that I did something that I ordinarily don’t do.

I pretended I was psychic.

Instead of asking YOU what you feel works or doesn’t work, I assumed.  And I’m sorry I made an ass out of the both of us. It won’t happen again. To fix this, I put together a quick survey to find out what you really think about my blog and what you would like to see more of  in the future. I’m hoping this will inspire me to keep writing the kind of posts that are fun for me and fun for you. Doesn’t that sound good?

Take the survey here!

You miss listening to music and imagining that every lyric was written for you. Actually, you miss being able to twist every lyric to describe your current situation.Like Hey there Delilah could actually be “Hey there dear Elala.” And Elala is only one consonant and two vowels away from Eleni. See? All songs, ever, could have been written about you.

You miss the first ‘beep’ of the very first text message. You miss the domino of beeps; back and forth messages that cram your phone until you’re basically having ten different conversations at the same time.

You miss the moment you realize this someone new is someone who you’d like to be more than new. You miss the way your name sounds when this someone more than new says it for the first, second and third time. You miss counting the number of times he has said your name.

You miss the first personal joke. You miss the first time your personal joke slips out  in front of other people. You both laugh and these other people exchange glances because they’re finally in on the secret. There is something new happening here.

You miss the first touch. The one that he thinks he knows you want, but still isn’t sure because this is the beginning and he still can’t believe that your legs are crossed in his direction! Everyone knows that’s the universal sign that a woman is into you.  He touches your arm, or your shoulder or maybe he moves you aside by your waist because you’re about to be poked by a cactus. Men’s kisses may lie sometimes, but you can’t fake saving a woman from death by prickly leaves.

You miss shopping with this someone new in mind. You pick up a skirt and you put it against your body, over your clothes, and twirl in front of the store mirror. You don’t even care who’s watching because all you care about is the way you hope his eyes might dumb down when he sees you walk down the street to meet him. You miss first dates, proper ones. The ones where you go for dinner until closing time. The kind where you jump from place to place until the only place open is a graffiti-ed park bench.

You miss first kisses. Actually, you miss the second kiss more. First kisses are good, but they’re so full of nerves, expectations and all that inhaled air you’ve stored in your cheeks for hours. But then you disengage from the first kiss, and you both laugh in relief. Shared laughter is so much more intimate than shared saliva. You stop laughing and kiss again. And this time, it’s real. Yes, you definitely miss second kisses more.

You miss goodnight messages. When you’re single nobody cares if you sleep well or not. Nobody cares if you have sweet dreams. You miss knowing someone gives a shit about your night-time travels.

You miss telling all your stories to someone new. Someone who wants to hear them just because he likes the way you mispronounce all his favourite words. He doesn’t honestly care about the most recent plot twist in Vampire Diaries (He’s a little jealous that you keep mentioning this Damon character) but he likes the way you trip over every sentence because you’re talking so fast. And its the same for you. You want to hear all his stories too. (Except the one that involves other women, in whatever context, because he’s mine,  fifty-year old married woman of four who offered him melon advice at the supermarket. Oh, I know your hand lingered when you showed him the way to tap melons to determine their freshness, don’t you even deny it!)

You miss the adorable but deluded way you think that all women everywhere must want your someone new.

You miss knowing someone new wants to talk to you. All the time if he could. You miss “You hang up”, “No, you hang up.” “No you.” “You!”

You would miss a warm body next to yours, but your cat spoons you quite regularly so you don’t really miss that. Besides, you don’t do well with other people in your bed. It’s the collateral damage from years and years (and years) of sleeping alone.

But you do miss the smell of someone new. On your clothes. In your hair. You miss smelling him in obscure places, like the one sleeve of your jacket. You miss spending the day investigating the way his scent could have transferred to that one sweet spot. You miss popping into Sephora on your lunch break just to find his cologne and sniff it.

And you miss your friends telling you that you’ve most definitely surpassed acceptable crush behaviour.