Shit or get off the pot.

Seriously now. In my relatively short history of dating, and through listening to the trials and tribulations of the women and men who confide in me about such things, I have come to the conclusion that a lot of twenty and thirty-somethings don't know what the fuck they want, and are too busy analyzing their navels in pursuit of figuring out what they want to keep from being inconsiderate jerks in matters of love. Well meaning, but.....

Does this sound familiar to any of you all? What is the deal? I have one thought about it, one fabulous New York idiom that I think goes well for this situation:

Shit or get off the pot.

Seriously. Do not mess around with someone you care about. This is a totally different story if you're picking people up at bars or wherever, and you clearly don't know each other enough to care, but in cases of friends, of people who you already know and enjoy and respect, (To continue with the potty metaphor...) you can't crap out once you've already begun. If you get into something, you'd better be prepared to at least give it an honest try. None of this getting scared and crapping out, that's just lousy.

Breaking up sucks, so do it for a GOOD REASON if you have to. If your lover is mean or annoying or rude or way too eager to marry you or cheats or if you just don't love them, then by all means, break up. But just because you're scared and you don't know what you want? That's not a reason. Everyone who's out there dating is scared, no one knows just what they want. If you can't handle that, then for god's sake, don't drag the people you care about into it!

We have some responsibility to be good to one another, don't we? As creatures who want to be loved and trusted, we have some responsibility to our friends to be loving and trustworthy, to mean what we say and do, to communicate about problems, and be considerate of each other's feelings. Right? Come on!

I know, it's not so simple, you can't really know how you'll feel until you try it out, everyone screws up sometimes, I know. But, doesn't it seem like some people are a lot better at handling uncertainty than others are? I think THAT's the ticket, really - not necessarily becoming more certain about our choices, because who can ever be certain, but getting better at managing and handling our uncertainty, expecting it, communicating about it, and trusting each other.

Anyway, rant rant, pardon me, just airing some collective grievance here on the state of men and women in relationships. Emotional retardation, is what it boils down to, a goddamned epidemic of emotional retardation. It's the spice of life or whatever, I guess, but I do hope it isn't a permanent condition. ::::fingers crossed::::