If I were to confess my biggest guilty pleasure, it would be this: I am a list maker.
I make lists about everything. There’s nothing in this world that I cannot make a list about.
What to pack for a weekend getaway? Make a list. What to do on the said weekend getaway? Make a list. He says he has reasons why he can’t commit? Make a bloody list of possibilities and give it to him (at the risk of coming off as a total crazy person).
Jokes aside though, it really is true. I could make lists about every thing.
They keep me on track. They help me figure out what I want and what I don’t. They play a major role in helping me weigh out the pros and cons of basically any situation. No list is too small. No list is too insignificant.
But this is about a whole different list. One we all have, though most of us don’t ever write it down on paper. This is the kind of a check-list which we mentally tick things off or score on every time we meet someone.
The ideal mate list. Don’t deny it! We all have one.
I never really got around to writing mine but over the years I have created this picture of how it should be. I’ve even decided on how it should all feel. Over the years, however, through many and many heartbreaks, I got to realize the plain hard truth.
All these lists can’t protect you.
Because when you begin to fall for someone, all your walls, all your logical intentions and lists cease to matter. You just fall. You fall regardless of whether or not they are what you want. You fall despite the fact that there’s a 99.99% chance they’re not right for you.
Honestly I never wrote the list because it is pointless isn’t it? We throw it away the first chance our heart gets to override our brain. And in the end, we never get that ideal person anyway, because there isn’t an “ideal” person at all.
Then…
…then came you.
If I gave this complete check-list listing out every trait and attribute that my ideal person should have to the universe and the universe actually got to work to create this ideal person to my exact specifications, it would be you.
It should be great then, right? It should be perfect, right? It should all fall into place, right? Right?
The answer is a big fat no.
It never does. Something is always wrong. Either you’re going somewhere, or he is. Maybe it’s the timing. Maybe it’s the past. Maybe it’s something. It is always something. Always.
Lists are great. They help you face things all pepped up.
But here’s the sad hard truth once more –
No amount of lists can prepare you for the heartbreak that comes with realizing that no matter how meant to be you two may seem, sometimes you just aren’t.