I was commiserating with my friend Jackie over the recent breakup of her two-year relationship. "I thought breakups would get easier after my 30's," she lamented over triple-tall-non-fat mochas at Starbucks. "But instead, they seem to be getting harder."
I suggested that perhaps that’s because of the way her boyfriend ended things. After two weeks of not hearing from him, she came home from work one evening to find a Post-It note on her front door saying that he’d met someone else.
Some men just have a knack for taking your breath away.
Personally, I find that breakups actually get easier as I get older. First, you get more practice. Like anything else, the more you do it the more adept you become. And although it’s not something anyone wants to practice enough to become, say, Carnegie-Hall-level perfect, your skills definitely improve as time goes by.
But as Hamlet said, “Ay, there’s the rub.”
"The Talk” is no one’s idea of a good time. But I think of it this way: You know how you can love your job, but you don’t love absolutely everything about it? In every job, there’s always one requirement that you dislike to the point of avoidance, but you have to do it anyway. Being single is like that. (Being married probably is, too, but that’s not my area of expertise.) I love having my own money, my own time, my own space. And my least favorite thing—from which my happily married pals are blissfully insulated—is having to initiate "The Talk."
But over the years I’ve gotten pretty good at it. One man actually told me that I “give good breakup.” I’m weirdly proud of that. I also secretly hope that I’ve rubbed off on the men I’ve dated, so that they would never consider using some of the breakup tactics that seem popular with other men.
Top Three Worst Ways to End a Relationship
#1: Post-In Note Ever since the Sex and the City episode where Berger ended his relationship with Carrie Bradshaw by leaving a post-passion Post-It note on her laptop (“I’m sorry. I can’t. Don’t hate me.”) some men seem to believe that this is now an acceptable breakup strategy. If the goal is to enrage a woman to the point where she loses all respect for you, then yes, this is the way to go. Definitely.
#2: 90-Second Phone Call The digital version of the Post-It note, along with texting, emailing, or leaving a voicemail message. It’s the romantic equivalent of a drive-by shooting. Extra points if you time the call so that it’s 30 minutes before you’re due to pick her up for an evening you’ve been planning for a month.
#3: Abduction by Aliens This option neatly disposes of the need to communicate at all. Although we don’t know for sure that an alien abduction has actually occurred, it frequently seems like the most plausible explanation for a man’s sudden—and total—disappearance. While he may have entered witness protection, we actually prefer to think of him as the subject of alien biogenic experimentation.
Reasons You Should Always Believe
Although it’s good to try and work things out before ending a relationship, there are some reasons you should simply accept as true. Don’t argue, don’t hope for change. Accept it and move on.
#1: You’re too good for me.
#2: I’m too old for you.
#3: We want different things.
#4: I don’t love you.
#5: I like being single. —OR— I’m married.
No discussion of breakups would be complete without the tried and true, “It’s not you, it’s me.” By which, of course, they mean that it’s you. But of course, you know that it’s actually all about them.
Maybe Post-It Man should have left that note on Jackie's door.
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Photo credit: "Love Hurts" by Kervinchong via Flickr, used under a Creative Commons license.
Twittering vixenish things @WriterVixen
