Cupid Must Die

Oh save me from that capricious, little, bastard who seems to rule my life with the attention-span of a hapless child. After exhausting myself dating in almost every form you can imagine and some you cannot, it feels as though love is indeed dead. Whatever happened to romance and intimacy? They have taken a back seat to hook-ups and booty calls.


Romance used to be about the teasing, intensifying, attraction between two people exploring their flirtatious boundaries to create feelings strong enough to build a life upon. Intimacy was cultivated as people, in love, learned to trust, share and open up with each other over time.

How can you build anything when the primary communication tools between dating adults includes; sexting, chatting, or sitting in loud, obnoxious places watching 40 something year old men, who insist on calling themselves, Pretty Ricky, drool over twenty something women as if you are blind and invisible? Is it romantic when your date starts the evening out with questions like, "are those breasts real? Let's go to a grown and sexy party, while holding his head up so you don’t see the hair he sprayed on moments before your date. Or worse you find yourself observing the man you have dated for weeks gets caught in lie after lie and insists it's your insecurities that created a hostile environment leaving him no room for honesty and trust. In other words, your well, honed, skepticism forced him to lie repeatedly because you were simply not sufficiently stupid to be adequately gullible. WTF?!?

Conversely, as romance and intimacy have taken major hits, sex is getting better and better. Whether it's the fact that through Yoga, Pilates and Wii Fit, people are keeping themselves tight, toned and nimble, combined with the saturation of the porn and porn lite culture in our society, these influences have done for sex what the Food Network has done for cooking. People can now research, analyze, practice and master almost any type of lovemaking style or technique. It is not unusual for an otherwise humdrum evening to reach "gourmet" heights after the partners, bored with trying to make small talk in the absence of electronic devices to facilitate the exchange of information, simply fall into bed or wherever and commence to exploring each other's bodies with the zeal of an Iron Chef. “Gourmet Sex” means that it's not enough to simply put out, you have to be adequately prepared, mind, body and soul.

Being prepared, doesn't just mean that your body needs to be in professional athlete condition, your clothes, and hair coiffed and your teeth Zoom whitened and Luminared, it also means removing every, single hair from your body, minus your head, brows and lashes. The use of boiling hot wax works best because today's man or cub is a discerning participant and an errant hair or God forbid stubble, could deflate his desire faster than a pair of granny panties. And speaking of lingerie, it needs to match, thongs or boy-shorts required, be made of silk, satin and lycra, preferably from France. Don't be surprised if your date wants you to perform a bit before the festivities begin, and by perform I literally mean dance. Thanks to all female fitness clubs like Xpose, you can learn how to gyrate around your man during a lap dance or shimmy up and down a pole, seconds before getting down to business.

And in terms of the actual events that may or may not be a part of the evening's activities. And it's not just physical appearance and willingness to do anything and everything, it means talking dirty, sexting dirty, and being proficient at saying things to a person you may have only known 48 hours that people had to pay 900 operators extra for in the 1990's. Just be prepared to put on your A game, ladies and gentleman. Intimate activities previously reserved for a married couples ten year anniversary (use your imagination here) may now be found in the Amuse Bouche section of today's first-date menu.

I don't condone or condemn these new dating requirements; I merely bring them to your attention in the event you are newly single or have been living on an island so you are adequately prepared: if that is even humanly possible. And all of these activities are flawlessly choreographed so that you can spend, one perhaps three evenings with the man or woman of your dreams, or at least reveries until one and or both of you hop on to the next stop on the relationship tour and abandon your current interest because they had the bad taste or luck to have a grooming malfunction, were not up on the latest sexual technique, or goodness forbid lacked the mental acuity or physical dexterity to sex-text while driving and applying make-up and driving their kids to soccer.

Cupid has turned into a randy, fickle, petulant little bastard. And I think it's high time some courageous soul snatched that bow from his hand and rammed down his throat. Or at least perched it on a high counter where he cannot reach it until he is willing to come to terms with love modern style. It doesn't have to be vapors, chocolate and flowers, but it can be intelligent, witty, cosmopolitan, mature adults still sexy enough to use all their years of experience and wisdom for good. If we are truly going to live longer, healthier lives, we have to find a way to have meaningful relationships, or what's the point? If being grown and sexy is something to aspire to then let's stop dating like 15 year olds. I would like to show them how it can be done instead of Farmvilling my way into a Facebook official relationship that makes me wanna murder an infant...

What is a good man or a good woman?

Many people find themselves in a place where they are looking for “a good man or woman”. They believe that the solution to many of the problems they have in their lives is based on finding and acquiring a good man or a good woman. Aside from the fact that it is never a good idea to look to others to solve your own personal issues, it almost never works. You should base finding your mate on the desire to give and share love and life experiences, rather than loneliness, boredom or unhappiness. The stronger you are emotionally, the happier and more stable your life is the more you have to offer a potential mate.


To ensure you are ready for a serious commitment you have to prepare yourself.  Think of the way a farmer, prepares the soil for an upcoming crop, he tills the soil to remove dead and decaying plants, he adds fertilizer to make certain the seeds and plants will have a healthy foundation. Getting your house in order may involve a similar level of dedication and effort. While it may not involve physical labor, the mental effort can be equally exhausting.  To ensure you maintain a healthy, positive frame of mind, preparing yourself will involve self examination, brutal honesty and hard work.

Sometimes before you are ready to start a new relationship, you can trick yourself into believing it's time.  It’s easy to simply say forget all that self examination crap and trying to understand what contributed to past failed relationships, to solely blame your previous partners and try to move forward.  But that is a dangerous tactic.  It is tempting to distract yourself with an externally focused objective like prematurely starting a new relationship. The more difficult the relationship is the more distracting it is to initiate and maintain so you can become very preoccupied with the relationship and all of its problems rather than your own internal issues. Not realizing those very issues may be contributing to many of the problems in the relationship. . It’s almost as though your subconscious realizes you want a distraction and points you to the partner that will create the most drama. So for many reasons, it is important, when you are in the midst of inner turmoil or have recently ended a relationship to take the necessary time to be by yourself to develop objectivity, context and heal.

Happiness in a relationship is based on your ability to understand what you want and need in your life focus your efforts on learning about the other person, understanding what is going on in the relationship, and knowing what you can contribute to be a good partner yourself.  The challenge is knowing what it is it about a person that makes them good for you. In terms of a relationship, the term good is really about compatibility; however there are universal qualities that you should strive to develop within yourself and look for in others. And, in the case of stable, healthy relationships, it means what enables a person, man or woman to be a successful candidate for romantic involvements.

When someone wants to purchase a car or a television they generally think about what they want and need then compare those requirements against what is available and come up with a match. However, when it comes to romance, people rarely take such an analytical approach. And that is natural because love and romance are based on feelings generally, not just thoughts and rarely analysis.  People consider things like, how does this person make me feel? The most someone may think as they are getting to know another person, is do I respond to them on a physical, emotional or spiritual level? As a result of dating services that sell compatibility as a key benefit, people are more sophisticated about dating and therefore likely to ask themselves more practical questions. But mostly people operate on intuition and their emotional reactions to people they meet to determine whether to move forward in a relationship. They assume most people they meet are good, but rarely break down the components of goodness to validate those assumptions against the persons’ thoughts, actions and behaviors.

But understanding what good traits are and what they mean can be useful. Qualities like integrity, honesty, kindness, compassion, self awareness, and generosity can be a blueprint for a good person. Knowing the answer to questions about the individual like ...How does the person live their life? How are they with their friends and relatives, children? Do they plan for their future?  Do they learn from past actions and mistakes? When they experience difficult times do they become negative and hard to be around for protracted periods, or do they maintain a positive attitude and react with tenacity and resilience? Are they frequently moody for no reason?  Do they have substance abuse problems that contribute to or exacerbate already negative behaviors? Do they support your successes and accomplishments or do they seem jealous or unnaturally competitive?

This is not to suggest that even good people won't have bad days or bad times, but how people react during those times is a very good indication of their personality and lifestyle.  To build a successful relationship with a person you have to be observant and patient enough to truly understand who they are and honest with yourself about whether they are compatible with your personality and lifestyle.  This can be most challenging when you are very physically attracted to a person that is not a good fit for you emotionally, spiritually or intellectually.  But try to be strong and resist the urge to give in to your passions, because it is to your advantage to find a person you can love with your whole heart, and to find someone who has the capacity to do the same for you in return.