Gold & Lead

The Roman Poet Ovid, known for his scandalous verses on sex, tells an instructionary tale about Cupid.

Cupid's arrows come not in one type, but two: some are sharp and tipped with gold; these induce desire. The others are dull and end with lead; these repel desire and cause repulsion or indifference.

With me these arrows never come in matching pairs - that is, both gold or both lead. Instead, feelings are never mutual. If I like someone, he invariably finds me distasteful, and if someone likes me - which happens once in a blue moon - the affections are typically unwelcome.

(Or the attraction is mutual..but he turns out to be a jerk with questionable scruples and an awful personality. Or he loses interest after an embarrassingly short amount of time. Anyway...)

I'm always uncomfortable when the latter happens and I find myself having to turn someone down. In fact, it would be accurate to say I have a moral crisis each time: I know how bad it sucks to be on the receiving end of rejection, and I hate to think I'm inflicting the same damage on another person's self-esteem. Michael tries to convince me it's a necessary evil and just something to get used to, but I still feel awful, like I'll have to volunteer at a homeless shelter to make amends. Any tips for not feeling so badly?

Luckily this doesn't happen very often and I'm usually the one with the burn notice - which is fine, because I get to play the victim all I want. (lol) But even on that side of things, I haven't met any eligible young man lately - guys that give me the giddy, "ah-ha!" feeling - and it's a little dismaying, if only because puppy love is fun and exciting and I need new and refreshing ways to delude myself. :)

On some level I want to emulate the disdainful youth of comedy and folklore who disparages falling in love, but even this involves some trickery. In the end these characters always fall the hardest, smitten by that god whose powers they've denied. In a way, it's like challenging Cupid: "C'mon. Shoot me. Show me what you got." I'm an unwilling target - at least on the surface.