The Bachelor Recap: You're Joking, Right?

I missed the “exciting” season premiere of season like, 101 of The Bachelor. However, during a 5 hour break between a lecture and my shift at work, I decided to watch it online.

It never ceases to amaze me how silly I can be sometimes.

To sum it all up, 25 plus an additional 2 women were selected amongst a sickening number of women who applied to be contestants on the show after finding out that the bachelor would be no other than some guy named (get your accents ready) Juan Pablo Galavis.

From what I know, he was on The Bachelorette last season and despite not winning the heart of Desiree Hartstock, he did win the hearts of women all over the world. Critics say it was his devotion to his daughter and life as a single dad that wooed us all. But maybe, just maybe, it had to do with his athletic build, perfectly messy hair, enchanting eyes, and “romantic” accent.

I watched in agony as the “wide” variety of blondes, brunettes, and the token black female were introduced. Each of them trying desperately to put on ridiculous Latin accents to impress him, appear genuine, loving, and “in it for love”. Despite vomit sitting comfortably at the back of my throat, I was able to waste an entire 86 minutes of my life that I will never get back.

As the show progressed, I found myself questioning the ultimate purpose of the show, particularly, the unintended consequences of it.

Maybe some of the women are in it for love, certainly some of them are in it for the publicity, and I bet a few of them are in it hoping for some sort of sexual encounter.

But as I sit here in the audience of God knows how many women, more critical than enticed, I can’t help but think about what this show says about women, and how it portrays us to be.

A number of these women in their introductions jumped at the chance to tell the stories of their “sad” and “depressing” love lives. One of them stated, “I was hoping to be married by 31.” As the visual image of depression grows on her face, she tells the audience the story of how that all fell apart after her ex-fiance called off the wedding six weeks after their engagement.

Aw, how sad. Two words: move on.

My spirits rose when a few of the women portrayed themselves as career-oriented females. One of them is a criminal prosecutor, one of them is a pediatric nurse, and to be honest those were the only two careers I remember really. My spirits sank again when the women attributed their devotion to their career as the reason they were unable to find love.

As if we haven’t seen this enough in our society; the unspoken ultimatum given to women; it’s either your career or your love life, and you'll be lucky if you can fit motherhood into the equation.

Although, Marissa Mayer did a fine job of indulging in all three.

I’m sick of it all.

After watching the show, unsure of whether or not I would progress to the second episode (luckily I have 6 days to decide), I couldn’t help but feel like women can do better. As much as I’d like to blame the television production company, I’m quite sure it wasn’t them holding knives to the throats of the contestants who uttered the following remarks:

“I’ve been dying to hug you.” (Dying, really?)

“It’s not just a rose, it’s my future.” (I doubt your future was that bright anyway, honey)

“I’m sick and tired of people looking at me and feeling sorry for me.” (This came from the woman who had been dumped by her ex-fiance and she said it as her eyelashes slightly unglued themselves)

I don’t know about you, but I don’t actually know any women like this. Not in real life. Most of the women I know who are single are single by choice, or patiently waiting for love. And half the women I know in relationships are dying to get out. Although we ought to be more careful with our use of the word "dying", right contestant #1?

Maybe it was my mistake to watch the show, although I do recall truly enjoying it when I watched it a few years ago. Mind you, that was before I took a few Women and Gender Studies courses at the University of Toronto and totally gave in to trashy, over-sensationalized television drama. I can’t be that unfair though, because I do watch every Real Housewives there is religiously. (New Jersey is definitely my favorite. Gotta love those Italians)

But how can we be onlookers of such genuine tragedy?

If you ask me, which I’m well aware that you didn’t, the biggest part of this tragedy isn’t the lame essence and desperation of the show. It’s that it has been so popular that it has lasted for like, 101 seasons, and evolved itself into The Bachelorette and Bachelor Pad.

The only ray of light I found in the entire show came from, drumroll please, the Canadian! Woohoo! 29-year-old opera singer Sharleen came to the rescue of dignified women. She was granted the holy grail (first impression rose) for being “elegant” and “beautiful” according to Galavis, and undesperate, according to ME.

Prior to the rose being delivered to her, she mentioned on camera that she felt, quite frankly, that the build-up of the chemistry she anticipated fell short of what she felt, or didn’t feel, after meeting (accent time) Juan 

Pablo. She opened up about how forced the connection felt, and then she uttered these magical words:

“It’s about whether I feel something or not. That’s the most important thing.”

The best part of the entire show was her nonchalant reaction to receiving, and apprehensively accepting the rose. She actually said, "Sure", when he asked her if she would accept it. Priceless. She proved to everyone that desperation doesn't win you a rose, just ask the girl in the pink dress with the terrible dye job who thought he called her name, had to turn around, and asked if he'd take them both anyway. Yeah, that really happened.

Sharleen proved that being cool, calm, and collected in the midst of such madness might get you farther than an erotic massage 5 minutes into your one-on-one time.

Bravo!

I know that come next Monday, I will face a moral issue of whether or not to tune into it on television. And if I do it will be because I have absolutely no homework, will have consumed a glass of wine or two, and really, to see Sharleen, my heart (and vagina’s) hero.

But the promise I’m making to myself and to my readers is that I will not let down my sense of reality, and certainly not my understanding of it, and believe for one second that this is a fair representation of women.

But in case it is, we have got a lot of work to do.

The Dangers of Post-Break Up Dating

After my relationships come to the usual gruesome and gradual halt, I often find myself alone again.

I always follow my usual routine of giving my number to every walking penis I encounter, standards completely abandoned, only to ignore the endless calls and stream of text messages.

I find that for the first few weeks after a break-up, this does me a lot of good. It gives me people to talk to, when I feel like it, dates to go on, if I feel like going out. But I think ultimately, what it does is help to make me feel desired-a feeling many normal human beings long for after a split, and often the few weeks before the split.

But I also find that in the few weeks after the first few weeks, there is a pang of loneliness that sets in amidst all the phone calls, text messages, unread Facebook messages in the inbox, and so on, that is so hard to explain.

But then I had a revelation.

As I sat in my girlfriend’s living room last night watching I Survived, a woman told the story of how a man broke in to her house and dragged her out into the woods by her home. Despite fearing every possibility that ensues in this kind of situation, the only thing that she could think of was how to keep the man away from her husband who was upstairs sleeping.

She stayed quiet, did exactly what the man said, and even though she could have screamed at once, letting her husband know she was in danger, she knew that meant also endangering him.

At the very end of the show, she talked about how she had used this experience to connect with other rape victims and said:

“It gave all of this a purpose. And that’s all I need.”

The effect of watching this woman’s retelling of her survival story was twofold. The first effect was how she could love someone so deeply that she was willing to endure the dangers of the unknown, so long as it meant protecting him. The second effect was how important purpose can be, and the dangers of doing something with the absence of it.

I realized, in that moment, that the reason we feel so lonely after we get over the excitement of being newly single, free, is because we indulge in things blindly, with no direction and no purpose, that feeling empty and unfulfilled at the end of it, or before it even ends, is entirely inevitable.

Truthfully, the type of shallow desire we crave after a split is a breeding ground for disappointment. The satisfaction of sex is not at all the satisfaction that is grown from a deep and true connection to someone and a complete understanding for who they are, where they are coming from, and where they hope to go.

Despite this revelation I had being quite miniscule, it was the greater understanding that allowed me to forgive myself, and arrive me at peace.

For so long, I found myself making the same mistakes repeatedly. I had these outrageous double-standards with myself and others, and as much as I felt like I was this big bad wolf that knew exactly what she wanted, 

I really had no idea.

The truth is, no one knows what they want after a break-up.

Knowing when to leave a relationship doesn’t mean you’ll know what to do after the fact. Having the courage to go after what we want doesn’t mean we actually know what we want. And do you have any idea how much what we want changes when we’re on our own?

We might want to love, so deeply that we’d be willing to be dragged into a forest to protect our partner. We might want to care about someone so truly that their well-being is our greatest concern. We might want to be desired so much that it becomes about the soul, not the sex.

But just because we want something doesn’t mean we get it. And certainly not in our timing either.

My advice, and this is for you just as much as it is for me, is this:

Don’t force yourself to do anything.

If you don’t want to pick up that phone don’t you dare pick up that phone. If you don't want to go on that date, don't go on the date! 

Be interested, not desperate.

People can sense weakness like some dogs sense danger. More importantly, it can make you easy prey for ill-minded people looking to get the best of you. Keep yourself and your feelings at bay.

Recognize what is and what isn’t.

I know a break-up can blur our vision sometimes, but if we lose our ability to call a spade a spade, we end up falling for people who don’t truly care for us, and end up caring for people who aren’t true to us.

And one last thing…

Always, always, always find your purpose.