single in your 20's

There comes a point in every single girl's life that you start to wonder whether you're single by choice (like you've been telling yourself all these yours) or if you're actually some sort of freak. You put yourself through college, find a job, start saving, and then one day realize that you put your love life on the back burner. Then you start to get nervous that you've ruined your chances of one day being in a functional relationship. You don't want to give up your indepence to just any schmoe off the street, but it's possible that all the good guys were snatched up while you weren't paying attention. But the thing is that there's nothing wrong with being single in your late 20's, or even into your 30's. In fact, people who are married generally envy the fact that you can do whatever you want, whenever you want. But try telling this to some raving lunatic that's just had her heart broken. There's usually a singular episode that sets off this spiral of depraved thinking, and it always ends in disaster. Girl's ex-boyfriend gets new girlfriend. Girl thinks she will die alone. Girl, determined NOT to die alone, starts dating absolute freaks to prove to herself that she's still got it. You get the idea...

I think I'm going to take the exact opposite approach and stop dating entirely (not that I date that much to begin with, given the fact that I made that conscious decision to put my career goals first). See, a few weeks before my surgery I found myself the star of my own bad romantic comedy... I started drunk-dialing, as I do every weekend, and decided to call the guy that ripped my heart out many years ago. I know that sounds like a disaster waiting to happen, but I haven't spoken to him in about 2 years and I genuinely wanted to see how he's been doing. When he called me back and informed me that he's engaged to his ex-girlfriend with the frizzy hair and the 1980's fashion sense, I was rendered speechless. I attempted to sound happy for him, but it's hard to be happy for the guy who couldn't commit to me, but could commit to someone with such poor taste in clothing. Hearing that an ex is engaged is a serious blow to any woman's ego, so I immediately felt sorry for myself and cried into a pint of Ben and Jerry's all night. OK, so it was 2 pints. Don't judge me.

Anyway, done feeling sorry for myself, I refuse to start dating losers just to prove to myself that I won't be found dead one day, eaten alive by my 12 cats. I'm not going to put some sort of ridiculous timeline on myself that I have to get married by the time I'm 30 (mostly because this is impossible unless I want to run away to Vegas one night and elope). I'm going to re-write this Shakespearean tragedy that I call my love life, I'll let you know how it ends...

Ah...physical therapy

So I started physical therapy this week....although it's totally painful, at least it's an excuse to get out of the house. I'm on short-term disability from work right now and there is nothing fun about watching bad tv all day. (There is only one good tv program on between 9:00-5:00 everyday: Ellen.) I can't even lift my own leg to put my socks on, much less go outside and do anything productive. I'm frustrated at my inability to do the things that we take for granted day to day. Getting out of bed and moving to the couch is such a production, it takes about half an hour. It's only about a 12 foot walk, but I can't carry my ice, my prescriptions, my books, etc. I feel helpless for 95% of my day, which is like hell on earth for someone who likes to think of themselves as independent.
I'm actually very excited about physical therapy. It's amazing to me the kinds of things they can do to help you recover. Right now I cannot flex my quad muscle at all, so they hooked me up to a machine to stimulate my muscle with a slight electric shock. It feels weird, but it's necessary. My therapist also gave me hope that I will have a speedy recovery since I'm reasonably young and was in good shape prior to the surgery. They also taught me how to walk on my crutches without my immobilizer on. Yippee! I also got my stitches out and my scar doesn't look like it's gong to be too bad. Obviously only time will tell, but overall I'm pretty hopeful about how my recovery will go.