As a married woman, I am grateful that I am not out there, in the masses, trying to find "the one". I work with some young women (and when I say young, they were born when I was about to apply to college), and they are in the mere stages of finding that soul mate. But the process of dating is a bitch. I think fondly of it (with Ching) but then suck in my breath like a bad cramp while thinking of the many terrible mistakes...the mistakes that weren't even worth shaving my legs for the event. When the process isn't going the way it should and seems to last longer than you thought, the subject of settling lurks like a mold.
In college, my sister always had a boyfriend. For several years she was with a man named Steve. He was a couple of years older and a nice guy, in a Subway eating, spreadsheet loving, frat guy sort of way. He was always nice to me and seemed to treat Jess well. But he wasn't for Jess. For someone else, he was a good catch, but for Jess, not so much. This is the crux--knowing the man that you are with is a good catch but not for you? Can you make them a good catch if you work hard enough to look past the little things? Looking past the little things is what I define as settling.
Jess and Steve didn't mesh. Jess is very active. If you looked at Steve, the word active didn't come to mind. I couldn't see him sitting at a family dinner with my Mom and me...I don't even think I could be snarky because I wouldn't want to make the situation weirder than it was. Every gift giving occasion brought up some sort of anxiety. The gifts were nice but not for Jess...and she didn't seem to want to give him anything either. He wanted to stay near his family (in the Mid-Atlantic) and Jess wanted to come home to Maine. So many little things...
I got a call one weekend back in 1999. She walked away, realizing that she needed more. She deserved more. So scary for her because she was walking away from something, not right, but tolerable. She was taking the chance of being alone versus being with someone who wasn't quite right for her. Absolutely not overnight, but (thankfully), enter a guy named Jon.
Jon is now my brother in law. When "Jess and Jon" met, it was confirmation that her risk of walking away from something safe was the way to go. She gushed about him. (Side mouth comment..I kind of made fun of her for it.) She bought him gifts and he bought the most amazing gifts. (My favorite call was when he gifted her a mountain bike. She loved to be outdoors and to bike. I don't think Steve ever got on a bike.) They worked together on their relationship. I am sure, not an easy relationship (hell, he married my sister) but one that got them to this day.
Two kids later and eight years of marriage, they seem to still get each other. And my family gets Jon too. There isn't that awkward, "Oh Christ, Jon is coming over." He is a part of our family. AND I can be snarky with him. He totally gets it.
They spent the past week in a cabin at a major lake in Maine with Jon's parents. Jess was beyond excited to spend the week with her children, her guy and his parents. Her excited rivaled back in 2000 when she got that mountain bike. Needless to say, a decision back in 1999 that definitely paid off.
So there you go...if you are trying to convince yourself that he is the one, "the trying to convince yourself" is the red flag. Moving in together isn't going to fix it. Getting married isn't going to fix it and, holy crap, a baby isn't going to fix it. He is ab-so-freakin' not the one. Walk away...
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