My paper life

My Chi-Bestie and I had an intriguing discussion yesterday while eating organic pizza and listening to the cheering Blackhawks fans across the street. Our topic: the paper man. The paper man feels nostalgic to me as it brings back memories of my childhood where I regularly used to play with paper dolls. The fun of these flimsy cutouts was that you got to dress them in different paper clothes and then they would go on paper dates, they would paper make-out, then they would go paper shopping, buy more paper clothes, go on more paper dates, and then paper get married, paper have kids, and paper live happily ever after. If paper life is so fun, then why are we so resistant to having a paper life with a paper man?

You know paper men, the guys who are good on paper--successful, intelligent, value-oriented, likable. Paper men provide their often paper women with very paper lives. Now, (as I often say so as to not offend my 5 followers), to be clear, I am not saying that there is anything wrong with paper men nor paper lives. I might think that there is something wrong with paper women, however, I will choose not to explain further. But as our conversation last night contended, we (she and I and many others) are not usually attracted to or interested in the paper man, and in my experience, the paper guys are usually not that into me. Whew, I must not be a paper woman.

I sort of qualify a paper life as a traditional life...a word I seldom find myself relating to. If I were a traditional girl then I would have went to all of my HS formals, I would have met my husband junior year in college, we would have gotten married 1 year after we graduated school, and right now I would be nursing a 4 month old...at least that is what all of my HS facebook friends are up to. Traditional, paper, and generic, and I am assuming happy. Now because my life did not follow in that specific order I have assumed its because I am not a traditional girl. I would always choose city life over suburbs, a nanny over stay-at-home mom, fashion, events, and cocktails over soccer carpools, and a an interesting and passionate partner over a boring CPA. I would always choose a colorful three dimensional life over a paper life.

Now, as I have gotten older and as I have become wiser, I realize that I may have been wrong all along. What I thought I wanted was excitement and passion, but now I realize that what I want is a companion, an equal, love born out of friendship, and shocker, possibly a family. Understanding that my priorities have changed is one thing, getting myself to act on these priorities is another. For example, I am currently juggling one paper man (Vegas) with one (multi)dimensional man (Danny), less I forget to mention my absent man (Big). Now, I know that in order to get closer to getting what I want, I need to date the men who will be able to provide that and give up the men who cannot. The good news is that I think I am getting closer, I have a second date(!) with Vegas this Saturday night.

My name is Single in the Chi and I want a paper man, and with my paper man I want to build a colorful paper life...after all, I might become paper, but at least I will be colorful paper.