Nothing to complain about (life is too perfect)

A few weeks ago I gave myself an attitude adjustment.

I decided that instead of gazing into the half empty glass and whining that I was terminally single, over the hill, and living in a city filled with picky bachelors and unavailable gay men I would look at the half full glass:

I was lucky to be single, relatively young, and living in one of the most stimulating, well educated and open minded cities in the world. I decided that I was beautiful, desirable and worthy of worship. And I decided, quite simply, to stop looking and allow myself to be found.

And suddenly everthing changed. Dating got fun again and men started pursuing me by the truckload.

I didn't change anything that I was doing, or saying or wearing -- I just changed my attitude.

I would go out on dates with only one goal in mind--to have fun on the date.

I would stay in the present moment.

And I would give anybody who showed interest in me a chance to unfold and reveal himself - instead of judging and looking for flaws and reasons to write them off my list.

My blog might get boring from now on, with little to complain about and so much to embrace, to be thankful for, to rejoice.

My aesthetician was giving me a facial the other day and I said I was getting ready for a Christmas party, a date. And she said:

"You're so lucky!"

Lucky, I thought, with a groan (oh no, not another date.)

And she said, "I've been married for 15 years, and so the idea of a date is so very exciting to me. We have a saying in Russia that you always wish for what you don't have until you have it."

Which reminded me of the old Pogo cartoon I once had taped to my fridge until it yellowed and curled and eventually disintigrated.

It said: "Most of us don't know what we want in life. But we're pretty damned sure we don't have it."

Was it the Russian mother who was worrying about her child's fever that switched my attitude? Or something deeper inside me that had been changing for a while? But I suddenly realized how truly lucky I was and how much opportunity and promise the world held. I suddenly didn't see much use for this blog anymore, and the steady stream of angst and negativity, of so much thought and energy entrenched in the past.

And, with newly arched eyebrows and skin as smooth as a newborn baby, I went forth into the world, thankful that so many men were pursuing me, petting me, dining, wining and calling me. Even if they were ten years younger or 14 inches taller or wearing tie-dyed socks. I decided to enter the idea of dating with an open heart.

I should have figured this out years ago. But isn't life always what happens when we're busy making other plans?