It is really late and I am exhausted.
But I needed to write.
PS, I got my nerd on and the quote is from Doctor Who. Just so you know.
This might come out in a jumble.
No.
This WILL come out in a jumble.
But blogs are the gateway to jumbled workings-out. So.
I had a conversation with a beautiful friend the other night about relationships and sex and physical attractiveness and the whole shebang. It was a very raw, real conversation for me, and left me with a lot of wonderings, but also a lot of things worked out in my head a little better.
One thing we kept coming back to was this issue of purely physical attraction. Without going into too much personal detail, she confided to me that she had been told before that she wasn't "pretty enough" to be taken into consideration by boys for a romantic relationship.
This utterly baffled me.
First off, this particular friend is beautiful. I'm not saying the old cliche that she is beautiful on the inside like a cop-out. Granted, she is simply gorgeous on the inside and has one of the most beautiful and caring hearts I have ever come across, but to me, she is beautiful on a purely physical level.
She is not your cookie cutter, Barbie lookalike, unrealistic supermodel. She is so much better than those fakes. She is refreshing looking, to me.
So it confuses me on a purely physical standpoint why on earth she would ever be overlooked by a boy.
But this is the part that really confuses me.
I get that everyone is attracted to different things. Even in the midst of conversation between this friend and I, I told her I think red-heads are attractive, and she doesn't.
I get that. On a surface level, we all like different things. And that is fine.
I am not trying to bash physical attraction, please don't hear me say that. I don't like Matthew McConaughey simply because I do not find him attractive. And his voice gets on my nerves, but whatever. But I adore Benedict Cumberbatch because of his looks.
Well, okay, there are like a million reasons why I adore Benedict Cumberbatch. His looks are like 197 of those millions of reasons. But you see where I'm going. Maybe.
Physical attraction is important. We cay say till we're blue in the face that it's all about what a person looks like on the inside and inside only, but I'm calling bullcrappy on that one.
Physical attraction matters. It just does.
But.
We should be better than just physical attraction.
This is what just blew my mind during my conversation with my friend: She had had someone tell her that they loved everything about her - her personality, her sense of humour, her relationship with God, her outlook on life - and they wanted to be in love with her, they just couldn't because they weren't physically attracted to her.
That was literally the only hangup for them.
What the what.
No.
If you see that many good things in someone, if you can honestly say that you love who they are on the inside and are falling in love with who they are on the inside, but can't accept them for what they look like on the outside, you are a truly cruel, hopeless human being.
You do realize that your Barbie doll supermodel will in fact get old, right? They can have all the plastic surgery they want and starve themselves as much as they like, but unless they off themselves at 60, yeah, they're gonna get old and not-Barbie-like.
If you are attracted to someone's "insides" so much that you think you are falling in love with them, then you ARE attracted to them.
Thank God my friend has been smart enough to know she's gorgeous and cool and not tried to hurt the amazing body image she has by changing for a boy.
You know that cliche where you don't find someone attractive but then you spend a few years getting to know them and you fall in love with who they are and then boom you suddenly realize that they are attractive on the outside?
Well. Yeah. Not really just a cliche.
Again, don't misunderstand what I'm saying.
I would love a man to stop be at a coffee shop and say he just had to come over and talk to me because he saw me sitting there and thought I was gorgeous. Yes, I would fall for that line and talk to this man.
But I hope that that's not where it would stop.
I hope that he would think I was kind of pretty, and then spend a few hours talking to me, and think I was even prettier when the conversation ended because he became attracted to my words and thoughts and ideas.
I dress for me. I wear the clothes I want to wear that make me feel pretty or the makeup that makes me feel pretty or the hairstyle that makes me feel confident. I do this for me, but I also do this because I know I am my prettiest when I am confident. And yeah, I want people to think I'm pretty. If they don't. that's fine, because I feel pretty.
I'm not a raging feminist. I have another beautiful friend who I won't name here (but if she's reading, yeah missy, you know I'm talking about you) who probably wishes I was more of a feminist.
But I do wish boys would respect the way women look a little bit a lot more.
We are different. Just like you. We are attracted to some of you and not attracted to some of you. Just like you with us.
But let us not go so far as to brush off feelings we might feel spring up in us because you are not who we thought we would fall for looks-wise.
One of my absolute favourite examples of this is with Jim Gaffigan and his wife.
Allow me to state it: Jim Gaffigan is not as attractive as say Benedict Cumberbatch.
But he is funny.
My gosh is Jim funny.
I honestly don't know of anyone funnier than Jim Gaffigan.
And this is why his wife says she first fell for him. She was attracted to his humour. And that turned into attractiveness all over, and now they're married with five children.
I want to be physically attracted to my boyfriend or fiancee or husband. And yes, if I am physically attracted to you, I will flirt with you upon meeting you.
But I have disliked many a hot hot hot of a man I have known because he is a total and complete prick.
Physical attractiveness is a fine place to start.
But heaven forbid it is where we end.
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