Moving on, on January 5, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

It’s New Year’s Eve and my ex-boyfriend and I are now 1,000 miles apart physically and emotionally. We have been apart for about a year now, but he was my first love, and I am finding it extremely difficult to get over him, especially with all the fond memories of the good times we had together. He really was awful to me — he lied just about every day and probably always had at least one girl on the side, and I know I didn’t and don’t deserve that, but I just can’t seem to get him out of my heart and mind. Do I crawl into bed and pull the covers all the way up over my head until I finally feel over him? Or do I catapult myself into the very frightening world of dating? I guess I just need someone to get me out of this awful funk. What should I do to move on once and for all?

–Funked-up in CT

Dear CT,

Some people say, “I just worry that I’ll never find anyone who treats me as well as he does.” You don’t have that problem. Crawl under the covers for one day. Then get out that catapult.

Love,
Breakup Girl

Looking for some smart writing about sex? Check out Best Sex Writing 2009, edited by Friend Of BG and cupcake aficionado Rachel Kramer Bussel. This is not a collection of erotica (drat!) but a smart — and, okay, sometimes steamy — series of essays on everyone’s favorite subject. From Rachel’s introduction:

Sex is everywhere–in our bedrooms, classrooms, courtrooms, and offices, as well as on our TV and movie screens, streets, and newspapers. This was a big year for sex, from prostitution (Eliot Spitzer, Ashley Dupré, Deborah Jeane Palfrey) to teen pregnancy (Jamie Lynn Spears, Bristol Palin) and beyond.

If you’ve gotten past the cupcake thing (Mmmmm. Cupcakes.) you are asking yourself, exactly how smart is this collection? Well, it’s so smart that they’ve included a piece by LYNN HARRIS, “Searching for Normal: Do Dating Websites for People with STIs Liberate or Quarantine?” Not tittilating enough? Try FoBG James Hannaham’s “Why Bathroom Sex Is Hot.”

Read more about it at Rachel’s Amazon blog!

A naughty boy from January 5, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

My boyfriend and I had our six-month anniversary on Christmas and of course I got him a present, but he never got me one. He says he loves me and that he just has to go over and pick up the present, but it’s been a while since Christmas. He’s on house arrest right now so I understand that he can’t go out, but actually, he’s been out many times already. He says he loves me, but he could have at least gotten me a little something, right? What does that tell me about him?

— Cristina

Dear Cristina,

Among the excuses that Breakup Girl has heard for being late with a gift, being under house arrest is actually one of the most convincing. Then again, the 90s have brought us many ways to shop without ever leaving home: catalogs, QVC, online stores. Also, the invention of food has long allowed boyfriends under house arrest to prepare dinner in their own homes, however primitive, for their girlfriends. So I’m not saying this guy owes you some material item of some prescribed value. But he does owe you some gesture that indicates your value to him. In that sense, I’d say you need to find someone with a shopping list longer than his criminal record.

Love,
Breakup Girl

I suffered my own personal heartbreak on the day after Christmas: I saw “Frank Miller’s The Spirit” — a movie that defies logic, taste, the basics of filmmaking, and, most importantly, the source material, Will Eisner’s The Spirit.

Eisner literally wrote the book on graphic storytelling, and his influence on comic book creators — both writers and artists — is so ginormous that the industry’s awards are called The Eisners. His work on The Spirit — in particular the postwar period — is an unparalleled achievement in artistry, combining the mainstream charm of a newspaper strip with groundbreaking film-style visuals all in service to a smart, taut, O. Henry-style short story. To see his soulful, whimsical masterpiece translated to film as a dreary, awkward catalog of Frank Miller’s personal fetishes is a cringe-inducing experience that diminishes two comics legends. People reading comics have known this for some time, but now we have box-office returns to prove that Miller, who wrote some influential comics 20 years ago, is now a mannered, self-aggrandizing hack.

Our Breakup Girl comics are heavily influenced by Will Eisner’s The Spirit. When we first set about trying to tell a rich story in only six (later five) pages, I couldn’t help but study the old Spirits which were just seven pages, but pack a punch greater than most of today’s 32-page comics. Plus, Eisner, always stretching the form, found himself creating stories that were more fable than adventure, not afraid to have the hero take a backseat, and that has always been our goal with BG. Looking back I can also see how his characterizations have also played into my writing. Like The Spirit, Breakup Girl is not a wealthy playboy but a “middle-class superhero,” very much an approachable character in her glitz-free New York neighborhood, who’s costume verges on plain-clothes and who’s workaday approach to crime-fighting is full-bodied, practical and plucky.

Now imagine walking into a Breakup Girl movie and seeing Barb Wire instead. Feel my pain.

Ask Lynn, Breakup Girl’s alter ego’s advice column at MSN.com (powered by Match.com), is now being updated monthly rather than weekly (boo!) … but now you’ll get two new letters at a time (yay!). So, for December, take your pick of guy drama: one’s written too many texts, and the other has one woman too many…

1. AE thinks he has driven his love away with too many calls and texts

or

2. Am I Being Paranoid, who fears the worst between her long-distance boyfriend and his best gal-pal.

Read the letters along with Lynn’s advice — then come back here and comment below!

The rules of disengagement from December 29, 1997…

Dear Breakup Girl,

My girlfriend told me that we just don’t “click” anymore. I’ve always tried to be there for her, and I loved — still love — her more than anything else in the world. More than I thought I was capable of loving. I mean, I was in the jewelry store the other day learning of the 4 Cs of diamonds, hoping to present her with a ring after the New Year. I want to be with her so badly. The only thing I want more in all the world, though, is for her to be happy. I’ve always tried to be there for her. Always tried to offer a shoulder to cry on when something went wrong, or encourage her when making a new venture, or join in her cheer when all was right. She has always done the same for me. We always tried to be equals; neither of us ever “dominated” the relationship. If anything went wrong between us, we always worked together to make amends. Our friends thought we were made for each other.

(more…)

Dancing around the subject on December 29 1997…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I was dating this guy for a few months and ended up moving to the city where he lived (no, he was not the reason I moved). When I moved in he asked me to a holiday formal. I knew it wasn’t a serious relationship and I knew we were both allowed to see other people, but he got involved with someone else and decided he wanted to be only with her. So instead of breaking it off before the formal, he took me. I didn’t know any of this and assumed we were going as a couple, but at the end of the night he broke it off. I wasn’t really mad about that — I was furious that he felt me the need to take me the formal where all of friends knew he was involved with someone else. Am I crazy to think this was wrong and childish?

— Angela

(more…)

The presents of boyfriends past visit December 29, 1997…

Dear Breakup Girl,

My boyfriend and I just broke up after a 3-year relationship. It was a mutual breakup because we just weren’t getting along like we used to. But we still have a tremendous amount of love for each other. This makes it especially difficult. He just gave me a brand new stereo for Christmas, after we broke up! He said he’s been wanting to get this for me for a while. But why would he do this after we broke up? We’re still “friends,” but I don’t want constant reminders of him around me. I’m still grieving the end of our relationship and need time to heal. But he keeps calling and now this huge present?!? Can you make sense of this?

— Amy

(more…)

A photo opportunity on December 29, 1997…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I really like this guy and I’ve asked him out before but he never answered. Other people have told him that he should go out with me but he never gave them an answer either. I am the only one of his friends who received a large picture of him for Christmas; everyone else got wallet-size. I feel all special — but I don’t really know how he feels and I don’t want to ask him out again because I don’t want to lose him as a friend. Please help!

— Nichole

Dear Nichole,

Breakup Girl is unfamiliar with — but intrigued by — this practice of giving photos of yourself as Christmas presents to people who are not your grandparents. I’ll trust you when you say that it’s possible to measure someone’s feelings for you in terms of surface area. But since he has not leapt at several obvious chances to go out with you, Breakup Girl wonders, gently, if the thousand or so words that that picture is speaking might go something like, “I know you like me but I really just think of you as a friend. I feel bad about that — and I do think you’re special — so I want to make it up to you and show you that by giving you a larger photo than everyone else.” See? So let him know you appreciate the photograph (don’t tell him it’s under your pillow), and focus on the friendship. If something more is meant to develop, it will.

Love,
Breakup Girl

More fruitcake from December 29, 1997…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I thought my girlfriend broke up with me last week. She said, “I’m not comfortable with the term ‘boyfriend and girlfriend.'” I was really bummed, it being right before Christmas and all. Then when I called her to cancel plans for a party arranged a long time ago, she said she still wanted to date…What is going on?

— John

Dear John,

What is going on is that girlfriend wants to have her fruitcake and eat it too. Apparently, the term she’s really not comfortable with is “alone.” She may not want to be committed to you, but she also doesn’t want to go stag to that party. Now, some couples (or semi-couples) do manage to have it both ways, but only when a “casual” thing is officially okay with both of them. If that doesn’t work for you, tell her you’re not comfortable with the term “just dating.” Either way, get to the bottom of it, communicate, straighten things out. As you now know, the most uncomfortable terms are “uncertain.”

Love,
Breakup Girl