February 29
Sexting Miss Robinson on September 21, 1998…
Dear Breakup Girl,
I’m fifteen, my friend D is fourteen, and Kay is twenty-six. D met Kay online awhile back. She’s rather the party-have-sex-with-everybody type of person, and he and she have had their fair share of cybering/phonesex (she called him; his parents are very strict). Now, I wouldn’t think anything of it, except for the fact that Kay’s birthday is coming up, and D is planning on buying her a gift. However, the gift that he wants for her is a $120 painting (plus shipping). Remember that he’s only fourteen, and he doesn’t even have a steady job. I’m probably just being a friend giving unwanted help, but I wanted to hear your perspective, BG.
— T in Ohio
Dear T,
Okay, yeah, eeeeuw. Belleruth and I struggled a bit with this one.
First, before we get to the creepout part, we concede two things: (1) in BR’s words: “If it doesn’t get weird [too late?], the world being the way it is, a shy, awkward 14-year-old can gently induct himself into the world of sex online without getting too banged around, and avoid diseases too. Also, (2) I can see why he’d want to get her something “big.” He’s probably thinking: “Wow, she’s old, I can’t just buy her, like, a Care Bear. Instead, I’ll buy her an expensive, sexy, soft-black-velvety … painting of the Care Bears. And then have it shipped because it’s too big to schlepp on my Huffy.”
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February 27
To Sir with lust on September 21, 1998…
Dear Breakup Girl,
Congratulations on your site. I have a small academic problem for you. I am a graduate student who is perpetually falling for academics/professors — of both genders. I am quite comfortable with the gender part of it, but the academic part causes potential ethical problems, and in my experience, the need to constantly attempt to bridge unwieldy generational boundaries. I am 24, and the objects of my admiration tend to be at least around 35 or over with Captivating Intellects/Teaching Styles. Oh yes, and most already have partners…I am not attracted to people my own age at all, as we generally do not have the same mindset or priorities. Am I Mad? Just Unusual? Destined to spend the rest of my days a lonely young spinster prowling the corridors of the academy? This situation has already caused some emotional strains for me.
Thanking you in anticipation of a reply with footnotes,
— Girl Gradstudent
Dear GG,
You are neither as Mad nor as Unusual as you might like to (1) think. For one thing, you seem to have good taste. Captivating intellect? Charisma? Good call! You’re off to a better start than the folks who write, “Dear Breakup Girl, The objects of my admiration are all dull as a box of rocks.” For another, you are, um, hardly the first young woman to fall for — or at least be attracted to — sharp, charismatic, Older men (women) who are ultimately unattainable (2). That’s why I think my response to you will apply to everyone out there who has considered — or entered into — an “Inappropriate Relationship.”(3)
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December 5
Wanting permission on September 7, 1998…
Dear Breakup Girl,
Hello there, BG. I love your site…it has really helped me put some things into perspective. But, I still have a predicament on my hands that I haven’t been able to shake for quite some time now, and I’ve never really written publicly to ask for answers but here goes:
I am currently living with someone I met on the internet a little over 2 years ago. It all started like so:
I met her on IRC, we emailed and spoke on the phone for about 2 months, I ended up taking a trip out to finally meet her, we hit it off, 1 month later she moved to my city to live with me. Then I moved with her to her city for about 6 months. And finally now we have settled in SF and are living in a decent sized studio apartment (and paying an insane amount for it BTW). Anyways, we have always gotten along great and I really care for her, as I know she does for me. But I almost think she cares about me way more than I do.
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November 18
Straight to the point on August 31, 1998…
Dear Breakup Girl,
I am seeing a guy who is older than me. He can go to bars and clubs and I can’t. Do you have any ideas on good dates that he would enjoy?
— PA Girl
Dear PA,
Yeah, I got a million (sports games, sports activities, going to movies, renting movies, eating out, baking cookies, etc.).
Does he?
Just making sure that when it comes to fun, you’re not doing all the work.
Love,
Breakup Girl
October 15
Knowing the score on April 20, 1998…
Dear Breakup Girl,
I’m 48 and I just met a 33-year-old Swiss cellist who says I “stimulate him in every way possible.” Is it ridiculous to think of having any more than a “good time” with him?
— KS
Dear KS,
Well, you know what they say about Swiss cellists. I mean, I hope you do, because Breakup Girl does not. Perhaps you’re alluding to the age difference? Well, if you like him, give him a chance — just conduct yourselves adagio at first.
Love,
Breakup Girl
May 28
Caring too much on March 30, 1998…
Dear Breakup Girl,
My live-in boyfriend (who’s 30, I’m 41) of three and a half years told me he wanted to ‘just be friends’ this past September. I moved out. He got engaged New Year’s Eve to a woman (she’s 29) with whom he had a brief fling in college and has heard from or had visit him a couple times a year for the past nine years (each time they met, she was all over him like the proverbial cheap suit). They are to be married in May. I have two questions. Will this marriage work? and Why do I still care?
— Patton
Dear Patton,
Why do you care? Of course you care. Are you kidding me? Even Breakup Girl cares, and she doesn’t even know these people. Dumped you in September, engaged in December?! Yeesh. All I can say is, she may have been all over him like a cheap suit, but oddly enough — as the genuine-article fashion zombies from the 70s and 80s attest — sometimes it’s the cheap ones that last.So this thing could be a flimsy rebound, or it could be some solid perma-crease that somehow never got ironed out. Or, gulp, it could be an age thing. So I don’t know if it’s going to last or not, but I do know that you’re not allowed to obsess about it. Write to Breakup Girl, speculate with your friends — but I can trust you not to pull any “I must stop the wedding” Julia Roberts antics, right? Buy your bad self a pricey suit and find some gent who doesn’t have his past mixed up with his future.
Love,
Breakup Girl
April 26
…may include the fact that he is engaged to a woman 24 years older than him. (I have no problem with this. I just want to know what they talk about.) Still, as our tipster says, “I’m probably hopelessly wrong, but they both seem kind of adorable and unconventional. I’m a sucker for an ‘up yours, world!’ romance.”
February 24
What a rollercoaster of emotions we’re feeling at BG today. We found this blog entry via Wired from OK Cupid, noting a bias in their dating pool against women of a certain age (“a certain age” being a year or two older than you are, but whatever).
The good: It’s a veritable candy store of charts, graphs, a javascript widget (ooh! shiny!), and the like. Plus, the blogger, Christian, makes his case enthusiastically, circling the ages 30-45 and labeling it the “Zone of Greatness.” Plus, he’s done extensive research (statistical research, you naughty-minded harlots) to support the thesis that older women are more sexually willing, open-minded, and hotsy totsy. Sure, in an ideal world he’d be all “and they have the most beautiful minds!” but given that we’re talking about a dating site, we have to assume a certain meat-market mentality. And how!
Plus, that’s only part of his picture. And with phrases like this:
There are two operative stereotypes of older single women: the sad-sack (Ã la Bridget Jones) and the “cougar” (Ã la Samantha from Sex In The City) and both, like all stereotypes, are reductionist and stupid and I’ve tried to avoid them. I hesitated beginning my case for older women with something about their sexuality, like I did in Exhibit A, because that territory borders right on cougar country. But the evidence there was too compelling to ignore.
Christian reveals himself to be a FOBG in a BW (big way). We luuurve him.
Plus, the comments section speaks well of OK Cupid users.
So why the roller coaster? The original premise. Like the one bad review in a sea of raves, we keep mulling it over and wondering if all the blog posts in the world will knock any sense into unwilling minds. What do you think?
February 22
MSN.com, Match.com, HappenMagazine.com: they’re in a healthy and satisfying 3-way relationship. Meaning that you can find MSN/Match.com’s “Ask Lynn†columns –penned by BG’s alter ego — over at Happen now as well.
This week Lynn helps Jennifer who is in the typical on-again, off-again, friends-with-benefits-again, off-again, FWB-again relationship. Or at least she was until recently…
Now we’re boyfriend and girlfriend again. And he’s treating me much better than he did the first time we dated! Picking me up to go out, taking me to nice restaurants, spending more time at my place, the works.
Is he a changed man like his friends say, or will he leave her again as her friends say? Read the full letter and Lynn’s advice at Happen, then comment below!
December 11
Rubbed the wrong way on March 16, 1998…
Dear Breakup Girl,
I have a platonic/romantic relationship with my masseur, who has been my companion to movies and dinner [for the last four months]. He’s nearly 20 years older. We are remarkably compatible, except that he’s jealous of my busy work and social life, saying that he gave all that up when he was a lawyer to pursue massaging — a more relaxing lifestyle. Anyway, I was getting tired of his mixed messages of “I love you, but I’m too old for you” — and so I decided to see less of him. At first he blamed me for my “change in priorities.” Now, he is really chasing me, calling or paging me everyday. I don’t always return his calls, which he isn’t happy about. I am feeling ambivalent, but torn. What is going on here?
— Anastasia
Dear Anastasia,
First of all, “ambivalent” and “torn” are the same thing. Second of all, platonic and romantic are not. Neither are “relaxing lifestyle” and “calling or paging me every day.” If Monsieur Masseur truly followed his dream and left the great American legal tradition for the Great American Back Rub, more power to him. But no fair for him to pass judgement on your lifestyle and get all less-busy-than-thou. He’s clearly still defensive about his shift to life in the slower lane. Find someone else to get the knots out of your back while he works out the kinks in his life.
Love,
Breakup Girl
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