Do you like the new journal look? If you hate it, let me know. It was a pretty sudden decision, and I can undo it. It’s based on a template from gingerbug. I like the clean lines, though, and the purple, though I worry the color is a bit much.

A list of my ex-boyfriends:

1. Davis. I’m not sure Davis counts, since we went on one date in the 7th grade. But he was the first boy I ever liked who liked me back, and it was a really good date in the 7th grade. We stayed friends for years after that.

2. Corrado. When planning this entry, I almost gave up on this list, since trying to describe Corrado and I is so complicated. So all I will say is that he’s one of my best friends, he was the first person I was truly in love with, I stayed in love with him for nearly ten years, and he was only officially my boyfriend for a few months. (Also, I think he cheated on me with Tea but I don’t hold it against either of them.)

3. DC. DC was the high school boyfriend. I mean, Corrado came before him and another kind of after, but DC was the one that counted. I learned a lot about myself from him, and about relationships. He was also complete head case. The second of my lunatic boyfriends, I guess. Corrado didn’t get seriously nuts until later, but he was no paragon of sanity in high school either.

4. The psycho. This overlapped with DC, which the psycho knew and DC didn’t. It wasn’t precisely cheating since DC and I had agreed to see other people. The psycho was my third lunatic boyfriend. He was actually a very sweet boyfriend; his craziness consisted mostly of a very bad temper. I told him that if he ever hurt me in any way, Corrado would beat him up and my dad would ruin his life in ways he wouldn’t even discover until later, so the psycho was always good to me. After we broke up he told everyone I’d slept with him, which I hadn’t. Luckily, nobody believed him.

5. The antichrist. Now we’re in college, where my taste in guys goes from bad to worse. Lunatic number four. This one was diagnosably crazy; he had depression and was on a ton of Prozac. Depression is no big deal, but I think he was also a pathological liar. The kind of guy who will tell everyone his mother died when she didn’t. (he actually did that in college) The relationship was brief but hurt me an amazing amount. Corrado warned me about him and I didn’t listen. My only comfort is that I was just one of many, many women who fell for his stories. And some of those women and I got to be good friends. Suspect Granger once came to a conference solely to protect me from the antichrist.

6. Lasher. First of all, as you might guess from the pseudonym, he liked Anne Rice. That alone should have warned me. I met him in Egypt, when I was a study abroad. This time it was Suspect Granger who tried to warn me and I wouldn’t listen. Lasher seemed a lot more interesting before you got to really know him. Unfortunately, he and I got engaged before I really got to know him. I was young. I didn’t know better. His parents were very sweet. I still kind of miss them – they were like having grandparents. I broke up with Lasher for being emotionally hollow and then found out he’d been cheating on me with a mutual friend. Lasher is lucky my dad didn’t kill him. Actually, from what I heard, Lasher is lucky his own mom didn’t kill him. I gave the engagement ring to Tea. It looks good on her.

7. Ace. (Wow, I’ve dated a lot of guys.) Ace was a good guy, just not the good guy who was right for me. He managed to love me without understanding me, he pressured me all the time to get married and have kids, he was boring, and he wasn’t a writer. We stayed home on New Years Eve because he was intimidated by the idea of First Night. He moved from Egypt to Boston to be near me. I broke up with him five months later. I wish I’d done it sooner. Ace was a total waste of time, except that he taught me that you can recognize someone is wonderful without wanting to be with him.

8. And, finally, Kir, who is no longer a boyfriend but a husband. I met him a bit over three years ago in Iowa. He is exactly what I was looking for, except that I thought I wanted too much and was never going to find it. Kir’s a good writer, he sings well, he plays various musical instruments. He likes to read. He’s fun to talk to. He doesn’t mind my male friends, even the ones who have crushes on me. He writes to his grandparents and loves his little sister. He’s never protective of me unless I need it. He doesn’t get jealous. He thinks I’m beautiful.

Kir’s the one I decided to keep.

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USAID is one of many donors for the project I work for. The views expressed herein are the author’s own views and do not necessarily reflect those of the author’s employer or especially those of the United States Agency for International Development or the United States Government. And I mean it. I probably give the US government heart attacks.