Playing Games

If you've been reading my last few posts - particularly the ones about Parker - then you will know how I keep making a pretty big deal out of the fact that he is coming after me full-force and isn't playing any games.

Well it's really got me thinking about game-playing within the dating dynamic, in general. I have never believed in playing games but that didn't seem to ever work for me, especially in Los Angeles, so I started to see them as a necessary evil. Plus, these days it seems like everyone from Cosmo to Anderson Cooper (I don't know why those seem like opposites to me, but they do) advocates that you have to play the game. So unfortunately, I got pretty good at it. The thing is, that didn't seem to work that well either.

So enter this guy who all of a sudden follows up right after a date, calls when he says he is going to call, tries to see me all the time, and a week into knowing him we have been in pretty consistent contact every day. If this was I guy I wasn't interested in, would this bother me? Probably. But then again, I wouldn't have reciprocated so it probably wouldn't have gotten to this point anyway. But I am interested in him. I don't wait to respond to his text messages, I have willingly accommodated his "extra date" requests, and really like that he wants to talk to me all the time. Does this mean that games don't work? Yes. But not because they don't work. Confused? Let me explain...

I signed on to Facebook today (Follow Penny on Facebook!) and one of my friends had posed a question as his status update: "Who plays more games in relationships. Girls or Guys?" Immediately all the single girls, guys, and gays went about slinging rocks...A couple of the most cynical  were...
"Girls. It's always girls. Even when it's same-sex and they're dudes, it's some girls fault."
"It's all a game. Anyone who says otherwise is either lying or losing at it."

But then somone said (And I couldn't help but notice she was in a relatioship and from the looks of her photos, although admittedly photos don't always tell the whole story, she looked very happily in a relaionship)...
 "neither if you are with the right one   " 

Then I had my "Ah ha!" moment. Could that be what's going on here? When you meet the right one and you are on the same page from Day 1, the need for pretense disappears? Is that why both my non-game playing and my game playing have never worked? I just wasn't with the right guy. At this point I am most definitely acknowledging it is a distinct possibility.

So...does that mean Parker is THE guy? It is sure starting to feel like it - in thinking back to all the guys I've dated, I don't think I have ever felt this way about someone: giddy, excited, strangely calm and totally on the same page. What I mean by that is, I am oh-so attracted to him and I still have all the amazing butterflies when I think about him but it has nothing to do with wondering when he is going to call or when I am going to see him. It's just entirely about our potential. Last night right before all his boys arrived he sent me a quick text. I told him to have fun but if he felt like sending me some drunk texts later they would be welcome, but no pressure. Then he said, "Haha, I will. Don't you worry." And you know what? I wasn't worried; it's really really nice to know that someone you like really likes you back. After his friends left we talked on the phone for an hour and he told me how he told them all about me - and they approve. (Cue mini freak out session).

But seriously, does anyone ever actually find happiness with someone in the end who they played games with at the beginning? I know I sure haven't.