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SHOUTOUTS

To Jeremy from C:

Jeremy--BG is right that you should start to accept whatever it is you're feeling, BUT please, please, please practice safe sex with your girlfriend and anyone else. I know planning for safe sex means you're planning for sex--something many of us are uncomfortable acknowledging--but AIDS is the ugliest, slowest way to die that I know of.

To P. from M.:

I too said "Aha!" when I read the forgiveness column, and I was glad to read your story too. I don't even like to go to bed angry, much less carry a grudge around about somebody in the past. I used to think I was Above All That. You go through the anger, and then you forgive the person and move on. Ideally, you can even be friends afterwards. (And you can skip the anger part too if you're lucky.)

What a relief to find that, much like being friends afterwards, forgiveness is OPTIONAL. When my ex hurt me cruelly to make himself more comfortable, I waited a few months until I could stand the sight of him again and then tried to make amends. But it didn't work. I just didn't feel like he deserved my forgiveness, and my feelings showed. And it was extremely frustrating because I wanted so badly to feel better and stop being angry. There were practical reasons to forgive him too (our close mutual friends). But I was just unable to do it, and felt guilty, as if I had failed.

It turned out that those close mutual friends were also very angry with my ex, and they didn't forgive him either, just ignored it and moved on. They wondered why I would even try to make amends. Suddenly, forgiving him started to feel like a meaningless exercise. Just thinking about him made me angry, so why would I want to do that, even in the name of forgiveness? I was drawing out the pain for dubious reasons, and it was preventing me from moving on.

It's been six months now, and I still feel angry, and regretful, the first relationship I've ever regretted having. It sucks, and it's a shame. But I try to keep in mind that I didn't cause this, he did. And I tried to forgive, but it was bad enough that I couldn't, and that's not my fault either. Being completely Above All That means getting out of the mire altogether, and what I really needed to do was give myself a break so I could stop mucking around trying to change my feelings. I only have so much energy and it's much better spent on other things.

I still wake up mad and it all still haunts me. I wish I could find my anger liberating, it just seems paralyzing to me. But little by little it's fading, and every new experience I have displaces more of the bitterness. Someday soon I hope to be in as good a place as you are now, P. And it'll have nothing at all to do with my ex, and everything to do with myself. I can't wait to get there :)

To Southern Shlemiel from Still Waiting:

BG is sooo right. Colleen is soooo wrong!(re: a relationship MUST HAVE sex before marriage!) My personal experience:

My fiance is a virgin and has always been dead set on waiting until marriage and told me so when we began to seriously date. I agreed for a few reasons:

Namely- that a really wonderful person and a chance to have a fabulous relationship with this person is worth waiting for andthat because it was so important to HIM, it then became important to ME- Because I love him and I didn't want to ruin our extremely wonderful and special relationship over a hot night between the sheets. We have been together for over a year and five monthsnow and waiting until marriage has proved difficult, but rewarding too. He knows that his values are important to me and the trust and intimacy has strengthened beyond what I have experienced in relationships with a lot of hot and heavy sex!

We will be married soon this year. And we are both looking forward to our honeymoon like you wouldn't believe! There are fantastic benefitsto waiting until marriage (though I know it isn't for everyone and that's cool too). Believe me, Schlemiel, the Girl Who Truly Cares and Loves You will not mind waiting AND she will be worth waiting for.

(And we both are of the same religious persuasion-- it does make a lot of difference to have someone who can share your faith as well as your values! Though I have known lots of righteous relationships where the couple have worked through religious deifferences to carve out a wonderful and unique life together as well.)

And from Chris:

Southern Schlemeil's letter resonated with me. I've recently renewed a relationship with a man from a conservative Jewish family (i.e. no interfaith marrying). We broke up 5 years ago over the issue of religion, he comes from a conservative Jewish family and I am southern WASP. I, however, have a very ecumenical viewpoint on things spiritual and am quite flexible. But he's still Jewish and the problem is that I'm not. Note that we are not young sprouts, either, both in our late forties And surprise, 5 years later we are just as crazy about each other as we were before, the relationship is just as rewarding as it ever was. My current solution? Pretend that the (read:a) future doesn't exist (aka:denial) and enjoy for today what we can have together. It's a helluva predicament and some days are easier than others. One of these days it probably won't be enough and the @#$% and the relationship will hit the fan again but dadgummit, a good partner is hard to find and I want to enjoy what I *do* have until it just won't work anymore, a compromise made easier by the onset of middleage and the absence of the kid-raising issue. An unresolvable dilemma, an uneasy truce with myself, certainly no easy answers. Southern Schlmeil and his partner Colleen have my empathy...BUT they are much younger than I and from this vantage point I say for God's sake (no pun intended) don't tiptoe where you are not willing/able to walk, don't tempt the fates, be *emotionally responsible*. If you are not willing/able to marry a Shicksa or she a Mensch (including being able to make the myriad attendant compromises) then DON'T EVEN GO THERE. As in, even on a date. Warning: possible heartbreak ahead for one or both of you.

(Do I sound like a parent or what??? Do as I say, not as I do???)

To BG from Shana:
"Brooklyn folks are scared of Queens"????!! Puh-LEEZE. You came dangerously close to committing the same borough-ist elitism your letter-writer Peter's flame is guilty of. Not only do we have the same nice, reasonably-priced apartments Brooklyn does (as well as some pretty ritzy areas, too), we also have two movie studios, a film museum, a top-rated Spanish theater company, a cool science museum, five golf courses, a wildlife refuge, botanical garden and wetlands, historic buildings dating back to the17th century, arguably the best Greek and Indian restaurants in the city (if not the country), the only working farm in NYC, the cemetery where Houdini is buried, and -- yes -- even the Mets, who despite their pitching weaknesses still have an excellent shot at the World Series wild-card slot because of their awesome infield. (Mike Piazza isn't half bad to look at, either.)

So you can tell Peter that he's not doing the wrong thing by moving to Queens -- just by dating women who can't see beyond their narrow little 212 world. As for you, Ms. Brooklyn, remember, we're part of the glorious 718 universe, too!

BG responds: Whoops!Right-o. Didn't take the time to make myself clear. What I meant was: if Brooklyn people -- whose Manhattan friends make the same "passport"-type jokes every time they come to visit, which is zero or one -- think Queens is far away, then imagine how far away Manhattan people think it is. Not repeat elitism; just acknowledging that yes -- alas -- it's part of the culture to think of Queens as ... differently-distanced. Which is something we should all get over immediately. Especially if anyone would like to take me here. (Where I will eat 718 cannoli.)

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