Dating Outside The Box
Romantic relationships have a strange way of making us act in ways we can’t quite rationalize. We’ll spend money on gifts we can’t afford, or stay out when we know we should go home. We’ll fight about things we shouldn’t care about or hang up when we still have more to say. In fact, humans have all sorts of bizarre mating rituals and dating behaviors that don’t quite stand up to a logical analysis. And for some reason we allow ourselves to be swept up in emotion and perform these bizarre routines that we don’t condone and sometimes don’t even understand. For the most part, our actions go uncontested and largely unexamined. However it seems to me that there is one aspect of our dating deportment that deserves a closer look. Perhaps the best example of seemingly nonsensical human behavior centers on how we handle the end of a relationship: a little phenomenon I like to call “Girlfriend in a Box.”
Psychologists are quick to identify the major stages of grief. They count among these denial, anger, depression and eventually get around to acceptance. But I believe that breakups in particular require an extra step that the mental health profession has ignored. Somewhere between depression and acceptance, we seem to go through a phase of decontamination. That’s right, we feel compelled to cleanse our rooms, and cars, and memories of anything that reminds us of our ex. Take those pictures down, turn off that song, hide those souvenirs. We rearrange our homes with all the precision and censorship of a CIA cover up. We try to rewrite history. But as we look at our blank walls and the small, nostalgic pile in the center of the room, emotions start to get the better of us. Do we shred all those letters? Can we bear to burn those t-shirts, sell those CDs, give away those mementos? No. We can’t quite bring our selves to discard those memories and so…we box them.
I’m not sure who started this trend, but somewhere along the line we seem to have collectively decided that it’s a good idea to preserve all reminders of our pain and suffering in a shoe box on the top shelf of our closet. What great historians we’ve become, archiving our past romantic failures into a depressing little museum. Years from now anthropologists can study with excitement these cryptic time capsules that chronicle the rise and fall of every failed relationship we’ve ever endured. But barring an altruistic concern for future archaeology, what possible rationale could we have for burying our memories in these cardboard coffins? What psychological instinct compels us to retain and reduce every past girl or boyfriend in a sordid collection of letters and keepsakes? For some reason human emotion once again overpowers logic and forbids us from throwing away our last remnants of lost love.
In theory this sounds romantic: perfectly preserving the good times to look back on with bittersweet fondness. But anyone who’s ever dared to “exhume” one of these crypts knows that stories they tell are anything but pleasant. Each melancholy box depicts a different kind of dysfunction and dejection. They always start pleasantly enough: “Here’s a movie stub from our first date. Here’s the picture we took at the beach. Here’s the ‘Our First Christmas’ ornament she bought me.” But slowly and surely we witness the magic beginning to fade: “Here are the receipts for the pizza we ordered every Wednesday instead of going out. Here’s the note reminding me to pick her up at the airport for the third time. Here’s the anniversary card I bought two weeks late and never gave her.” And inevitably we watch it all disintegrate: “Here’s a program from that show where she kept flirting with the usher. Here’s the letter where she told me I was smothering her. Here’s the restraining order she filed after she dumped me and broke my heart.” The truth is that any relationship that was relegated to “box” status is probably best kept sealed up tight. But for some reason we keep on making boxes. In fact, I’ve never known of any major break up of any of my friends or family that didn’t end with empty walls and a full shoebox.
At some point, a pseudo-sociologist like myself has to look at these (hilariously insightful) observations and wonder “how can we learn from this? How can we take our neurotic, emotional, completely irrational habits and make some social progress?” I’m practical enough to realize that no one reading this will likely march to their closets and pull those romantic receptacles off the shelves. And in all likelihood the people we’re dating or dumping today will still end up in an 8″ x 5″ x 15″ exhibit behind the extra towels. So instead I propose an amendment to our actions, a relationship revolution: From this day forward, all new relationships should also come with boxes.
Just like any new purchase we take home, the new girlfriend or boyfriend should come complete with everything we need for successful use in one neat package. Each new date has of box with instructions, frequently asked questions, maybe diagrams as needed. I’ve known a few girls that I really wish had come with trouble shooting tips. Why not turn the box phenomenon into a positive thing? Imagine it. On your first date, you walk up to the door, hand her her flowers and suavely ask “You got your box?” No more wondering how many days to wait before you call…just consult the box. Boyfriend buys you presents you hate?…pull out the box and look under “H” for “hinting tips.” In an age of couples’ therapy and self help, what could be better than a specific, hand delivered how-to guide for a successful relationship?
Now there are, no doubt some purists out there who will sing the praises of the “old fashioned way.” Relationships are hard, they’ll say and you have to figure them out by yourself. Well programming my VCR was hard and if it hadn’t come with directions, we wouldn’t have stayed together all these years. In fact, I’ve had “her” longer than any of my last relationships lasted so perhaps it’s worth giving this new method a chance. After all, if the mausoleum of love in our closet is any indication, some of us could use a new strategy. And as long as we’re quite literally compartmentalizing our emotions, we might as well fill those compartments with helpful dating tools. From an ideological stance, I’d say the box plan is a healthy step towards fully understanding an appreciating our significant others. And from a practical stance, if things don’t work out, we’ll already have a box.