Spark Plugs

We all know when it happens: you meet a guy, you find something intriguing about him, and numbers (or emails, Facebook/Twitter/MySpace, and whatever other electronic database that can be substituted for actually picking up a phone) are exchanged. You go about your life, the grind of work and balancing friends and family, but you never quite forget about that guy you met last weekend. He calls out of the blue (which you were totally expecting so it isn’t really out of the blue) and a date is set. The date goes stunningly well. Perhaps better than any date you’ve been on in a while or maybe you’re seeing other people, but this date just feels different; feels right. You’re already falling, but what self-respecting girl starts planning the wedding after the first date (can you see the sarcasm dripping off the screen…)? He calls almost immediately and a pattern begins. You chat each day while at work, start each day with good morning text messages while on the train, you speak again at night and dates are rolling in. You’re sitting at dinner and you look across the table, laughing and enjoying the effortless conversation, sharing cuisine, and tasting each other’s wine. You’re lingering over after dinner drinks and dessert (one with two forks, of course) and he’s telling some tale that you realize you’re actually interested in. You aren’t sitting there thinking of when this date will end or what topic you’ll broach next to fill gaps. You look at him as he nears the punch line and it hits you like a bolt of electricity. The spark. Not just any spark, the spark. The spark that keeps the relationship going long after the days of wooing are over (which, in my opinion, never should, but whatever), the spark that makes you giggle when you tell your girlfriends about him, the spark that makes you want to be closer to him than altogether possible, the spark that sets off fireworks in the bedroom (or wherever else it just has to happen). Yes, that spark. That undeniable link of charged energy that exists between the two of you. We love it when it happens and, unfortunately, miss it when the charge is dead.

Exhibit A: James, who from the first date I had to keep myself in check. I had to constantly remind myself that it had only been a couple of dates and that a proposal wasn’t around the corner. I’d catch myself smiling for no reason whatsoever and then realize that the reason was him. I had just finished dealing with someone who just wasn’t the one (insert revulsion as I reminisce) and I had forgotten what it was like to have a man make me smile verses the opposite. Well, James made me smile ‘so big’ as my best friend always says. Everything just seemed perfect. He was just as into me as I was to him, we met each others friends, started dating regularly. And after a few months, it ended for a number of reasons, but the slew of men that came post-James seemed so lackluster in comparison. There was always something missing: that undeniable spark, which absolutely has to be there. Now I’m not saying that a spark can’t develop over time or maybe I am, because that would make no sense. Someone can grow on you, but you’d have to initially recognize that certain something about them that makes them different from Joe-Schmo, whom you either wrote off after the first date or is now like a brother to you. A spark is what ignites the flame of a relationship and if you’ve got it, fan it and let the fire burn like a California wild fire, but if not, well, you know what to do: Break the glass, ring the alarm, and evacuate.

That bitch stole my line…

xoxo Blackie Collins