How do you know when she’s “the one?”
This question came up twice in the last week. The first time, I was working late in office and on my walk back to my desk, a coworker pulls me to him by leaning back in his chair. With his hands in front of him, he spread his fingers apart, like he was holding a globe in the air. He then let his thoughts drift out into the air like a scientist with an abstract puzzle.
Holding up three fingers, he articulated his sentences emphatically: “Imagine having the option of three women, each of them you like equally. How would you choose who to settle down with?”
Needs and wants, I can struggle with emotions of want. There was a time I dreaded having to follow my college group of friends who would want to go for a mid-day snack: ice cream, coffee, or cannoli. No, it wasn’t a social anxiety that some experience before making an order. Indescribably, I would simply feel a burdensome weight of indifference every time my eyes tried to read the menu. The items were devoid of any strong memories, real preferences, or differentiating characteristics. To make an order I cared so little about, for a snack I candidly could’ve gone without felt borderline dishonest. And so I would shuffle uncomfortably and end up with an order that sounded conveniently like exactly what my friend ordered.
The second time, I was the one that asked the question. Alternating between swings at Chelsea Piers’ driving range with my coworkers, we were talking about marriage and timing a child. The chop of the ball clipped the air. He swung, and turned his head back at me to answer my question:
“For your girlfriend, personality’s probably the most important. Compatibility matters a lot.”
He then stepped off the grass mat and put his hands on his waist.
“For the woman you want to have a kid with, what’s really important is the family setting they grew up in because it shapes the ideal of what a family should look and feel like.”
Around us, I listened quietly to the ceaseless percussive strikes reverberating besides our booth. The sun slowly set ahead of us in a burst of radiance between the Jersey skyscrapers washing over the Hudson River horizon.
Optimistic as I was, I couldn’t help but reflect solemnly at the moment. The wisdom of my 12-year old self was my enduring detachment to the circumstances I was in. If you approached me during recess with a schoolyard issue, I would probably step up on my little pedestal and lecture you about how little choices we had at the start of our lives. Little Billy: you and I, we are frogs sitting in the bottom of a well. With conviction, I’d convincingly tell you that the present is not all there is, for there is always the future to look forward to. The present contained only school work that I needed to finish. Important books I needed to read (like Rich Dad Poor Dad or the news). Reasons I needed to not question. The rare instances were I had ice cream, it was likely handed to me, by my teachers or in church.
At the golf range, I thought to myself how little I wanted my future family unit to resemble the various apartment units I moved from and moved to again and again. Looking down on the ball, I committed to my swing and toed it; it hooked right. The ball set itself up from the automated tee. I rolled it down to the mat and committed to my next swing. I knew I had taken my eyes off the ball before I even make contact; I topped it. I looked out into the water, the distance, the horizon and reminded myself to keep my head and shoulders still. I pulled the 7-iron back and kept my eyes dialed on to the ball. I struck the ball pure and it flew into the air. Higher from and higher to again and again. I tracked it all the way from its apex to where it eventually lands. That went straight, beautifully straight.
So how do you make a choice that you can live and settle with? I start by taking two options away. As many options away that makes sense, and start with one. If you’re right, you’ll end with one eventually too.
