Someone Who Gets Me

I'm staffing a convention this weekend for the youth group, which is very long and time consuming, and a lot of over stimulation on the Judaism front. Of course, the theme of this year's convention is the Jewish life cycle. And the course I'm staffing (with the help of a much senior advisor, of course), Jewish weddings. Oh lord. If my conscience wasn't already screaming to me that I should be dating someone Jewish, well this didn't help either. And to be honest, I don't want to date/marry someone who is Jewish because I want to be really religious all the sudden. But, the rabbi tonight put it very well, it's easier to be with someone who gets you. And if you're raised in similar situations, with like-minded families, and have like minded goals, the better chance that the person you're with will get you. I get it, totally. And it's something I want. I just haven't made the commitment to finding it yet. Well, to be fair, the guy I had a huge crush on over the summer was Jewish, not practicing, but from a Jewish family - just the way I like 'em. But I hadn't made a commitment to finding that in him, it just happened to be a pleasant surprise. Not that it matters, it didn't work out in my favor, but that was the last and only Jewish guy I can remember even being mildly interested in for quite some time.

The guys I've dated before that were Jewish don't have the greatest track record (well, let's be honest - none of the guys I've dated have a great track record - otherwise - I wouldn't still be looking!), but let's focus on the Jews in particular. Because according to the rabbi tonight, these will be the guys who "get" me. My longest term relationship was with a Jewish guy, he's now SUPER UBER Jewish, and that's horrifying to me. When we dated, he was interested in Judaism culturally, and we celebrated the holidays, but trust me - he ate bacon and he liked it. But now he's Kosher, and probably keeps Shabbat, and seriously, I don't like the idea of subscribing to a religion because it fits your life. It should be because you believe in it. The first guy in Brooklyn I dated for a substantial period of time (the poker player) was Jewish. Definitely not practicing, and we never dated over any of the holidays, so it never even played a part in our relationship. Regardless of our shared background of religious upbringing, we had NOTHING else in common. That kid did NOT get me. And to be honest, I didn't really get him either. So that brings me to the last Jewish guy I dated for any significant period of time, and that's CK. Now, I KNOW our mothers and my grandmother set this up because they both looked at us and thought -- Hmm, they are relatively the same age, and JEWISH. A match made in heaven for them. The fact that he had a bisexual girlfriend living in Canada? Irrelevant. He was Jewish. He must be PERFECT for me. And you know what, in a lot of ways CK and I really worked. If it hadn't been for his girlfriend in Canada and him lying to me about it... well maybe things would've been different, but that's neither here nor there. I do remember one of my favorite dates with him was when we went out for Chinese food on Christmas. Last year's Christmas was obviously spent with Mr. Perfect, and I had my very first Christmas tree, and had Christmas morning with presents, and big family breakfast, but it wasn't MY holiday. I felt like an outsider, and that's not what I want.

I think someone who's not Jewish could get me. definitely. When I was in Hawaii, I wrote out a list of my "Perfect Guy" attributes (and I can't believe I'm going to post that on here, but it's what I think I want at the moment. It changes all the time!)
#1 - SMART (and yes I wrote that in all caps, and underlined it a couple of times)
#2 - Passionate - about something, preferably me....
#3 - Creative - goes along with passionate, but I want someone on the creative side of the spectrum - musically, artistically, emotionally, how ever it works...
#4 - Friendly/Social - Someone who can hold their own in a group, Someone who doesn't have trouble meeting new people (can anyone guess where this one stems from??)
#5 - Positive - can look at a bad situation and make something better out of it. (again - three guesses on who DIDN'T do this...)
#6 -Laughter - Someone who can make me laugh, and partakes in laughter, a lot.
**Bonus points for - Jewish (or just spiritual), successful (not rich, but happy in his chosen life path), grounded, goal oriented, spontaneous, a reader, and someone who can keep me guessing, and smiling, most of the time.

Above all, someone who wants me to be happy.

That right there, is the guy who gets me. Doesn't seem like it would be too hard find.