But little by little, he began to find character flaws, and he was happy to spell them out. I was too silly, too rambunctious, too sloppy in my logic. “You’re too much,” he’d said when he finally dumped me, acting as if I fooled him or something, like I’m a carton of eggs that you think is perfect, but then you crack one open and there’s a yucky chick blob inside.
So that was over.
Was it my fault for pursuing icy, perfectionistic brainiacs? Was it my fault for chasing after that initial Hugo high?
I eventually moved to Madison and landed that job with the creative marketing firm. It was an early naughts-inspired workplace full of modular seating, blond wood, and Ping-Pong tables. The creative staff would hang around late into the night brainstorming big ideas for clients.
I loved it. We could hammer at it until three in the morning and I’d be energized. Flying. Ten years I was there, rising up through the ranks, building my personal brand as a somebody who can think up campaigns that will move the ball for clients.
I had a little apartment near Capitol Square, a cute flowerbox out the window, and a steely determination to steer clear of brilliant, handsome, remote, perfectionistic men who’d find me flawed after a test-drive period.
I even went so far as to identify golden retriever types with the help of a couple of concerned friends. I dated two different men like that—kind, outgoing, fun men who were really into me. Those relationships went well enough that the guys wanted to be more serious, but I couldn’t do the wagging tails and excited happiness.
I only wanted the icy brainiacs. It was like a disease.
I ended up with Jonathan, a dashingly hot statistics professor, an enchanting conversationalist and an enthusiastic wearer of Obsidian Valor cologne for men, which features peppery bergamot notes, as he liked to point out.
He was brilliant and perfectionistic, yes, but he seemed more easygoing than the other Hugo types, and certainly more easygoing than Hugo himself, so I thought it would be different.
Jonathan and I laughed a lot. We made ambitious recipes. We watched old movies. We had decent chemistry that seemed like it could evolve into love.
We spent two great years together. We even bought an SUV that we called the baby-dog mobile, because we planned to fill it with a baby and a dog.
Until he went to a Coldplay concert one night. The concert made him realize our relationship was him settling—that’s what he told me when he got back. He wanted to be with me, but he simply couldn’t. There were problems that couldn’t be repaired. He couldn’t settle anymore.
“Settling?” I’d asked, distraught. “What does that mean?”
“It’s hard to articulate,” he’d said.
My heart was pounding out of my chest on full déjà vu mode, because I knew what he meant even if he didn’t.
“It won’t work.”
“You just can’t with the character flaws?” I tried. “The reckless, overzealous thing? Too loud, too much, too cheerleader-y, light as gossamer, lacking ingravitas?” These were a medley of observations Hugo once made about me.
This look he gave me right then. I’d hit the nail on the head.
“Never mind!” I’d added, wishing desperately I hadn’t supplied him with those words. “It doesn’t matter.”
It mattered to Jonathan, because one of the features of icy, brilliant men is a need for getting the perfect description for a thing, even if it devastates a person. “No, you’re right. That’s how I feel, but that’s me, that’s my loss. Other men won’t feel that way, I promise,” he’d said.
Why couldn’t one of these men have fallen for a hot, leggy model-type and dumped me on the basis of looks? It had to be my horrible character flaws? I had to be the carton of eggs with the bloody, partly formed chick blob running roughshod over their perfectly ordered lives?
I walked away with money for my half of the baby-dog mobile and a total Pavlovian reaction to the smell of Obsidian Valor for men by Jack Hermann.
Even now, when I catch even the faintest whiff of the peppery bergamot notes of that cologne out on the street, my entire soul cringes.
I went to a therapist who showed me a thing called an emotion wheel and had me identify all the emotions I was feeling. I didn’t like the emotion wheel. I didn’t want to sit around naming my emotions, I wanted to get away from my emotions. I wanted to never feel like that again.
I was done with Hugo types. I put caramel streaks in my hair, fought like a banshee to land my dream job in New York City, pulled up stakes, and moved to New York.
Not only was it a geographical fix for the heartbreak of Jonathan, but it was the next logical step in my career. I might be failing in the love department, but I was killing it in the short-form video niche, where coloring outside of the lines and being overzealous and extra are highly prized.
And Zevin Media was the best. The team wanted me. Our Zoom interviews were brainstorming lovefests.
What did they discover about me? Did they go to a Coldplay concert, too? And why did it have to be Coldplay? Jonathan couldn’t have had his epiphany at a cooler concert? Something more badass and rocking or exciting? I would’ve even accepted classical or jazz.
* * *