from l to r, Michael James Schneider, Jess Burchett, Blake Morgan

The scene fades up, and there I am, eating my lunch on a bench at the waterfront near downtown Portland. I’m on break from work, wearing a suit, and have ordered a tortilla positively stuffed with ingredients (local, organic, because Portland). I look up and there he is: the man of my dreams. Bearded and short, with glasses on that make him look smart (YAY EVEN IF HE’S NOT), wearing shorts that show off his legs, and walking his pug. I smile at him, and he smiles back.

It’s then that it happens: The Fantasy. It always happens, but it’s different for every guy. With this one, I imagine his name is Ben. He just moved to Portland and has a job he loves at Nike, but secretly loves painting. He shows me his paintings on the third date, and they’re really good. “They’re really good”, I say right before we make out for hours. Our friends love each other, and then he and I move in together. A year later we do a Star Trek-themed photo shoot (he’s Data with a beard, and I’m Riker ’cause I got that swagger) for our engagement photos. We move in a cabin outside Portland, etc. You know the rest.

Except that doesn’t happen. His brows furrow in a frown, and he pulls his pug quicker down the waterfront. It looks back at me, hungrily.

It’s then I realize that I’m hunched over my food box like Gollum over a living fish he’s eviscerating and eating. And I’m not eating a YumWrap, I’m eating Taco Bell (shart my words, I’ll regret that later). And my hands are covered (COVERED) in refried beans. And there’s sauce on my pants (not a euphemism). And there’s salsa in my beard. I sigh. This is why I’m single. Where is The One who will see past the taco sauce to the real me?

Or is there even a “One”? Where did this idea come from, that there’s someone for everyone, that there’s one man or woman out of 7 billion people on this planet who we’re destined to be with? It seems like a strangely metaphysical and spiritual idea in an increasingly secular world. Is it a construction, a fable that we tell ourselves to feel less lonely? Or is it something even more sinister and insidious, tied into the fabric of our American culture?

I was talking with my new friend Erin last week about this very thing. It seems that we’re taught growing up that if you work hard enough at something, you’ll achieve it. In advertising and in our education system, we’re inundated with images of successful people (usually white) who are presumably hardworking and happy, because they reached for the brass ring and grasped it. You put in the time, and you eventually get that job you want, or that promotion you’ve been working so hard for, or even that relationship you wanted. Everyone, everywhere, gets a trophy.

But that’s a lie. I’ve been single and dating for more than two years now. I’ve met some amazing guys, near and far. Some have been awesome but we didn’t click romantically, and I count them among my closest friends. A couple have been daunted by the prospects of a long distance relationship and we still keep in touch, in case our lives and locales intersect in the future. Some, unfortunately, have been unable to articulately or kindly reject me and I’ve cut them out of my life permanently. But this could be it for the rest of my life. There’s no cosmic scorekeeper up in Heaven who’s going to automatically reward me with love after my 20th rejection. It’s hard for me to admit, but God or Goddess may not give two shits about my dating life. I don’t “deserve” to be with someone, all I can do is make myself a more whole and complete person on my own.

The myth of The One is powerful and pervasive. I want to believe it, but what am I really buying, and who’s selling it? I recently pursued a guy whose texting habits were really frustrating, because he would break off in mid texting conversation, or take days to respond. Of course, my mind was filled with images of him with his secret boyfriend. Or maybe he was too busy masturbating to porn to text me back. Or maybe he was showing my texts to his friends and laughing at me. Or maybe…or maybe…I made up these elaborate fantasies, and a reason to stop pursuing him. “If he was The One he would be totally into me and FUCKING TEXT ME BACK.”

And here’s a strange idea: the concept of The One, of predestiny, is tied into theism. If you believe in the idea of destiny, then you believe in God, or an influencing higher power. A lot of people ask if I believe in God. I usually shuffle my feet, mutter something neutral or noncommittal. The real answer, finally, is yes. I believe in a higher power. I believe in a binding energy in the universe, the function of which is to make things more orderly instead of entropic.

It wasn’t always like this for me, though. I started out at an early age believing in God. I grew up going to parochial schools in New Mexico, and attended Catholic Mass with my family every Sunday. My God at that time was a dude with a white beard up above me, and acted as a powerful best friend when I was in the closet. I was a deeply lonely little kid, but finally started coming out to friends and family in my senior year of high school. God got a little less important to me around that time, but I do remember, even then, believing in the concept of “The One”.

I tried to pin down when I stopped believing in God. No, although my belief was tested around the time of my brother’s death, I’m sure I still talked to God then. No matter the cause, it was sometime around the late 90s or early 00s that I simply didn’t talk to God anymore, and stopped believing in things like destiny. I also realized that my relationship with God was completely one-sided: I only talked to him when I needed something. How shitty is that?

It was only in the past few years that I’ve craved a spiritual component of my life again, and cultivated a relationship with what I finally feel is what my higher power should be: a benign energy that constructs more than it destroys, but also isn’t afraid to give bad news or expose ugliness in my journey in order to make me grow.

So why do some people hold on to the idea of “The One”? Habit? Upbringing? Unlike Valentine’s Day, The One isn’t something the card companies are selling (um, are still even card companies anymore?). I think the answer is simply “us.” It’s us, we want to believe it because there’s a payoff, there’s a pot of gold at the end of this rainbow we’re chasing. Yeah, romantic love is great, but my higher brain knows that it’s far better to just know that I’m a catch, and if I find someone who thinks that too, then great. I should think this, but I don’t…old insecurities get in the way. I meet a guy I’m excited by, and my first thought is usually “I’m going to ruin this better than anything I’ve ruined before.”

But what about “The One” in my journey, is there even room for that in a rational, scientific mind? The answer is yes…and no. It’s a concept that simply doesn’t work for casual dating, it raises the expectations to unrealistic, unattainable levels (and comes off as, like, “Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction” crazy). That person who you do eventually end up with will become The One only in retrospect, will become the person who made going through all that shit worth it.

In the end, there’s no way to get ready to meet the person you’re supposed to live the rest of your life with.

If you liked this, then you’ve moved the bar to new lows! Indulge my weirdness and read the rest of the Single Gay Time Traveler posts. Let’s be horrible people together.