Erin Series: Why I Stopped Loving a Man-child Part I Back
By Erin • October 01, 2016
Hello everyone! Hoh-tza-khee to all you! (Good morning!) I am sorry for my phonetic Erin-style Fookien. But this is my very own hugot blog series so I leave you with no choice but to decipher the Fookien Chinese terms I will be dropping here and there, hahaha!
This blog entry is kind of heavy because I will be recounting my “baliw sa love” days of 2015... … bring on the hashtag #hugotpamore
Things might be over between us for good, but I am thankful to God that I met Chinito Guy. No, really, I mean it from the bottom of my heart. It’s something that he knows because I have always told him that.
I know you’re thiking, “Seryoso? Baliw ka ba? Sinaktan ka na nga ni Chinito Guy, thankful ka pa?” (Chinito Guy hurt you and yet, you’re thankful?!)
For you, my dear readers, to understand why I feel this way, I need to tell you what I went through before I met him.
For whatever that’s worth, I’ll blog about my soul-sucking toxic relationship with a Caucasian man-child who looks like the Daddy version of Backstreet Boys’s Nick Carter.
Let me take you back to May 2015. I was trying to forget someone – Valentine Guy (churva lifespan: 15 days). I was trying to forget Valentine Guy but I am finding it hard to do so.
I met a 6 foot 2 1/2, blue-eyed Caucasian guy with a cherubic face one afternoon in an open foodcourt in Makati City, and I jumped at the chance. I forgot about Valentine Guy in an instant.
He was a man-child. My then-36 year-old child boyfie. I was 28 that time.
Before you judge me as a then-28 year-old pedophile, let me explain what a man-child is. A man-child is an immature guy who refuses to grow up, just like Peter Pan. A man-child always has one foot out the door. A man-child is never fully committed when it comes to relationships. Think Hugh Grant in the Nick Hornby novel-turned-movie About a Boy. When you’re in love with a man-child, forget abou that elusive “in a relationship” Facebook status, because the man-child always wants to keep his options open. That’s right, you are only an option.
The day we met in Makati City, we ate at an open food-court, a barbeque place. Sort of. Because I was not in the mood to eat in a place like that. I just nursed my overpriced lasang-fake na buko juice. There are so many restaurants around the area. He could have taken me to one. There’s no way that this cheapskate and I could get along in the long-term. Like hello, you’re gonna take me to an un-airconditioned food court? Like, what the heck? Am I doomed to a life of chintzy gifts, if he will ever give me a gift at all? But at that time, I was okay with it because it’s not everyday that a cherubic-faced Caucasian guy asks me out. I needed a rebound guy for me to forget about Valentine Guy.
He told me that he speaks Mandarin. I challenged him to talk to me in Mandarin. It was true; he could speak kindergarten Mandarin. I thought, maybe a future with him could be possible even though he had no drop of Chinese blood in him.
For our second date, he cooked hotdog and eggs as my dinner. The gesture was so simple, but that gesture was like “gayuma.” I fell for him at that instant. I was so enticed by this Caucasian guy who cooked the most delicious breakfast food ever.
Things were good for the most part whenever we were physically together.
“I love you,” he said on our third date.
I said nothing. I thought about mentioning that this“I love you” from him, at age 28, would be my first from a guy that is not a family member or a relative. But I knew announcing that would be worse than just letting it happen. My “Lannang Kiyeme” took over in this aspect. That “Lannang” restraint.
Dropping the L-bomb too early in a relationship is a kiss of death. He jumped the gun and said it too soon. I knew he wasn’t genuine. I took it with a grain of salt, but still, there was a part of me that believed him. Kinilig pa rin ako.
Our third date was very surreal. I felt that he really meant tht he loved me. He was very affectionate towards me. His hugs were so addicting to me. “I’ve missed you,” he said as he hugged back. “I’ve missed you too,” I hugged him back.
It was on our 4th date that I noticed that my man-child boyfie was obese. My heart froze for a second, or maybe a minute. I wanted a guy who could motivate me to be healthy. He’s a chain-smoker, and he is obese. There are things that one cannot unsee. This is a consequence of my being un-observant. Nevertheless, I still loved him.
We have met 5 times — all while rarely talking, never connecting. We do not have anything in common except for the kindergarten Mandarin knowledge. When we were apart, he texts me that he loves me, but I felt that he’s not sincere about it because I do not see it in his actions. If he really was into he, he will talk to me about the little things that were going on with him. Well, he’s silent as a clam.
The last pararagraph I wrote, I just realized when I met Chinito Guy. And that makes the Chinito Guy thingy so much depressing.