Recently, I’ve been binge reading romantic comedies. One thing I’ve learned is that my life is nothing like them.
Maybe you can relate.
5 signs you're not living in a Rom Com
Sign 1: The man who owns the orchard down the road is not a grumpy but eligible bachelor.
It’s a truth universally acknowledged that the man who owns the orchard down the road will be a grumpy but eligible bachelor with a dark secret who wears cable-knit sweaters and is perfect for you.
But only if you live in a Rom Com.
In real life, he’s a big, burly ex-military type who laughs like Santa Claus and thinks you’re married to your brother.
The first time you visit the orchard, he will be the one who makes your sale.
It starts off so well.
Him: (holding a cold compress over a swelling eye) You got to excuse me. I just got lit up by wasps.
You: Yikes.
Him: (tallying your haul) Your husband must like nectarines.
You: Listen very carefully. This is important to me. That (points) is my brother.
He belly laughs. Bags up your fruit and veg. Mentions his wife. Steps out into the sunlight to walk you to the car, bellowing, “HOPE YOU AND YOUR HUSBAND HAVE A GREAT DAY, MA’AM.”
And that’s the first sign you don’t live in a Rom Com.
Sign 2: The meets aren’t cute.
Scenario: The carpenter you contacted online drives up on a motorcycle. Removes his helmet and flips back his hair.
He doesn’t speak much English, and you don’t speak much Spanish.
So far so good.
You show him the woodwork you need done. He gives you a thumbs up and demonstrates how he will fix it. He then mimes sending you a message, which you take to mean he’ll send you a quote for the job.
Over the next few days, he sends you a series indecipherable emails in which the entire message is written in the subject line.
None of these messages are quotes.
After three of these exchanges, he stops replying. You hire someone else and never see him or his motorcycle again. Sometimes when you’re lying awake at night, you wonder if it was all a fever dream.
But at least you know one thing for sure.
You’re not living in a Rom Com.
Sign 3: No one thinks your flaws are adorable.
When a woman in a Rom Com latches onto a stranger in an elevator, follows him around all day, and tells him her entire life story, he finds it charming.
When you do it, it’s a “problematic” and a “red flag” and “possible felony stalking.”
Which is another sign you’re not living in a Rom Com.
Sign 4: You make sensible decisions.
When there’s a landslide right up the mountain from where you live, you do not go against warnings to drive up to check out the damage. If you did, you’d inevitably meet a handsome but frustrated first responder who’s exasperated with interfering locals like you who should just have stayed home and let him do his job.
You’d fight, shouting at each other in the rain, both saying things you’ll regret.
Later, you’d both turn up at the pub in town and your eyes would meet and you’d both apologize—you for interfering with his job (although, at this point, you explain that you had a good reason), and him for losing his cool (because the landslide triggered a trauma from his past).
In real life, when you’re asked to stay away from the affected area while the first responders do their jobs, you drink your eighth coffee in your jammies, watching rain drizzle down the windowpane while streaming “Landslide” fifty times in a row.
You really have no other choice.
Because your life is not a Rom Com.
Sign 5: You can take care of yourself.
When you cut your hand on broken glass, you do not drive down the road to the fire station and ask one of the firefighter-EMT’s if he thinks it needs stitches.
Instead, you bandage your own wound one-handed, muttering darkly to yourself, like the reasonable adult that you are.
Later, a friend will point out that this might be one of the reasons why you’re still single.
But you tell her that can’t be it.
It’s just that you’re living in the real world, not a Rom Com.