is it bad?

Whew, weekends are probably worst days of the week. Everyone is out and about and since it's so close to Christmas they're about 3 seconds away from biting your head off.... or they're just plain rude to begin with. Toward the end of my shift I was hiding out in the kitchen and doing behind the scenes stuff to avoid people so I didn't hear the actual conversation but I saw the result of it. One of my coworkers is a larger girl. She's great and we all adore her. Well, one of our regulars (one we particularly don't like since he's a creepy old man) told her that she apparently put on some "holiday pounds." Jessica, being the wonderful person she is, handled it well but after the customer left, she came into the kitchen and ranted before declaring that she needed a smoke break so we let her go.


On my last 15, my roomie and a friend came to visit me. They just happened to arrive at the right time. I hung out with the roomie for a bit before deciding that I needed to sit down and rest my feet. Robyn, a bookseller, was on the phone when I got into the break room so I just sat down at started to eat caramel popcorn. *yum* Not too long after that, Robyn got off the phone with a self-conscious laugh, turned to me and stated, "He keeps telling me he loves me before he hangs up but I never say it back. I always say 'Uh-huh okay, bye-bye' really fast. I just don't feel attracted to him."

M: "Your boyfriend?"

R: "Yes."

M: "How long?"

R: "Five months. I've told you about him, right? He's 9 years younger than me...."

M: "I thought you weren't seeing him."

R: "I thought so too but he's really sweet and nice and loves my daughter and he's just a great guy. And the sex. The sex is great."

M: *awkward* "You're not attracted to him though?"

R: "No. I've told him before that he's not my type but we're still together and he always tells me that he loves me. Is it bad that I stay with him when I don't feel the same?"

M: "... You are aware that you're using him."

R: "Yeah, but the sex. It's great. You know, I'm 33, I'm not getting any younger so I thought... you know. And he's perfect. Anatomically, personality, equipment... what counts, right?"

M: *raised eyebrow, didn't need to know some of that* "But you're not attracted to him. That's not fair. To yourself or him. Could you stay with him long term and be content knowing that you don't feel the same as him?"

R: "But... is it bad?"

M: "What do you think?"

R: *thoughtful pause* "Damn you! Now I'm feeling guilty!"

M: "Sorry."

R: "No, you're right. Damn. F***. I didn't think you'd be this insightful."

M: *laugh* "Really."

R: "Seriously. You don't talk much so I never really knew. I should talk to you more often. Be my moral conscious."

M: "Uh..." *time to go back to the topic at hand* "Anyway, you just have to decide if you could be content with what you have now, not being attracted to a great guy. The longer the relationship lasts, the harder it will be to end things if it ever got to the long-term things like marriage."

R: "F***! You're right!"

Any other conversation following was going back to work stuff. We went our separate directions, I went to the cafe and she went back to customer service. I don't know when I suddenly became the dating adviser but yeah... that was my day.