Name Of Girl [Here]

I try to frequent my subscription blogs, but sometimes I get a little too busy and start neglecting them.  Lately that's been the case, but I took the time to read one of them today.  Tales From A Rejection Queen reminds me SO much of what happened to me when I was 21.  She talks about her rejection letters mostly, as she continues to try to be accepted by an agent and eventually, like some of my readers and subscriptions, be published.  I started reading her blog for the sole purpose of keeping my own hope alive, but her personal life is what really brings me to my blog today.  We both have a love for musicians and it seems to be heartbreaking for both of us.

I dated my first musician in high school.  He was a drummer, and the bad boy of our school.  I didn't date him until after he had graduated, but everyone still knew who he was because he was in the hometown hero band.  I was only a junior when we started dating, and we went on and off until fall of my senior year, when he began neglecting me for side projects I wasn't exactly into (read: sex, drugs, craziness).  He cheated on me several times with girls he would meet at the bar during his gigs, and because I was naive, I let myself believe he wasn't.  But I was no fool.

I reconnected with my old best guy friend from high school while on hiatus from that relationship.  The best guy friend was, also, a musician.  He played bass and had been in several bands throughout the years.  He had just left his girlfriend of two years, and had always had a crush on me.  However, I was pretty sure he was just looking for someone to help him get over the ex, and figured it would come and go fast.  It lasted three years, then another year, on and off, until he also cheated on me.  It wasn't a band groupie, but it may as well have been.  Several months after the first time, he cheated on me again, and that was when I broke it off.

I don't know why this is, but there is something so charming and sexy about musicians, even when I know (we all should know) they are heartbreakers.  They write songs about it, so they should know how it feels- but usually they are the ones doing most of the heartbreaking.  After the ex-fiance and I finally split it off for good in 2006, I started back onto the dating scene (around the same time as Weird Underwear guy).  The first person I manage to lay my hands in is, OF COURSE, a musician. 

His name was Ben, and he was adorable.  He was formally in a band with my past ex The Drummer, but was completely different.  He married a girl he met in high school and just a year after separated from her.  He moved four hours south (Ann Arbor), and began a new life.  I happened to run into him on Memorial Day weekend, when everyone in our town seems to party.  I hadn't seen him in years, and happened to be buying a case of beer at a local party store.  Once the guy in front of me had finished paying I threw the case up on the counter.  The guy stopped at the door, and turned around.  I started walking past him, but he put his finger in the air and said, "I know you."

Indeed, he did know me.  It was Ben.  And he looked good (I would like to post pictures of these guys, to prove they are good-looking, but I feel that would be wrong lol). 

"Oh, hey Ben!  It's been a while!  What are you doing up here?"  Of course I"m smooth as butter around the musicians.

"Just up here visiting.  I can't remember..."

"Nicolette.  Or Juj, like everyone calls me."  I knew my ex never called me Juj, but Ben's ex-wife did (did I mention we used to all hang out when I was dating the ex-fiance?).

"Yeah I knew it was something crazy," he said and smiled.  My friends were watching from the car, and waited very impatiently for me to hurry it along.  Ben and I wound up exchanging phone numbers, and once I got in the car, I got to hear it. 

"Was that Ben?" my cousin yelled. 

"He looks HOT!" Alison added.

I could just laugh.  Oh yeah, it was Ben all right.

The weekend was busy for both of us, but come Monday we wound up getting together at a BBQ.  We just sat around and talked, but it was fun.  We had a good time, and decided to keep in touch.  I would continually text him for the next couple months, and then finally actually drive to visit him.

Ben had a way with words.  Like most musicians.  I would wake up some mornings, and there would be some sweet, lyrical-like text from him waiting for me.  "Nothing looks as beautiful as you do while you sleep."  Of course, they only time he'd actually seen me sleep was when I stayed at his house with his ex and my ex, but- still, very very sweet and I got sucked in. 

He convinced me, during a very terrible period for me, to drive down and visit him for a weekend, because he wanted to see me.  He offered to pay for everything, and my friends told me I should do it.  So I did.  And it was really, really great.  He took me out to eat everyday, brought me to a comedy club, introduced me to his friends, we watched the Michigan vs. Michigan State game (he's Michigan, I'm a State girl), we went to the bar, we shot pool, we watched movies.  There wasn't a moment to spare.  We got along so well, it was crazy.  I knew it would end in disaster.

It didn't.  I drove home, we still texted.  However, he was seriously looking into recording with his band downstate, and of course, this left him hardly any spare time for a serious girlfriend.  I wasns't heartbroken, but I was pretty let down.  I let it go, and we eventually drifted apart.  He would come up north to visit his family and always invited me along, because I was the "girl his mom loved".  We went to the movies and baseball games, but it never became anything serious because, I thought that was what he wanted.

Turns out, he was waiting for me to say something.  On Valentine's Day, of all days, I received two text messages- one from him, and the other from my ex (after nearly three months of not speaking).  It was confusing.  Ben had driven up north that weekend to visit, but had blown me off completely the entire time.  He left me waiting for him to call, didn't return my voicemail, and then the text I got was from him, saying his phone had died earlier that day and he left his charger at home.  Likely excuse.

We ended up getting into it over the phone, and I said he was rude not to call and let me know, because I sat around the entire weekend because he had told me he wanted to chill with me, but never called.  He then told me, "I feel like you're not even interested in me so I didn't want to waste my time."

...I wasn't interested in him?  When he was the one that blatantly said, "I don't want a girlfriend because I'm very busy being a musician"?  Hold the phone!  (Ha ha, 80's reference)

I told him I was interested him, but was giving him space because he said he didn't want a girlfriend.  He told me he said that because he didn't want me to be clingy.  WTF?  In the end, that was it.  Ben was great when he was around, but apparently double-talked and just wanted to see if he could get a girl to fall for him even if he was stand-offish and said he didn't want anything.  It failed.  I didn't "fall" for him, but I was pretty hurt.  However, it made me ready for my next phase in life, and it turns out I would never want to date him, anyway.  He is still a broody guitarist, writes poetry and lyrics and chain smokes.  He still has the same ice blue eyes and the thick dark hair that makes any girl want to run their fingers through it.

But to me, he is just another guy.  It wasn't the fact that he was a musician.  It was the fact that he knew how to play the cards right.  There are many, many men out there like this that have no talent to play a musical instrument whatsoever- but they can play the game, and that's all that matters to them, and to us in the end. 

The good thing is- I don't think I'll ever want to date a musician again.  That is, of course, unless he wants to take me on tour with him.  I'll gladly meet all the other hot musicians he'll be on the road with.