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The older I get the more Waiting to Exhale goes from being a really good movie to feeling more like a “story of my life ” film. As a child, I never thought I’d end up so painfully relating to the thirtysomething women I’d watched countless times. Wasn’t Waiting to Exhale supposed to be just a movie? Looking back on it, I thought I’d be married by now. I thought my life would look something like a husband, a couple of kids, a dog, and a nice house with a manicured lawn. Now, while my ideas of what marriage, success, and happiness look like have changed as I’ve gotten older, I’m still not living within that ideal. My current life looks like a full-time job, a small business, and the same dating apps I delete and download when I’m bored.
True love seems to clock in late and leave early. In my singleness (which I enjoy for the most part), I can’t help but to think about the kind of love I want so I’ll know it when it comes. What do I need from it? What will it feel like? Taste like? Sound like? How willing am I to allow for it to be something different? There are a lot of questions to be answered, but what I know for sure is that I want the love to be an oddly satisfying mashed melody of trap music and R&B.
You’d have to know me to understand, but plainly put—I am a lot of things at once. If duality had a face, it’d look a hell of a lot like me. So, to think of my love as one-dimensional is not only off base but also impossible. I want a love that thumps, bumps, and gets to the nitty-gritty. A love that makes me yell out “ayyeeee” like I’m at a lit brunch. I want a love that makes me feel invincible, resilient, and smooth like the lyrics about selling drugs and driving fast cars I rap over on my way to my 9-5. I want a love with a banging beat, some bass, some treble. A love that’s catchy and kind of gets stuck in my head all day. I want a love I can twerk to. But I also want a smooth love. A love that makes me swoon. I want a love that makes me hit high notes and drop gracefully into lower ones. I want a love I can sway my hips to. I want a love that makes me slow dance, cry, and laugh in joy. I want a love that feels like an Anita Baker album. A love that drags me out of bed on Saturday morning for deep cleaning and singing into the broom because so I’m so in love. I know the kind of love I want, but between “wyd” texts and endless left swipes, I’m starting to wonder if love knows to swing my way.
There’s an ideal of what love will be, but then there’s the reality of what love in this crazy age of dating apps, ghosting, sexting, and situationships has been. And then we’re back to feeling like a stand-in for one of the characters in Waiting to Exhale. To be honest girl, a lot of the time the love feels like “get yo sh-t, get yo sh-t…and get out!” A few times, the love has left me, like Bernie, embarrassed, fumbling and trying to figure out my next step. The love has felt like the disappointment settling into Robin’s eyes when she finally realized Russell was not and would not ever be the man she’d hoped he grow into. Sometimes the love has called me a “raggedy b—h” when I enforced my boundaries and refused to tolerate nonsense. There have been many times as a single thirtysomething where I felt like I “could’ve had a V8” instead of an unsatisfying romp in the hay with someone I probably didn’t think was all that great (if I’m being honest). Like Savannah, I’ve dated “a good man” who was just “in a bad situation.” The same good guy my mother would’ve adamantly vouched for just like the character’s mom. Chile, please.
Don’t get me wrong, there have been good men along this singleness journey who’ve given me good love that made me want to cook “fried chicken, peach cobbler, and a few slices of ham.” I appreciate the love that’s made me giggle as I wonder if he’s watching me walk away. But in addition to the love, there’s been so much lust and lies. As I get older, I can’t help but wonder when will the love finally stay. It’s hard to hold your breath waiting for an exhale especially when love doesn’t seem in view.
