Dating after divorce is not fun. I met my ex-husband when I was 17, got married when I was 23,
separated at 28, and the divorce was finalized when I was 31.

Guys never really asked me out in high school, I don’t regret that. I had the best time with my
friends. Having water balloon fights, throwing Elijah Wood parties just so we could have cake,
watching all six hours of the BBC “Pride and Prejudice” with vintage Colin Firth. My high school
days were full of theatre and happy memories.

But at the end of four years, only having “dated” one guy for barely a month, that seeping doubt
began to creep in. What’s so wrong with me that no one wants to date me.

The first week of college, my ex husband asked me out. I said no. I didn’t want to go to school
and just be someone’s girlfriend. I dated one other guy, for about a month. And that was fine.
After a year and a half, my ex-husband and I got together. It was the midwest. I had a
boyfriend. There was validation in having found my person.

When things fall apart and no one really did anything wrong, it hurts. You’re left reeling. I had
only ever dated two other guys before him, and for a little over a month. Dating wasn’t my
strong point. When you’ve been married, you’re supposed to do things for that person. Spend
time and grow together. And when that sort of comfortability is compromised. Out in a big city,
dating and casual sex are like a foreign language.

I was a virgin when I got married. And here I was at 28, having only been with one person. All
of my friends and coworkers were having casual sex and dating around. I’d go to parties, and
just practice talking to men. It felt weird. I couldn’t bring myself to go home with them. The first
time I semi-drunkenly kissed a guy at a party. I froze, immediately went home and sobbed. I’m
in my 20’s, the prime of my life. I should be having fun.

Since then there have been a few guys. Nothing super serious. But my low self confidence
with men usually leads to my self-sabotaging the possibility of a relationship. And for a long
while I’d promote the “I fly solo” theme out there. Because being vulnerable and letting
someone new in is scary as hell.

Starting your dating life at 28 is a doozy. But I gotta keep growing. Keep on pushing to open
myself up to the possibility of love. While it doesn’t happen very often, the guys I’ve gone out
with give me lots of hilarious stories . There’s the guy who lit up TWO joints on our hiking date.
The guy who kissed me, barely touched my boobs, then immediately came in his pants. To the
guy who for the first time I thought might go somewhere, only to have him text me out of the
blue that he was getting back together with his ex-girlfriend.

Those guys aren’t my person. Some people don’t have one person, they have many. My
family, my friends, and coworkers. I’ve grown so much by being independent over the last five
years, finally being comfortable being alone and being with myself.

Over the course of the last year, I’ve learned to let go on dates, and just enjoy the experience.
I’m now growing into the powerful force I’m meant to be. And maybe that scares some men, but
it hopefully will lead me into the direction of someone just as independent as me. Who gives me
plenty of room to be myself and gives me that authentic need for freedom so we can both
realize our full potential.
​
And if not, I’ll just keep on being awesome.

Author
Kate Orlando has performed in It's Personal On Stage and will be joining us again this summer for the Fringe show: Los Angeles. We are thrilled to have this lady be apart of It's Personal and THE PERSONALS.

Behold her:
A woman, getting older 
Growing bolder
Instead of colder
With two strong shoulders 
Beneath a head swirling with things I told her:
That being alone and being sober
Turn you into a female soldier
The first to admit 
her needs don’t include a man to fit her
For the sister glitters without a mister
Wants no other to need or complete her
Her independence is transcendence
And no one person’s entrance could possibly end it

Or so I told her

Then one day
She swayed
Because her knees were weaker
The days tasted sweeter
And as if it had been eager to meet her -
Love greeted her

And in just a moment
Her heart burst wide open 
She found that it had her feeling
Like someone peeling back the covers
Who then discovers
That the world has secret colors
And she was just now able to see them

Now, behold her:
A woman, growing younger
Filled with a new and lovely hunger
That will make her fight through rain and thunder
To simply watch her lover slumber

They say that age is just a number
And if that’s true
Then growing up
Is merely showing up
To the possibility 
Of falling, headfirst, into opportunity
And perhaps maturity 
Is understanding life will treat you brutally
And just as often beautifully
To lean into that lunacy
Is to be behaving humanly
Maybe love is that confusing dichotomy?

So behold her: 
A woman, timeless, on the rise. 
A belly full of butterflies
A heart of easy compromise
Sunrise dawning in his eyes
Moonlight resting on their thighs
She needs him, but she needs him not 
Love simply isn’t what I thought -
Truly a better endeavor 
Than I was ever taught.

So I did not plan it
And I may not understand it
But by god
I now demand it

Author
We hope you enjoyed this beautiful piece written by Anna Snedden.

I appreciate my vagina. I do.

This thought kept going through my head as I used the bathroom in the Vegas airport during my layover cause damn it, I appreciate my vagina. I do.

I was flying solo, which meant I was getting drunk solo, which led to ordering Burger King solo. And, then I realized, I'm a goddamn champion. And, it's because of my vagina.

My vagina keeps me sane. If my vagina's healthy, I'm healthy. If my vagina feels good, I feel good. If someone messes with my vagina, I’ll fuckin’ kill you.

But, it didn’t always used to be that way. I didn’t always appreciate my vagina. There was a time when I hated my vagina.

I grew up in a house with 3 brothers. My mom took incredible care of us- we’re very close- but anything pertaining to, or in mention of the vagina was off limits. Not because my mom was being neglectful; it was because I’d rather get my leg gnawed off slowly by an army of angry mice than to have to look at a simple, hand-drawn diagram of my fallopian tubes. Ew. I got home from school, and my mom said, “Emily”, and waved me into the kitchen. I sat down awkwardly on a stool at our island table, like omg, what is it mom. She scribbled something onto an index card and slowly slid it in front of me. It was a very simply drawn picture of a uterus. The f*ck is wrong with you?! is what I wanted to say. Instead, I looked up with an expression of full on hatred. I don’t know if you’ve seen a tiny, prepubescent girl in the shape of a twig turn into a raging baby alcoholic, but I’m pretty sure that’s exactly what happened. I’d been successfully pushing off this conversation since my grandma bought me a bra for christmas when I was 9. The f*ck is wrong with you?!

My mom quickly rattled off the briefest explanation as to what a period is, and why I will want to kill myself. She did this because she knew, based on past experience, that she had about 5 seconds before I got pissed and started throwing shit, and bolted for the closest door or open window. I didn't wanna talk about it!

I don’t know if it’s because I wasn’t used to talking about female stuff, or because I just wanted to be one of the guys, but I felt super weird about it. My mom eventually resorted to getting one of those period books about Sally accidentally getting period blood on her gym uniform and having to ask her friend to borrow a tampon. It was in one of those books that I learned how to put in my own tampon. It was also in one of those books that I learned my boobs might not fully develop until the age of 18. I had time.

However, I did have a slight change of heart once my friends started getting their periods, and marking their calendars. And then I was like F*ck. When am I gonna get mine?! Oh, I got it. 4 years later. Then I got braces, almost simultaneously. Then some kid in Chemistry said I had hairy arms. High school was good.

At this point, I wanted to know more, more than just the basic period stuff. More about my vagina. But, for some reason I still couldn’t talk about it. Then college happened, and ya know, ya get drunk. And you eat mcdonald’s sitting on a curb, and ya pass out on a couch next to a hairy dude wearing a pair of fairy wings. You maybe kiss a girl for the first time. Maybe you like it, maybe you don’t, maybe you’re too drunk to know. Then you start to see this guy, not the hairy dude, another guy, a cuter guy, and you have sex. For the first time. And, you make him wear two condoms at once just to make sure. And, then after two periods and 3 pregnancy tests, you still think maybe you’re pregnant because you “feel” like maybe you’re pregnant and it doesn’t matter that 3 tests came back negative or that now you’ve had 3 periods. But the worst part is, you feel dirty. And not in the good way. And then he never texts you back.

That’s when I started talking. I just, I needed some answers and there was no way in hell I wasn't gonna talk to my mom, so my roomie- my best friend - became my therapist, and my own instant pocket comedian. She’s the best. Things got better, and I started to appreciate my vagina.

When I got older, the subject of my vagina was later replaced with finances. I still won’t talk about em, but I’ll talk about my vaginaaa all damn day.

Author
Here's another weird piece by Emily Dorsett. I can say that because I am her. Enjoy.

Oh Veggie Burger,
How did you entrance me?
Mere seduction of my need to feed
Especially on a day I couldn’t eat meat
Such a feat, I never thought would occur
Taste buds on overload, hyper drive, what a blur

To think I avoided your presence
I was self-sentenced to life, as a carnivore
Especially thinking back, before all this
Memories of my youth
Long have I knew
Of my food habits
Rigid, safe guarded
Never would a garden touch these lips
Never would greens and oranges and reds
Breed romance onto my eternal menu
Only tried and true foods
Would pass my tests, and just as all of the rest of my days
I would find ways to bypass the change, the new

So was I afraid of you?
Was I afraid of what I could become?
A predator becoming docile
A lion? No; a goat
Grazing on the landscape
Hopping freely, dancing till sunset
One I hoped would happen for me
As I grew and matured
My horns sharp, my hoofs overworked
To prove my existence to this world
Change became inevitable
Greener pastures
The more foreign fields I would graze
Others like me could see the quality
That makes me, me
Smiles all around
So easy to come around to the new
Of wanting to fit in
So change once again rears it’s ugly head
If I were to relate, my palette would be redesigned
Recalibrated, revolutionized

Against my better judgment
So reluctant in my attempts
Such weird, hideous looking foods before me
So lewd as they, my friends, viewed
Eyes rudely glued as I tried eating these foods
Hopefully they understood how I excluded so much before
How dare they attempt to woo me?
Collusion aside, nowhere was safe for me to hide
From them, I would renew myself
Bravely included in their shrewdness
Guided, no longer fighting it
Giving in, growing up
Factually enticed by the tastes
My face red, with anger and embarrassment
Anger for the time wasted
Embarrassed of my past omissions

It was now my mission
To reach for the new
To grow I must bestow my head, my horns
Humbly to whatever comes before me
On a mountain, beyond the lakes
The unknown awaits
Such as what I just ate on my plate
Oh Veggie Burger
I whisper my thanks to you
A new chapter can begin
As I finish you and order myself another
Such an honor to find you
After all these years, system reset
Safe to say, on that particular day
On life, not quite full yet.

Author

Andy Quintana is one of our core-members in our live show. We <3 Andy and his veggie burgers.