And The Stalkers Are Popping Out

The last time I was single, I had a few problems with guys refusing to leave me alone. I didn't want to tell them where I was or what I was doing for fear they were going to show up & bother me. To get rid of the 2 ex-boyfriend turned stalkers I had (one even went to my parents' house on Thanksgiving & left this wrought note about how his life was nothing without me, among other things), I had to tell one I had a boyfriend and the other that I was attending law school in a different state from where I was actually going.

For those of you who haven't had them, let's define what a stalker is. A stalker is someone who refuses to leave you alone. Someone who can't go live their own life & allow you to live yours. Oh, no! That would be too much for them.

Let someone go about their merry way & NOT bother them? God forbid!

I consider stalking as banal as saying "hi" to me at an event when I don't want to talk to you & have made that abundantly clear. When I cut you out, you are to be dead to me. I don't want to know you are still roaming this planet or NYC or wherever I happen to be.

One of my biggest pet peeves is someone still trying to talk to me when I have A) blocked them on social media, B) blocked their phone number, C) blocked their e-mail, D) said "I do not want to talk to you anymore," E) got my personal property out of their place or F) did anything that would make a rational, sane person say "You know something? She doesn't want anything to do with me. Maybe I should leave her alone."

Another huge pet peeve of mine is guys getting way too damn clingy & saying things that they have no grounds for. Case in point: I go to a networking event weeks back. Being where I am in life right now, I'm not as prompt in follow ups as I'd usually be. I go to networking events with the express purpose of networking & making business contacts. This is the same reason I use LinkedIn.

I DO NOT go to these events or use LinkedIn to have guys hit on me, call me "babe" (outside of a general entertainment industry context where they just call every female or everyone that) or declare their love. In the past week, I have had a total of 5 guys harass me or declare feelings they've got no business having.

1. A former friend/person I had an involvement with who has long since been blocked, told "I'm not interested," that kind of thing approaches me at an event. It startled me & frankly I didn't want to deal with it so I dashed off.

On my way to find someone more desirable to talk to (usually a cute guy by himself), I get a text message from another guy I had no interest in. This one revealed himself to be a Jesus freak & the thing that made me not want to speak to him further was his little sermon on the evils of pre-marital sex. The genie is out of that bottle, dude!

2. The Jesus freak says "hi," despite the last conversation where I said he should find someone more suited to him & his beliefs than me since he was not going to "save" me and I knew way too much about the Christian faith to be swayed by any attempt to make me into the frump they'd all love.

3. I go to a fashion show & meet a guy from Italy who says he'd like to learn American English. He instantly asks me if I'd want a serious relationship alongside telling me I'm "beautiful" and how great my eyes are. Had a friend with me I was trying to help forge business contacts & he was going to contact this guy.

The next day this guy is sending me text to e-mail messages & veers away from polite, normal topics into "I need your love. I need you."

Uh, no you do NOT "need" me!!!!! You had a 5 minute conversation with me after a fashion show & I left since my ride for the evening had to go. No way did you get to know me well enough to assess whether you "need" me or not.

If you get emotionally attached to someone that quickly, there is no hope for you in this life. There is definitely no hope for me if that's how all guys are going to react to me.

4. I get a connection request from LinkedIn from this guy who is a diver & has a mutual contact. Generally, I'm liberal on who I accept connection requests from on there since you never know who might be a useful or beneficial contact. If it's not someone trying to have a million contacts they never speak to, I'll generally approve. After all, you're getting the vanilla version of me on there so it's not like someone's going to be overcome by the vapors by having me as a connection. A Facebook friend, perhaps but NOT a LinkedIn connection.

Recently, I had to add my picture to my LinkedIn page. This is because I got a sponsored ad from Avvo offering very good terms & used my headshot pic that is on my company's website as well as my IMDB profile. I figured it wouldn't hurt to maintain some consistency.

I'm still very resistant to having a profile pic on there & I suppose this most recent experience illustrates why.

No sooner than I approve this request, I get a message asking me if I'd consider "a serious relationship." He talks about true love flourishing, calls me "babe" & tells me to respond to his personal e-mail address if I am interested.

I wrote a response a few days later since at first I'm thinking "Was I just propositioned on here?" Who calls a woman he's not married to or dating "babe" in a LinkedIn message? I'm also thinking to myself "Is this guy offering to be my sugar daddy or something?" I've gotten quite a few in-person offers for that stuff that I may have mentioned before. How, I don't know. I did nothing particularly special, just be myself & show up. Maybe it's part of 2.0 stuff & the new order.

5. Yesterday, while I'm going about my business & dealing with tasks at hand I get an e-mail from a guy I met at a networking event ages back. He sends me a pic of a rose & says "i remember you very week...i think of you every days, please reply to me."

Then he signs off with "Kisses"

I want to know: what the holy fuck?!?!?!?

First off, I might be pretty & I might be a great conversationalist with a sense of humor but I'm not so sure it warrants that type of reaction. Men falling in love with me in 5 minutes by just having a conversation with me & not even seeing me naked? I'm highly skeptical of that claim.

I at least had sex with some of these stalkers & maybe a reaction like that afterwards is understandable. Not to brag or anything but natural redheads have some skills & I'm not exactly a slouch in that department. I could very well have spoiled a few men in my time. More than one has told me I was "the best [he] ever had."

Some of them shouldn't forget it since it seems lots of women are either super freaks or stone cold frigid. There's very little middle ground or "lady on the street, freak in the sheets" types.

I also realize there are some sexually deprived men. That's a situation I feel some sympathy towards depending on how long that's been happening. It's not always the ugly or average guys, either.

Second, I don't believe in love at first sight. In fact, I don't believe in love at all. I feel it's a term guys use when they really mean they are in lust with you. Apparently falling in lust with me is so easy, I don't even have to try to get that reaction. They seem to take one look at me, have a short conversation & BOOM! One more man enamored with me for some reason; this is why I have a Facebook fan page.

Third, I hate clingy guys just as much as your typical guy hates clingy girls. My first boyfriend Psycho Boy was such a clinger, I'd have suffocated if I'd stayed in that relationship. I felt like I was gasping for air at times. Let me tell you right now clinginess is NOT endearing, charming, flattering or romantic.

I view being clingy as the emotional equivalent of a tick on your skin. Maybe even a tick on the side of your boob like a fellow camper I bunked with once had to deal with. She couldn't even put a shirt on to go across the way to the counselors' tent. We had to go tell the counselors she needed help without having to go into graphic detail (since we liked our tent mate & weren't trying to embarrass her). Ticks are painful, always end in places you don't want them & they just cause you unnecessary stress, strife, aggravation, you get the idea. That's how I view a clingy guy.

Again, middle ground. Take an interest & give a damn if I live or die (vanishing from the radar means you will vanish from MY radar since there are always other guys & friends who contact me). But you don't have to call or text me every hour, on the hour. Once a day or once every few days is okay. I understand you have a life. I do as well. Respect it & we will be fine.

Clinging to me tells me you do NOT have a life, that you will shape your entire existence around me & I won't be flattered but will end up terrified when I need to get out of your basement b/c you have decided to kidnap me (hopefully not literally since figurative kidnapping is bad enough).

Fourth, don't beg me for sex. I think it's pathetic when a guy does that. Not sure how guys feel about girls doing that but I sure won't do it. I have never had to beg for it & I sure won't now.

I'm thinking of an episode of The Golden Girls where Blanche is out with this guy she tried to sleep with & never did. Her "the one that got away," if you will. She goes out with this guy, despite him no longer being the hottie she knew in college & finally gets fed up after asking him for the upteenth time if he wants company and gets rejected.

She goes off on him & informs him that he may not want her but she will damn well find a man who does. After she does this, she leaves the restaurant they're at and 4 guys follow her, including the check and this guy dining with another woman! At this point, I could see something like that happening to me if a guy rejected me & I'd had enough.

Finally, I like my space. In particular, I like my emotional space. No, I LOVE my emotional space.

People need it from time to time, especially when they are going through what I have but I loved my space even before that.

Those who need their space will understand what I'm saying here & those who don't will never get it. We people who love our space just need to find others who also cherish their own space & understand why you don't want to be joined at the hip 24/7.

Sometimes, I just want to be left the fuck alone. If I'm bleeding due to girl stuff, I REALLY just want to be left alone. It's called "Stay out of my face. Do not bother me & definitely don't engage me if you don't want to get injured or hear me say something you won't like."

Could anyone possibly tell me why all this stalker mess? I want to know why. Why are they all stalking ME?!?!?! Where are some rational, normal, non-clingy (but still caring) guys who also have a professional background & some ambition in life?

Aren't there other women for these guys to bother & send these impassioned "I need you" notes to? Surely I can't be the only attractive woman in NYC with naturally red hair, a career, ambition & looks. I'm not the only model; let's balance out some of this stalker shit.

Plus, I have yet to see any super hotties be stalkers. None bothering me have ever been the kind of guy women would throw their panties at "just because." Now maybe it's just that guys I find attractive haven't been the stalker type since I'm sure looks have zero to do with a guy becoming a stalker. Please tell me there are hot ones guilty of it as well.

Some of you might think "Oh, I'd love to have stalkers." No you don't. If you wanted a stalker, he wouldn't be a stalker. He'd be a guy you want to do naughty things with. Another downside to being pretty & I'm not even famous at this point. God help me if that happens. I'll need a full security staff with military gear.

DNA Doesn't Make You Family

I probably learned this at a very young age after seeing some of what I did. I saw total bullshit happening in the name of "love" and "family members" (you know the people who are supposed to be your unconditional supporters in life) treating people worse than strangers on the street.

Add this to the dysfunctional marriages I saw and you've got some basis for my heavy cynicism.

You'll probably notice that I don't talk so much about my extended family or relatives. There's good reason for that. Are you ready?

So, apparently Southern families are soap opera like. I wasn't really aware of this until a law school classmate told me; I asked a fellow Southerner about it today & he confirmed this. But seriously? My family is probably higher on that soap opera scale than average, even though we don't have a Stefano DiMerra figure (he implanted microchips in people's brains, fathered most of Salem, kidnapped Marlena Evans about a hundred times & basically did so much meddling into people's lives that my mother once said if he, Vivian Alamain & one other Days of Our Lives character were real people, they could singlehandedly take out foreign combatants).

Shall we start with my mother's side or my father's? I guess we'll go with my father's. To start with, my father's family was dysfunctional long before it was cool or hip (we're talking the days of I Love Lucy here). He had this stepfather that was abusive & even tried putting the moves on my mother when she & my dad were engaged; they called him "Mr. [His last name]". His recently departed brother (I can't say "dearly" since he was an ass & no one really liked him) was a creeper pedophile (as I learned more recently, which explains why we didn't really hang out with him). I feel like I got lucky with my father even though living in that family was no bowl of cherries. I'm also not sure I'm cool with the fact that apparently my parents provided aid & comfort to this creeper when the snakes were striking, so to speak. I addressed this issue in an earlier post; if you read it, you'll understand where I'm going here.

Second, I can't prove this but my paternal grandmother was allegedly Miss Atlanta GA; if we're going based on looks, it could very well be true but I don't know her first name or her maiden name so I have no way to verify it. In fact, they really don't have a family tree or other relatives I've heard of except a great aunt they were close to that died when I was younger. This grandmother, like most of my grandparents, died before I was born.

It feels like I'm adopted in some ways with this whole shroud of mystery here. It gets better, though.

My mother doesn't talk to pretty much any relative except my uncle (her brother). Factions of that family fought over money left by a distant relative some years back. When we were much younger, we saw some of those relatives but as we got to middle school & onward they vanished without a trace. No one made efforts to contact us or keep up with us. They do have a family tree, though.

Now, they are all curious on everyone's business but they never ask with legitimate concern. It is apparently more like an inquisition & having gossip fodder. I should mention both sides of my family have a healthy assortment of gossips & hateful assholes. Yes, I know this is not uncommon but I thought the whole ceasing of contact had to do with physical abuse or something horrifying like that.

Our basic attitude here is the same as mine on life in general: I'm not going to follow you around seeking your approval or favor like a little puppy nipping at your ankles. You want to be around? Make a fucking effort! Otherwise, don't whine about it when you do nothing to make an effort.

I could pass a relative of mine on the street & wouldn't know it. Doesn't this sound like a soap opera already?

One hazard of working in this industry, especially if you're an actor, writer, director or anyone else who's more out in front: long lost family & friends will try contacting you for favors.

I've been prepared for that possibility for some time since I kind of have to have an online presence for the sake of business. I also know what trajectory I'm going on & as a consequence, it's just bound to happen sometime.

Sometime became Tuesday. I go check my e-mail in the morning as I do every morning before I start working & I find a cousin I've not seen since I was 7 has written me a message through my website to then ask about why my mother won't talk to them.

Gee, did I wake up & become my mother all of a sudden? Did I end up back in NC & inhabit her body sometime? Last I checked, I was a separate entity.

That window of time when I'll bother to give someone any benefit of the doubt on not seeking special favors is rapidly shrinking; I suppose it already shrank from going to law school & leaving the South but it's definitely gotten smaller than it was even 2 years ago.

I check a different e-mail account to find this cousin also wrote me the same message through Avvo.

That evening, when I've decided how I'm going to handle this I see this cousin has sent me a Facebook friend request & has no public details on her profile to give me an idea of what sort of person I'm dealing with. Nor do I have any way to respond through Facebook.

Another fact about my mom's side of the family: there are a lot of Christians in it. Some of whom are probably part of that lunatic fundie fringe that's intolerant & quoting Bible verses at you constantly while breaking most of the commandments. I'm not so certain they'd accept me for me.

I thought "Oh no she didn't!" Because her messages to me said she'd done "research" on me, I decided to point that out in my response. I also addressed what an aunt of mine said concerning my plans to live in NY state; she had claimed I was following the guy I was dating at the time (Vampire Boy) instead of having a real interest in it. Jesus, people who'd spent a few hours around me knew I had no interest in living in the South. An aunt on my dad's side I didn't spend a ton of time with even told my mother that she wasn't surprised about what I did in my adult life & where I'd moved to. She's also dead now.

I figure if that aunt knew, it should be as plain as day to anyone else. Total strangers down there knew how miserable I was living there; it was obvious & I made no secret of that fact.

In writing this message, I figured I'd treat this relative just as I'd treat a total stranger who sent me a Facebook friend request & provided no explanation or reason why I should care about connecting with them, especially on a personal social media site like Facebook. I get those kinds of requests fairly often on various social media platforms so I'm pretty direct about it.

My mother said I didn't have to be offensive & all to this relative. I said "You're assuming I care what this woman thinks. I really don't." She seems to forget I'm the woman who's known as "the enforcer," the person who'll tell you right to your face if you're crossing a line or doing something that offends me. I've got a rep to maintain, you know?

My thought is regardless of my approach, it's a win for me. I also stated that if you want to have space in my life, you'll have to accept me for who I am without trying to "save," convert or badger me about my life choices (all of them, not just the ones you like such as my super heterosexuality) as well as accept my spouse, who is not going to become a God bothering asshole.

I further stated that my mother was an adult & she could speak to her directly on that issue but that I would not be a conduit of information and would not be violating her personal privacy since she's not violated mine. I presume she would not be selling me out to some tabloid or exploiting my friends/harassing my contacts. I know she wouldn't bother celebrities since she's got no interest in such matters.

So, I'm giving this relative a week. Regardless of what happens, it's a win in my book. If she's all offended, then I won't have to worry about them bothering me. Really not worth your time to deal with me if you offend easily anyway. If not, maybe we can have a serious discussion here & lay our cards out on the table. See if there's going to be acceptance. I even put in some light profanity after pointing out that I do curse & have earned that right since I live in NYC and am an adult. Would you rather I curse or repress all that to then snap one day & shoot innocent people in a bank like that day trader did in Atlanta shortly before I moved there? I've asked my mother this question anytime she complains about me cursing out some dumbass driver in a fit of road rage while I drive.

At this point, I'm not in the mood to grovel for anyone's approval & see no reason to do it when it comes to who I am as a person. No acceptance means why bother in my book.

Just remember that your family is the one you create for yourself, not the one you're born into.

Oh, and 50 Shades of Grey is total porn but if you want honesty in some of the terms you should read the sex stories in Playboy or urban fiction (according to a librarian I know, wink wink). They spell out the male & female private parts in the characters' sexual experiences. That leads into another rant but since I'm sleepy, I'll save it for another day. Just know that my husband was right when he said this book is porn. Not that this is a bad thing; I'm just stating facts. More thoughts on this later. I have to actually finish it first.

The Blog's First Press Moment & Getting to Hear Me Sing

I wondered why my reader count was up last week & last night, I figured out why. Avvo linked to it in their 2010 Legal Wrap Up, Part II!!

I've never linked this blog to places like my LinkedIn profile & so called "business" social media. There are a few reasons for this:

1. I can't imagine the typical lawyer really being interested in anything I have to say. After all, countless attorneys have made me feel like some clueless neophyte or just seemed appalled that I dared to have a personality or spoke to them as a colleague and not one of my "betters."

Let me tell you something: I don't have ANY "betters." There's me and there's you. You might be talented & you might know more about something than me but as far as I go, no one is "better" than me. Respecting someone's expertise doesn't mean you diminish yourself as a human being.

I don't suck up to anyone & if I wouldn't do that for some celebrity everyone's heard of, why would I do it for some attorney who isn't even a household name?

My attorney friends & entertainment law attorneys? Sure. Friends know I'm off beat & the entertainment attorneys who actively work in the industry can at least appreciate my creativity/warped world view/whatever uniqueness I have that makes me capable of writing a blog anyone would bother reading.

But the BigLaw types? Why would they read it? I feel like this blog may as well be written in a foreign language when it comes to them. I don't get their mentality & I'd be shocked if any managed to get mine. The last people on Earth I'd expect to be my fans are any BigLaw partners since the anti-establishment aura from me has to be nauseating.

2. Most attorneys are sticks in the mud. If you're a friend who's a lawyer, this is not directed at you. I figure if you're an attorney who can stand me, it means you have a personality & are not overly caught up in the "prestige of being an attorney" BS.

Per capita, though I'd say entertainment people have better personalities & a sense of humor. My raves from this blog have largely come from people in the business, creative types & those working in it. You have to be at least a little anti-establishment if you want to work in this business since that lends to passion, thinking outside the box, etc.

3. This is an anti-censorship space. I don't think a lot of established lawyer types would like what I have to say or my observations. It's not as though I really need to worry about blacklisting the way the law school scam bloggers might have to (though I still think if you hate the game that much, you should just embrace your exclusion, give the proverbial middle finger & do something that doesn't require sucking up to these "evil, greedy bastards", as you call them).

I do, however, have incentives to avoid being harassed about my entertainment connections or dealing with whiny people getting butt hurt because they aren't the grand humanitarians they think they are (such as bar associations who have no financial respite for people with NO MONEY).

I'm not going to write or allow this blog to continue if it means I have to censor my honest feelings & reactions to particular situations, however controversial. I will not condone using social networking searches as a pre-condition to an interview or playing Twitter nanny. Nor will I defend child molesters or change who I am to be "politically correct." I could see more attorneys whining about my exercise of free speech than entertainment folk, especially considering the BigLaw types don't have free speech rights or freedom of expression. The draconian policies I've read & heard about in those firms seem to support this.

This press moment took me by total surprise since I'm not on here to be intellectual or bore you with law review style tomes. One of my other sources of discomfort w/most attorneys is the fact that I don't lord my intelligence over other people nor pretend to know what I don't.

Another piece of great news: I learned today that I can now add audio samples to my personal website. This means you can finally hear my singing voice if you want to. Now, you can decide for yourself if I'm full of shit when I talk about my experiences as a singer or if maybe I have some real talent. Those who've heard me tend to favor option #2.

Once I find a good program that allows me to record longer clips in mp3 format (hopefully w/the best audio quality I can muster), I'll be all set. Thanks to my business partner, I was able to find a conversion program to convert my current wav files to mp3.

The sucky party will be having to hear myself sing. I'm so self-conscious about seeing or hearing my work; my inner perfectionist tends to come out in full force. I always critique myself, probably more harshly than anyone else ever could.

Soon, though (ideally before Christmas) you'll get to hear sound clips. At least I can now send them to people who want to hire for paid singing gigs. Soon I'll be able to simply send my website address (at least if I don't mind being public w/a total stranger).