movies and swans

Last night Elodie, Isadora, and I went to see Er steht einfach nicht auf dich, or the American title… He’s Just Not That Into You. I read the book in 2005 because Janet told me it would change my life. I had a very long plane ride to Vienna and knew that it would make good plane reading, so I caved, bought the book which looked like it catered only toward a ‘certain type of woman’ (yes, I stereotype a little), gave in to the neon pink and green cover and started reading.

If I could tell you now, how many angst-filled mornings, nights, and afternoons I would have saved myself by simply heading all of the advice in this book… Maybe, if I start now I can save myself a few wrinkles as I age. Advice of the book goes as follows…

1. If he is not calling you… He’s just not that into you. When guys like you they CALL. If they want to be with you, they CALL.
2. If he introduces you to his friends as his “friend”… He’s just not that into you. If a guy likes you, he will want to show you off and let other people know that you are taken.
3. If you have been together for an extremely long time and he’s not marrying you, we’re talking… over five years… He’s just not that into you.
4. Last but not least, my personal favorite, because you think this would be a dead giveaway… If you want to sleep with him and he’s not sleeping with you, he’s either gay or… He’s just not that into you.

There, of course, were more tidbits of advice in the book, which now I can not remember, but I think those four are probably the most important.

Why, do we as women torture ourselves when the answer is often so obvious? I think it is because we want to believe that we are the exception, or Ausnahme. Should we blame Hollywood for this, or ourselves? Or, does it go deeper to the lie that our mothers tell us when we are little because their mothers told them when they were young, and their grandmothers told their mothers when they were young, and so on and so forth, that when a boy is mean to you, it means he actually, secretly likes you. Gee, if that were the case, I would have so many boyfriends right now I would not know what to do with myself. If I end up lucky enough to have a daughter one day, and she asks me why a boy has pushed her down in the playground, I will hopefully be strong enough not to start the vicious cycle anew, but instead reply with… “honey, maybe he’s having a bad day, but that still doesn’t excuse his behavior.”

So yes, Janet was right. This book did change my life, although at first I was hesitant to admit it simply because I did not want to fall into a category. Specifically there were several instances just last year when I found myself saying… “he’s just not that into me”, but not wanting to believe it, because I had read it in a book that half of the women in America had also read, but also because I wanted to be different… the Ausnahme, the exception. I would make excuses. Well, maybe he’s tired, or maybe he’s out with some friends, or maybe his phone has no battery left. But the truth of it is… I was just too chicken to actually believe that maybe, just maybe it was because he did not like me. As the book says… If a guy likes you… he will call you. He will call you because he wants to talk to you, to hear your voice, to ask you about your day.

I recommend this book to any and all women. It really will change your life.

On another note. There are swans in Wieselburg and Scheibbs. I went out on Saturday and photographed them in Wieselburg. They were being fed bread by some children.