I may be young, but I understand that romance alone can’t make a person happy. I’m madly in love with my boyfriend of almost two years, who I’ve lived with for the past few months. We’re great together. Our living situation is pretty much harmonious. The one problem I have with him is that he can be set in ways. He also comes from a priviledged background and so, despite being brilliant, can’t grasp what kinds of comprises he needs to make in obtaining his goals….and despite being a down-to-earth person, his bourgeouis background sometimes seeps through. I was recently in Europe and hung out with an old crush who I’d met while traveling. We share the same ideals as to what we want to do with our lives and how we want to experience the world–and also how our biggest turn-off is when people are set in their ways. It was obvious we were both still attracted to each other but we never did anything more than just hang out and talk. At one point in the evening he mentioned how he wanted to get a work permit in the US and how I wanted to get a work permit in the EU. Then, with that charming smile of his, he suggested that we get married and do some sort of Greencard exchange….I completely melted when he said that. I’m now back home but am always thinking about him and about whether I may be happier starting a new life with him than with my current boyfriend. I don’t even know if that fantasy would work out, but just the prospect of knowing that I’d have the papers to go and live abroad for a while–even if it means never being with my boyfriend again–sometimes seems more attractive than what my future might hold: being trapped in the same place with a man who’ll just constantly bitch about being a failure.
