Puffy eyes vs. fried chicken

Last night, I had one of those epic sobs. You know: the kind of crying that you did in high school when your boyfriend forgot to call you one night or when someone you love tells you you’re fat. Kidding. Anyway, I’ve been having a stressful time with my boyfriend regarding small things. I made a pact with myself long ago not to air my dirty laundry in this column as it has backfired in the past. But you see, I have not really sobbed for a boy since, well, college.

I know we’re gonna be okay, but I guess the frustrations caught up with me, plus this general malaise I have attributed mostly to writer’s block and the sudden guest appearance of my insecurities that have been dormant since college, around the time I had my last epic sob. It was one of those good therapeutic tearfests, complete with gulping, hiccups and grasping for air. Emotions raping my tear ducts. The kind of crying you see in the Starting Over house. A good cry is as good as a good laugh, sometimes.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m quite dramatic. I usually have tears welling up in my eyes when I’m angry. Which is really embarrassing. Once I was panicking because the photographer failed to deliver a cover shoot for YStyle and I just cried on the phone. Instead of showing a firm display of disappointment and a general loss of respect for him at that moment, I cried like Tammy Faye Baker. It’s just how I react. Some people plot revenge in their heads, while others count to 10 before saying anything. In my case, I cry. It’s the most counterproductive way to get your message across. I mean, how does this sound? "You (hic, hic) are sooooo unprofessional (waaaaah)." Pretty damned psycho.

I don’t know why I stopped sobbing over heartbreak. Maybe it’s because after college I started to become more casual (not in a slutty way, but more pertaining to a state of mind) in my relationships. It was no longer the center of my universe. After maybe my third breakup, I just quietly let a tear pass through the corners of my eyes and just ate a lot of KFC to deal with it. Maybe I just got used to breaking up. That’s terrible. And also I have had good luck with all my boyfriends. They are all still my good, if not best, friends. I tell you, I’m so much better at breaking up than hooking up and flirting like an underaged tart, that’s for sure. Plus I’m not counting the times I drunk-cried to total strangers.

So after crying, I just forgot how it was to actually feel wonderfully and pathetically romantic all over the place. Throwing myself on the bed like Bette Davis and bawling like a maniac in a silk nightgown (that’s what I did, actually) and not be like a clinical Gen X-er (Is it baduy to say that word? Who cares I’m still wearing cargo pants these days). It’s quite chic to be blasé. You know, talking about pre-nups like it’s hot gossip and not caring for anything Nicolas Sparks preaches about makes you quite the strong one.

However, allowing myself to cry like a teething baby made me feel stronger and more in control than I have ever been in quite a long time. A total surrender to one’s emotions can be quite a delicious experience. Almost as self-indulgent as pampering oneself with a Diamond scrub facial (it’s great but totally so Kimora Lee).

It’s not cool to have feelings. Being as jaded as we are, we see pig-murder crying as the kind of thing reality TV stars do when they get booted out of the For Love or Money mansion. Or celebrities wanting lots and lots of attention on TV. It’s baduy. And at my age, I guess I saw crying or rather sobbing over a boy as kind of old. I’m no cold fish, but I just don’t like wallowing. I spent much of my academic years in the abyss of a depression, that’s why I was determined not to let anything, or anyone, for that matter, gnaw at me like a termite on damp wood.

So it’s somewhat classy, I suppose, to hold back the nasally decapitating drama blubbers for clichéd stuff like relationship problems. I’m so dysfunctional it’s not even funny. A woman of the world spends no time on heartbreak; she does invest time finding the perfect purple shoe, though.

Crying and being vulnerable reminds us of the value of things. Crying because of my stupid fight with my loved one just reminded me of how important my sweetheart was to me. How I could hate him so much at that moment and yet care for him even more. I guess our emotions truly make us smarter about the things that do matter, while the mind controls the id from making us act like idiots. Is it ironic to say that crying like a baby can sometimes make you feel all grown up? Just as long as you do it alone with just your dog judging you, yes, it does.