Karen Savoy / Sputnik Photography

The following submission has been modified for readability.

I’m gay and I’m also pathetically romantic. Not as in I fall in love easy, but more like I love the concept of love. There was this girl who I had been talking to on Tinder that I thought looked so beautiful and cool in every way. I wanted to fall in love with her and have her fall in love with me. For this reason, I may have bluffed about how much I enjoyed walking and the outdoors. I truly don’t. On our first date, she made me walk as my makeup melted in the heat. My bag broke while we walked around and I was bitten by countless mosquitoes. By the end of the date, she told me she wanted casual sex and my brain was melted enough to have me saying yes, even though I was exhausted and looked like the ghost of Bly Manor. The relationship never happened. 

Loving love can be such a downfall, I get it! The idea of love is so intoxicating and all consuming. Unfortunately, as you prove my point, it can lead us into situations we wouldn’t normally put ourselves in. There is nothing wrong with trying new things, however making up hobbies so that someone else will love you isn’t fair to you or the other person. They deserve to know you, who you really are, not who you think they want you to be. You also owe it to yourself to let someone love you for who you truly are because you deserve it!