How I Knew He Wasn’t The One
By: Sarah Shoshana Rosen
Tags: Relationships, Sex And Relationships, Partnerships, Love And Relationships, Love

How I Knew He Wasn’t The One

And why you should pick blueberries with your partner…

Blueberries freshly picked by me at Rulf’s Orchard in Peru, NY.

I dated a boy for much too long who was quite obviously not good for me. There were many reasons for this, but one exchange sticks in my mind that proves to me just how wrong we were for each other. And no, it had nothing to do with our opposite political views or starkly contrasting moral compasses. The moment that sticks out to me in hindsight has to do with blueberries.

Yes, blueberries. Or more specifically, picking blueberries.

I grew up not far from an area in New Jersey that is known for its blueberry farms. The boy I was dating lived in this area so I thought we could go pick them together. It’s kind of a basic boyfriend-girlfriend activity that I thought could be fun. I craved taking cute pictures together and then maybe going back to his house, well his mom’s house, and baking a pie with our goodies. People love to pick apples with their significant others so let’s just replace apples with blueberries!

Now, this guy didn’t like to do much with me besides watch TV, eat food, and have sex. That sounds pretty great at this moment in time actually, but not if that’s all your relationship has to offer. He would very occasionally come to visit me in New York City, but he hated it there. He much preferred the comfort of his bubble. I would often come home just to sit with him on his mom’s couch. But I wanted us to be like a real couple. I wanted to share experiences with him even if I had to force it.

So one weekend I was visiting him during blueberry season and I thought going blueberry picking at one of the local farms would be something he’d be mildly into. He wouldn’t need to travel far from home. It wouldn’t take long. It would be cute. I was nervous to ask him about it because he so often would shut me down, but when I finally brought it up he responded quickly with a “Sure we can go to my friend’s farm.” I was shocked at how quickly he responded and even more surprised that he seemed into the idea. I immediately replied with “Really?! Your friend will let us pick there?” to which he responded with “No, we can just go buy blueberries from my friend.”

Womp, womp, womp.

I tried to explain that I didn’t want to go buy blueberries, I wanted to experience picking them. I wanted to spend the time with him. He shut it down though. He thought picking them was a waste of time when we could just buy them and be done with it. I shared this story with my friend and she laughed because it was such an odd reaction on his part. Doing cheesy activities with your girlfriend is far from unheard of. Even if he didn’t want to do it he could have just said yes, but that was a lot to ask of him, apparently. Looking back I laugh at this because it’s so ridiculous. I also see it as a very clear moment of us being on completely different pages. I’m not even sure we were in the same book together. He didn’t want to spend that time with me and couldn’t even pretend that he wanted to go pick some stupid blueberries if only to make me happy. He truly did not care. It was disappointing and it hurt my feelings although I pretended it didn’t. I wanted something so simple from him and he couldn’t provide.

Sometimes small differences between people don’t matter at all. It is, of course, possible to have a healthy and fulfilling relationship with someone who doesn’t want to do all of the things you want to do. But sometimes the small things really matter. They can shine a light into what your future might hold. In this case, I saw that my life would be spent trying to convince someone to want to spend time with me, to love me, and to be who I wanted him to be. That isn’t a way to be in a partnership with someone. Sometimes your partner might want to do something that you’re not into, but you do it anyway because you know how happy it would make them. You know that the small, simple things matter. It took me a long time after this to finally walk away from that relationship, but eventually, I did.