Models: Fear Them When You Don’t Know Them, Hate Them When They Steal From You

There are so many moments in our life when we look for models. Having models gives us a better idea of who we want to be. But sometimes, we end up hating those models. How? I’ll tell you how.

After my first week of gym in months and leaving behind what it could probably be a bad Valentine’s Day tradition, I was already feeling good with exercise. I was eating healthier, concentrating more in my job and getting closer to my friends.

However, there was only one thing in my head that kept spinning around like a hurricane: Where had Raphael gone? And why did he leave without any explanation?

Sometimes, you need to find out what happened with someone and why that person disappeared from one day to another. In order to get things straight (more or less), I decided to check the social networks. Fortunately he was on my facebook. So, as a good stalker, I began to daily double-check his profile, until a few days later I found out the reason why he had disappeared. 24 years old, 1.85mts, black hair, big nose, sexy, stylish and a model!! There he was. I had finally found my thief!

After two hours in front of my pc and one feeling completely stupid, I start thinking if it was necessary to satisfy my curiosity. Why did I want to know who Raphael was dating with? Maybe I should have stopped looking for his date at anytime. But do we really know when to stop? Are we completely masochists?

Sometimes is masochism. Sometimes it isn’t. But when you finish a relationship, you always have to make sure it has a closure; even more, when you finish two relationships. Sometimes one, or maybe both reappear. The thing is you don’t know when.

Raphael was on my facebook and Eduardo was on my BlackBerry Messenger waiting for an answer to his new status: “Please tell Love, I’m on vacation”. Should I answer it?

Next chapter: “The story of the selfish men.”

Karma: What Goes Around Comes Around

Not having enough time for me, seemed to be the perfect reason to finish my relationship with Eduardo. However, we know it’s not the only one. Giving up on Eduardo was easy because I knew that Raphael was there. What I didn’t know was how much time he would be.

The word Karma may sound familiar to many of you. It has many different meanings, depending on where you are or which religion you practice. So, as I was in Peru, I chose to believe the western culture meaning of “what goes around, comes around”, or in my case: “what comes around, goes around”.

A few days after I had broken up with Eduardo, I tried to set a date with Raphael to announce him my new status. The date never happened. Apparently he was looking for a one-month stand. So, that’s how I realized that Raphael had entered in my life as fast as no one had ever done before and it took him less time to walk away.

That was the perfect example of Karma and how you can lose things from one day to another. Worst of the case, Valentine’s was the week after. I felt how life was smiling at me… in a very ironic way: “Hey, couldn’t you make your mind on one? Well, now you get none. Enjoy Valentine’s!!”

In order to avoid the black hole, I decided to catch up with my friends. We went to a bar, which turned out to be a darkest hole. After one night of party, alcohol and destruction, we decided it was time to do some exercise, eat healthier, and look like Valentino’s male models on Valentine’s.

Our plan never succeeded. Valentino had unnatural standards for models and Valentine’s had no bigger plans, but a dinner with my friends, where I realized that I wasn’t going to accept any artificial things in my life but some flavors of food, not even to look like a Valentino’s male model.

Models were the last thing I needed in my life, and unexpectedly models were the ones who took away Raphael.

Next chapter: “Models: fear them when you don’t know them, hate them when they steal from you.”

Bosses Who Love to Create Mini Versions of Themselves

Talking about dreamed jobs, I began to wonder if I had one of those. I’ve been working for 5 years now in Marketing and had become Junior Brand Manager at BDF Peru. With all Personal Care Brands in charge, I decided to let my boss to teach me some useful things. However, he was teaching me too much. Don’t get me wrong, he’s one of the best bosses I’ve ever had.

Unfortunately for him, I am not the ideal person to teach to. Stubborn and a little authoritarian, I felt I was becoming “one from the mold”. The mold my boss had created for someone who works in Marketing and is in charge of deodorants and soaps brands.

Then I asked myself about the relation between a career and the age. For some Psychology authors, adolescence lasts until the age of 27 or 28 now. So, if I was still 26, could it be that maybe I was passing through my last rebelliousness age? Was that the reason why I was thinking of my boss as the one who wanted to create a mini version of him?

So, I thought about growing up. As I say my friends very often: “Grow up, child!”, I did the same with me and start repeating that phrase, over and over again. Until I get to the conclusion that when our body stops growing, we began to see the world just as it is. That’s when we start evolving emotionally and that’s called: Growing Up!

Back at home, I realized I had not evolved in my personal life. I was still a teenager when it came to love, sex and relationships. Eduardo and I had just broken up the week before, and I was already beginning a “new relationship” with Raphael.

Had I taken a quick decision? Was it a mistake, to let Eduardo go? I tried not to worry about the fact if it was a wrong decision or not. But instead of that I was worried about repeating some behavior patterns. A few years in the past I had given up some relationships, when someone new appeared. So, I began to see myself as the compulsive unsatisfied.

Life was going to make an effort and teach me that karma is a strong word and a real fact.

Next chapter: “Karma: What goes around comes around.”

Once You Cross the Door, You Will Never Come Back

Be separated from our relationships, gives us enough time and space to think of what will be our next move on love paths.

After two weeks of absence, Eduardo got back from Colombia, and I had to take an involuntary trip to a Caribbean Cruise. It was a work convention. So, I left Lima with nothing in mind but to find a solution for the troubles of having two relationships would bring me and what I should do about it.

One part of my heart told me to be honest, to tell Eduardo about my situation. The other part was telling me to remain in silence and wait, because my future was not certain with him. We had been dating for three months now.

After my return, I decided to listen to “the other part” and I chose not to tell Eduardo about Raphael and wait what fate had written for me then. The day I met Eduardo again, we started talking about us. Apparently he was not that into me. He had a huge crush on his job and his career.

He said that he was very upset because he had been thinking a lot and he could not get to any conclusion. Sometimes, when your guy doesn’t find the right words, you have to say those words for him. So, I took some courage and told him to stop seeing each other, because after three months of dating he was not sure if he wanted a serious relationship or not. But everything was confusing for him.

So, I tried to make myself clearer with an analogy of work: What happened when we find our dreamed job? We immediately connect with it and we do not let anything or anyone gets into our way to be happy and find glory. It’s the same when you find the “right one” or at least the “right-now one”. Then, I started thinking that if an analogy is understood as the identity of relation between any two ordered pairs, then how many pairs could be in our situation right now? Lots of relationships start and end every day. So, I thought that maybe someday I would have the chance to start a new relation with someone who thinks of me as HIS right one.

And that’s how Eduardo left my life… for the first time. Just after he crossed the door, I thought that he was never coming back. Instead of him, Raphael walked in.

Next chapter: “Bosses who love to create mini versions of themselves”.

3 Toothbrushes in a Bathroom: The Beginning of a Bigamic Relationship

My name is Santiago, my story starts when I was living in Lima. 26 years old, single, gay, proud of it, brand manager, comfortable with it, films & writing, dreaming with it.

I’ll skip away 26 years of my live in Bogotá, and I’ll get you directly into the facts.

Just when I was finally having a stable relationship, organized! (we saw each other 4 or 5 times a week), independent, he had his flat, I had mine, and things were heading to what it seemed a normal relationship, one of us had to travel out of town, even worse: out of the country. Unfortunately, for me and for both, it was him, Eduardo, the chef. Not me.

He went to Bogotá, until last year “my city”. One of those boring, endless, lonely days, I decided to go out with my friends and “just hang out”. Well, it turned out to be more than just hanging out.

Raphael, a French guy, decided to make his move. A move he perfectly did, so in two weeks –don’t forget: boring, endless, lonely- my feelings changed and a new fire was starting inside of me. So, I began to wonder: if fire gets closer… are we willing to play with fire even if we were not looking for “it” in the first place? The thing was that this guy was everything Eduardo was not.

By the time I started reacting positively to his charming behavior I asked myself about my strong emotional reactions. Were they part of a hyperactive state? Or could it be that maybe I was responding to recent comparisons?

Suddenly I was having two relationships. It was not my dreamed version of relationships, but one thing was clear, I was OK with it. Raphael was OK with it too, or so he seemed. Eduardo had no idea.

Everything seemed to be OK. I was celebrating my 5th month in Peru and my 5th year of work. I had two relationships. However, it was easy to know things were going to get messy when Raphael decided to leave his toothbrush next to mine and Eduardo’s.

Next chapter: "Once you cross the door, you will never come back”.