Too bad love just doesn’t seem to pick me. It has tried, of course. Cupid has failingly sent his arrow in my direction on several occasions, only to barely graze the surface of my skin, consequently leaving a minute physical and emotional scar, left to plague me for the rest of my existence as a woman. Perhaps this is the only time in my life I will ever pray, God willing, that a fat baby will waltz in my direction and stab me, successfully, with a sharp object. No, Cupid was never too good at aiming that arrow. He often missed me, accidentally hitting the girl next to me in my English class and the woman who works out by me at the gym, as well as the guy who delivers my mail and even my dog, who recently fell in love with the cocker spaniel across the street. I can only assume that my keen reflexes have caused me to miss Cupid’s line of fire, leaving me to be surrounded by people who are in love. Yet, when it comes to me-nothing.

I blame it on Cupid.

That’s the easy thing to do, of course. It’s easier than blaming it on myself, even though the men I’ve dated have had no problem moving on without so much as a decent face-to-face goodbye. I never did understand why the good girls get burned.

In my first true brush with Cupid’s arrow, I fell in love with my high school sweetheart. After two years, we planned the fairytale wedding and the fairytale life with the fairytale “Happily Ever After” as our ending. At a na’ve age of 18, I did the one thing all teenagers’ parents have nightmares about their children doing-I got married and moved out of the state. Little did I know at the time, as I was planning to follow my Air Force prince to his assigned military base, I would be settling down in the not-so-fairytale-like city of Anchorage, Alaska. If not for the sake of the two five-story malls that graced the streets of this bitterly-cold dark crack in the earth, I would have driven myself insane much sooner than anticipated.

It was not long after I put on my big-girl pants, flew across the country and embraced wifehood that I realized I was in the middle of nowhere merely coexisting with someone who was now a stranger to me.

I’ve forgotten the psychobabble that suggests couples should wait until after marriage to move in together. Sometimes, at that point, it’s too late. The joy of purchasing that first house, picking out flower-patterned wallpaper and deciding whether to get a joint checking account could be just as appreciated by committed, promising couples without rings on their fingers. But this, of course, is just my opinion.

Don’t get me wrong-I still believe that it is not until you live with a person that you can truly appreciate his or her presence. But I have learned from experience that it is with that level of commitment you may also come to realize that you are living with a pig-a person that physically appears to be a grown man but somehow has regressed back to his childhood ways, whining when he is hungry and complaining when “playtime” is not occurring as frequently as it should according to some unofficial man-o-meter embedded in his suddenly overactive libido. Although sex remains a priority on many females’ repertoires, a woman likes to be reminded she is a wife, not some unattainable pornographic fantasy.

Despite the awkward stares across the dining room table and the silent treatment at bedtime, I still fulfilled my duties as a military trophy wife. As I grew accustomed to this lifestyle, relying on my toy poodle as my only source of companionship, I grew more homesick, more lost and more resentful. I had always been an independent woman focused on academics and the future, and there I was-a doormat-leaving my dreams and goals behind to live my life for, and vicariously through, someone else.

And as I dug myself into this hole of solitude, instead of giving me a helping hand out of the pit, my husband essentially handed me a shovel and told me to keep on digging. If I cried, he grew frustrated. If we fought, he didn’t care. And I began not to care, either, as the distance between the two of us grew and the hole became a crater. Part of me knew what was coming next; so it was no surprise to find he was spending his nights “working” on something other than jets and engines.

Sometimes, shoes and chardonnay-or whatever your guilty pleasures might be-aren’t enough to fix a problem or right a wrong. Sometimes, we have to stop living in a fantasy world and handle things head-on. When most women find themselves in a situation like mine, they can only do one of two things-run or hide. Obviously, some (as they probably should) walk away immediately and never look back. If only it were that easy.

Others stay, hoping for change, hiding under a smile and a laugh and trying to glue pieces back together that just don’t fit quite right anymore. Then, they scratch their heads wondering what happened because they remember the pieces fitting perfectly before they fell apart. And before they know it, they have become the “other woman,” left trying to convince their partners to stay with them and make it work.

And for women like me who choose to hide, only to find that they remain in the same deep hole, after a while, it no longer becomes his fault that he lies, cheats and manipulates them into thinking he is more of a man than he really is. It becomes the woman’s fault for letting him do those things. Women are strong beings-stronger than most realize. And when they see the road they’re taking is leading off a cliff, the smartest thing to do is turn around. Trust me-the cliff isn’t budging.

The truth is, in some relationships, there comes a day that you wake up, look at that person and wonder who he is. And you realize somewhere after “hello” and “I love you” you lost it. You fight more than you laugh. You cry more than you smile. And you want to sleep as late as humanly possible so that you don’t have to be awake for as long because the days are that hard. He looks at you differently, holds you carelessly, smiles that empty smile and says those empty words. It makes the love you once had seem like a dream, like it never happened. And you think to yourself, maybe it would be better if it hadn’t.

Worst of all, you hold on as long as you can, until your fingers go numb and your heart breaks into even more pieces, hoping that maybe you’ll say something or do something that will make it all okay. All the while, you know deep down it won’t work. You know you deserve better. And you know that after all the things he said and did, you should have walked away a long time ago. You should have turned your shoulder when he came running back. You should have let him hurt the way he made you hurt.

But one day, you find that the days aren’t so long. The nights aren’t so lonely. And you begin to smile, laugh and look forward to things that you never used to. You realize, most of all, that you are moving on. You’ve dealt with the heartache, accepted the pain and let go of the past. Some people are meant to have your heart forever. Others are simply meant to take you to where you need to be.

Thus, I don’t cry because I lost. Or hate because I can. I smile because I’m where I’m supposed to be. And I’m thankful because he took me here.

So it only took me a few months to pack my bags and buy a one-way ticket back to reality. It only took a few weeks for me to file for divorce. And it only took a few days for Cupid to find me again…