Having just gone through a breakup, and before that, a period during which I was not broken up, but rejected constantly by the person I loved (note the PAST TENSE) I have been feeling a bit sad. Also a bit, um, h***y. Well, more than a bit.

But it’s more than hot sex that I crave. I want some luv! I want hugs! And kisses! And let’s just say that this entire overheated summer has been greatly lacking in the luv department.

Except, I must note, for my affection of my friends. I’ve had that kind of love (with an “o”) in abundance. But for the kind of luv you need when you’re down and out and want someone to hug you and kiss you for hours on end, there is really only one place to turn. And that is to a golden retriever.

Luckily, there is such an animal at my mother’s house in the Golden State, where I am now, and where, in two days, my younger (YOUNGER) sister will take her wedding vows and cement her disgustingly perfect relationship unto eternity.

But anyway, the dog (I’ll call him “Fluffy”) will lie with his head on my shoulder, gazing adoringly into my eyes, letting me hug him for as hard as I want, for as long as I want. Sometimes he will lie there with his eyes closed, unmoving and still, with his cold nose against my neck, the picture of devotion. Then, for no reason, he will look up, lick me, and wag his tail gently.

After that, he’ll put his head down on my chest, and wait for me to pet his big blonde head, and I know that for as long as I do, he’ll never, ever leave me (until he hears my mom putting food in his bowl). In fact, it will take a lot of muscle to finally get him off the bed when I’ve had enough luv for the moment.

It will be hard to leave Fluffy and go back to my beautiful but pet-less apartment (I lost my cat in the breakup). One can only hope that I will find a boy to give me some luv soon, or I might just have to settle for hot sex.

For some reason, and I have done this ever since I can remember, I’ll stake my whole life on a crush. I am not capable of having just a little crush. Unless I’m in a happy relationship, and then I’m surprisingly good at limiting myself to a little “ooh, he’s sexy,” or, maybe, “ooh, if I weren’t dating M. I would like to (go out with) (sleep with) Y.!” And then I happily go home with M. (Even though, unbeknownst to me, M. has just drunkenly confessed to Y. that he cheated on me and wants to dump me because he now believes he is God’s gift to women, but that’s a whole different story).

But if I’m single, no such luck. In the course of one workday or one evening, my whole world can (and does, quite often) get turned upside down. “Oh my GOD,” I think, as I toss and turn in bed, “I REALLY like him. He REALLY likes me. We are SO meant for each other! I have NEVER felt this way before! I have NEVER met anyone like him before!” These fevered thoughts are based on one conversation or one look or some “profound” feeling in my soul that is probably just the result of too much tequila.

Then, for a day, or a week, or a month – however long it takes my daydream to crash and burn, I lose whatever serenity I may have accrued since the last crush. Suddenly Z. becomes the ONLY man I can ever love–even though I might have met him only two days ago, even though two days ago, I felt exactly the same way about W., until he failed to return my e-mail (but maybe his e-mail isn’t working?); even though two months ago, I was in the process of getting dumped by M. and thinking I would never, ever be attracted to any one else again for the rest of my pathetic, lonely life.

Once I’m actually in love, a different set of blinders goes on. “Ooh, so you don’t speak to anyone in your family, and you’re extremely moody, and have been on antidepressants for five years completely unsupervised – but that’s OK! It doesn’t mean anything!” I lose all perspective and feel like this must work out at all costs or my life will become a lonely, living Hell. Even when I realize, deep down, that something is wrong, I hold on with a death grip until the bitter end until I (at least in recent years) end up getting dumped. When I should be the one doing the dumping!

So now that I’m a single girl let loose once again upon the world of men, the crush roller coaster is beginning. I can’t seem to stay off this ride no matter how dumped I get. All I can do is fasten my seatbelt and hope that maybe, somewhere inside, I’ve learned something that will keep me safer this time.

One day I’m going to be a famous writer and every boy who’s ever wronged me is going to regret it. There’ll I’ll be on the back of my book, gazing out at the world with soft yet cynical brown eyes, my long hair just the slightest bit windblown, looking unbearably brilliant, beautiful, and rich.

Trying to escape from their own sordid lives, which will have sadly gone to hell since they dumped me, they will stumble upon my fame and fortune in a variety of painful ways.

There is Josh, for example, the rock-climbing counselor I met at summer camp the summer I was 22, who effectively ended my childhood by breaking my heart open like a piñata and leaving the candy to rot in the sun.

Josh will be killing time in his squalid apartment one afternoon, before heading off to his janitorial job, and, quite by accident, will see me appear on “Oprah.” I will be there with my soulmate Johnny Depp, and we will be sharing innermost feelings about being madly in love with someone as brilliant, beautiful, and rich as ourselves.
As Josh watches me toss my chestnut mane, charming Oprah and an adoring crowd, he will realize – in one of those life-changing epiphanies -- that he’s never forgotten me; couldn’t forget me if he tried, and that it was the biggest mistake of his life to dump me in such a brutal manner.

Though we haven’t talked in more than ten years, and there is no possible way he could have found my unlisted phone number, Josh will call me at two in the morning at the Montana ranch where Johnny and I spend our time when not in Los Angeles or New York, and tell me how he loves me still and that if I could just forgive him for dumping me like a carton of spoiled milk, he would follow me to the ends of the earth.

There will be silence for a moment, and I will stretch it out, because how many times have I hoped to hear him say this? And then,
“Josh,” I will say, and my voice won’t be trembling at all, despite the fact that until I became a famous writer and met Johnny Depp and became unbearably happy, I could not forget him no matter how hard I tried, “Please don’t ever call me again.”

And then I will hang up. I will go back to sleep with no regrets and Josh will never haunt my dreams again, where he had a habit of showing up to cast a shadow of loss just when everything was going wrong.

My bold proclamation will break Josh’s heart so completely that he’ll never be able to love again. Instead, he’ll spend the rest of his days as a Unabomber-style hermit, venturing into civilization only to buy each of my novels as they come out. Josh will spend the next two years in his dilapidated shack, staring grief-stricken at my smiling photo on the book jacket, until the next novel comes out, with an even more glamorous photo. He will read each book obsessively, over and over again, searching for references to him as the one great love of my life.

But they won’t be there, of course.