Can we talk about this for a second?
You are sitting on your couch, staring at a text message from someone you recently started seeing. The message says something like, ‘Sorry I missed our plans, my plants seemed a little stressed today and I couldn’t leave them alone.’
Normally, this would be a glaring warning sign. You’d immediately tell your friends that this person is completely unreliable, possibly living in a different reality, and definitely not ready for any kind of healthy relationship. You’d write them off as a funny story to tell at brunch next weekend.
But then you remember how they looked in that green sweater last Thursday. You remember the way the light hit their eyes, the effortless way they ran their fingers through their hair, and how they laughed at your terrible joke. And suddenly, your brain goes to work, building a massive defense case out of absolutely nothing.
‘Well,’ you tell yourself, ‘it’s actually really sweet that they care so much about their houseplants. It shows a deep capacity for empathy. Most people are so disconnected from nature these days.’
Somehow, this always happens.
The Beautiful Story We Tell Ourselves
We all know how this ends, yet we do it anyway. It isn’t because we lack common sense. It’s because we’re naturally hopeful, and when someone is exceptionally good looking, our brains work overtime to make sure their personality matches their face. We want the beautiful picture to have a beautiful story behind it.
So, we invent little explanations. We create harmless excuses that feel completely reasonable in the moment, purely to keep the dream alive. When they show up forty minutes late to dinner, we don’t get annoyed. Instead, you convince yourself that they just operate on a more relaxed, artistic schedule than the rest of the busy world. We decide that their lateness is actually a sign that they don’t let the rush of modern life dictate their happiness.
At some point, it stops being about what they actually did and starts being about our own creativity. We find ourselves performing mental gymnastics that should earn us a gold medal, all to protect the idea that this attractive person is also a wonderful match.
The Friend Intervention
Eventually, the people who actually love us have to step in. Your friends, who are not blinded by a symmetrical jawline or a charming smile, start asking the obvious questions. They sit you down and say things like, ‘Are we sure it’s normal that they don’t own a bed frame? Or plates? Or a single towel that doesn’t have a giant hole in the middle?’
And instead of agreeing, you immediately jump to their defense with a level of passion usually reserved for courtroom dramas. You explain that they’re a minimalist. You tell your friends that they’re deeply committed to reducing clutter and living an intentional lifestyle, totally ignoring the fact that they sleep on a mattress on the floor next to three empty pizza boxes.
The funniest part is that deep down, you know the truth. You know that if someone you found completely average looking behaved this way, you’d have stopped replying to their messages weeks ago. If a person you had zero chemistry with told you they couldn’t make your dinner date because their weekly astrology reading advised against traveling east, you’d have laughed, blocked their number, and gone about your night. But because this person looks like they just stepped out of a magazine, you find yourself googling planetary alignments at midnight, wondering if maybe they have a point.
The Chemistry Curve
This is where the magic of attraction really takes over. When the chemistry is strong, our judgment becomes surprisingly generous. We look at a giant, bright red flag and somehow convince ourselves it’s actually just a festive banner celebrating how unique and interesting they are.
They tell you they haven’t spoken to any of their past partners in years because every single one of them was completely unstable. In any other context, you’d recognize that if everyone else is the problem, they might actually be the common denominator. But in the warmth of their smile, you tell yourself they’re just a sensitive soul who’s been repeatedly misunderstood by people who couldn’t appreciate them.
Five minutes later, you’re nodding along as they explain why they don’t believe in using turn signals because it ruins the mystery of where they are going. And for some reason, sitting in their passenger seat, this suddenly feels completely reasonable.
The Morning After the Spell Breaks
Of course, this illusion never lasts forever. Eventually, the spell breaks. It might happen when they forget your birthday, or when they refuse to help you move a couch because it disrupts their personal energy flow. Suddenly, you look at them and realize that the green sweater wasn’t actually doing that much work, and their excuses are just plain exhausting.
You look back at the conversations you had with your friends and wonder how you could’ve been so blind. You laugh at the fact that you spent three weeks defending someone who literally kept their clean clothes in a laundry basket in the bathtub because they didn’t believe in drawers.
But there’s no need to be too hard on yourself. We’ve all been there, standing in the kitchen, trying to explain to our roommates why our new favorite person is late because they had to help a squirrel cross the street. It’s just part of being people who want to believe in the best version of others.
So the next time you find yourself making up a highly complex, philosophical reason for why a very attractive person just sent you a text message consisting entirely of random symbols, take a deep breath. Smile at your own hopeful imagination. We all do this, and honestly, you’ll probably do it again next time someone with nice hair looks you in the eye and tells you a ridiculous story.
