There's an episode of How I Met Your Mother that is often cited as one of Ted Mosby's more romantic moments (and that's saying something because the guy literally stole a blue french horn for a girl on a first date during which he went on to tell her he loved her...ok, maybe creepy and romantic overlap with Ted Mosby). The episode in question is called "Drumroll, Please", and (spoilers) it centers on the meet-cute of Ted and Victoria, the pretty brown-haired girl with the alluring smile Ted meets at a wedding and goes on to have the most flirtatious, hopelessly romantic, almost-a-little-too-perfect night with. The one caveat to the perfection? Victoria makes Ted promise at the beginning of the evening not to pursue her once the night ends: no numbers, no goodbyes, no tomorrow.
Ok, so what does this have to do with The Bachelor? Well, to be perfectly honest, there are 22 contestants on the show right now. That means 22 names to remember and hey, names are hard, so yeah I give the ladies on The Bachelor nicknames, because that is really the only way in the early episodes of the season to remember the contestants well enough to be able to discuss them with all of your friends. Or your mom...No shame.
Naturally, Liz, drama queen of last night's episode and former fling of Nick at a wedding 9 months ago, was nicknamed Victoria. I mean come on, it matches up too perfectly! Liz met Nick Viall, the current bachelor and eye-candy of our hearts, at a wedding where they had a magical (and fantasy suite worthy) night together. At the end of the night, or more accurately the next morning (hey, hey, no judgement Liz! We all saw Nick's abs last night when he was in that little leafy speedo during the group date wedding photoshoot), Nick asked for Liz's number, she said no, and the rest, as they say, was (a lack of) history.
Flash forward to last night's episode, where everything came to a dramatic conclusion between Nick and Liz, during the second group date of the week to the Museum of Broken
Relationships. During the date, Nick and the ladies, Liz included, attended a symposium where random couples broke up with each other in front of an audience. Obviously, Nick had all the girls break up with him during the event, because what says "I wanna date you" better than forcing someone you've only been on one date with to break up with you?! Things got truly weird though when Liz's break up with Nick, in front of all the other contestants on the group date, consisted of Liz recounting exactly what had happened 9 months earlier at the wedding during which they had met. Liz's bizarre speech to Nick ended with her saying, "I hope that when you find the girl that you are willing to fight for, that you will fight for her in a way that I wish you would've fought for me, and in the way that every woman wishes she would be fought for." The whole "break up" was so odd and so...real that at the end of Liz's speech, even Nick himself wasn't sure if the two of them were still dating or not. The answer at the end of the night for Liz was unfortunately no, they weren't still dating, because honestly her speech was crazy and clearly made Nick feel very uncomfortable and probably a little ambushed as well.
However, even though Liz's way of confronting Nick was obviously the wrong approach, I couldn't help but feel for her as I watched the disastrous departure unfold. The truth is, I think we all yearn for a romantic moment like the one where Ted Mosby ignores the promise he made to Victoria and instead tracks her down, running into the bakery where she works and kissing her after she says, "Oh thank God." We all want to find someone who reads our mind and instinctually knows that when we say "I need space" knows to stay and fight for us instead. But in reality, how many times have most of us, like Liz did 9 months ago, pushed someone away rather than fought for what we were too afraid of or not quite certain about? Haven't we all wasted time running away from someone we should have fought for because "the timing wasn't right" or "things could go wrong" or we "didn't want to get hurt"? Come one, wouldn't life be so much easier if, instead of just hoping a guy or girl can read your mind and recognize when you're just being dramatic or playing games, you just stuck around instead of wasting your time running away?
Well, Liz learned the lesson too late when it came to Nick, and so he sent her home. But I can't help thinking that if she had just given Nick her number all those months ago, if she had been honest and actually tried to open up to him and pursue the connection, maybe Nick wouldn't be The Bachelor right now. Yes, maybe they weren't compatible and it was really just one night of fun, but if there's anything to be learned from last night's wedding-centric, drama of an episode, other than the fact that if you want the rose on the group date, you should take off your bikini top and let Nick hold your boobs "Janet Jackson" style (jk Corinne that was crazy), it's that if you want someone, you need to do something to keep them in your lives right now, not 9 months from now. If you want to be with someone, give them your number, make time to talk to them, or jump in a car and drive to them to show you care, because as the wise Ted Mosby once said, "when you find someone you want to keep around, you do something about it."
So here's hoping that Nick does heed the one nugget of sane advice Liz gave during her otherwise crazy speech: "I hope that when you find the girl that you are willing to fight for, that you will fight for her." Best of luck with all the fighting this season, Nick!