One of my favorite songs is “I’d Find You Anywhere” by Creative Source. It was made popular by Kanye West who sampled it and looped it up for The Game’s ode to video hoes “Wouldn’t Get Far” which was a riveting and compelling look into the souls of women without a voice and chance to share their platform for…

…what the f*ck am I talking about. They’re video hoes.

Anyway, the lyrics to “I’d Find You Anywhere” are lovely until you really dig into them and place them into 2011 context. It’s a song that basically states that no matter what, this lady would find this man ANYWHERE. She’d track him down, like a bloodhound. And you know, in the mid 1970s, that probably sounded romantic. In 2011, that sounds like some straight up stalker sh*t. Imagine if your significant other called you and told you that they wanted to dedicate a song to you and it was this song. You wouldn’t feel special, you’d be out here trying to hide your kids and your wife. ANTOINE DODSON LIVES!

Change has come as times they been a changin’. Things that used to be considered sweet and thoughtful now come along with a side-eye, a tweet, a Facebook public shaming, and a possible website created strictly to document lameness. Really, I blame women for this. Ever since the advent of dontdatehimgirl.com and the relative ease of putting folks on blast (a female sport when emotions get involved…shake something), men are second guessing themselves faster than a white woman at Black relationship forum being sponsored by a bunch of loc’d up AKAs. I’d assume women might be too, but generally, the onus falls upon men to be romantic and provide the woo-woo-woo-woo to tickle your fancy and help you chase waterfalls.

Well, here are some other formerly romantic overtures that might catch the side-eye from the ladies…

(Sidenote: I acknowledge that all of this is contingent on how interested the woman is in the man.)

1) Flowers on the doorstep

I’ve done this a time or two. Copped some really pretty petals and placed them at a woman’s door so she’d have them first thing in the morning. That used to be A+ game. Now, it’s stalker activity on some stage 5 potential murderer steez. And do you know why? It’s because it means dude was out in front of your house. Moving like the “g” in lasagna. In silence. I’ve had a chick tell me that some cat did that to her and it totally weirded her out. She’s still single by the way. Not sure if there’s any correlation but I wouldn’t be surprised.

And a close cousin to the flowers…

2) Cards in the windshield

You know how sometimes you just want to do something nice for somebody? Well a card goes a long way because women like written words. It’s why rappers are so popular. And Scrabble. Ovaries like scrabble. Well, now imagine you put those words in a card you picked out and place it under the wiper…RED ALERT! ALARM! Who the f*ck is this, stalking me at 8:46 in the evening. Like the flowers though, the woman might not actually mind it and will think it’s cute til she talks to her one hater friend who reminds her that this cat was out there being creepy doing hoodrat things AT HER HOUSE.

3) Just calling to say hello

This one is tough. Mostly because who even talks to people anymore? I have friends who have v-mail greetings that say “leave me a text or email me because I won’t listen to this message”. Ten years ago, calling was the standard but now if you call too many times the chick/dude might think you’re being pressed. And being pressed dries up more thongs than Kenmore appliances. It goes from, “aww that’s nice” to, “why does this dude keep calling me? He doesn’t want nothing. He’s just saying hello.” Used to be sweet to be thought about. Now chicks tweet : #whydisdudekeepcallingme (translation: I’m going to be single forever…forever…ever.)

4) Surprise visits

Admittedly this one has generally always been frowned upon. You can’t just be showing up at folks homes unannounced unless that relationship is established. So perhaps we should move on to…

5) Running into somebody in public

Even if it ain’t on purpose and is TOTALLY accidental all of a sudden you end up looking like a straight up stalker. Here’s the thing….you know how you have a convo with somebody who tells you EVERYWHERE that they’re going to be. That could be construed as dropping hints. But then you show up and next thing you know your face is plastered on Facebook on its own AVOID THIS MAN AT ALL COSTS Fan page with the description: I told him where I was going to be and at what time AND DO YOU KNOW HE CAME?!? Loooooooser.

Confusing times.

BONUS:

New age stalker sh*t – reading somebody’s whole Twitter timeline or Facebook updates, etc.

But here’s the problem with this. Why WOULDN’T you read somebody’s whole timeline if you’re interested. Men and women alike straight MURDER their chances with some of the dumb sh*t that gets said on Twitter. But once you allude to something crazy they said, all of a sudden you look pressed and like a stalker. It’s a lose-lose so you might as well read it all just to make sure he/she isn’t publicly looking like a dumb*ss or a little TOO loose. Sometimes you gotta shake this. Just like an employer would be dumb NOT to look at a potential employee’s Facebook profile. If it’s public info, you might as well know. Johnnie Cochran game propa.

Does P speak the truth or is he wrong? Does vintage traditional romantic overturation still fly?

Is this all overthinking??

Talk to me.

-VSB P aka THE ARSONIST aka TANGLE JIG P aka PLYMOUTH RICO aka SHUGGIE JACKSON JR aka GIIIIIIIIIIIIRL HE A 3