The Line

Every solo person who is dissatisfied with their single status harnesses the dangerous potential to hate the sex of the people they want to be with. In some cases that line is crossed without the single even knowing it, and it only adds to their misery. How can someone like you when you hate them before you even start? For that matter how can someone like you if you don't like yourself?

I see this in a lot of blogs by men who feel they have trouble with women. I am in no way saying women are free of fault, there are plenty out there who seem mean and shallow, just as there are many men of the same, but everything is relative is it not? Everyone seems to want something different from the people they are with and it all hinges on what ‘makes them happy’. I suppose that’s the one common goal we all have, the only differences are in our means to get it. Actions by a really great person can be simultaneously interpreted as bitchy by one, as courageous by another, etc.

You can never know how you really stand in someone else’s eyes. The best you can do is be ok with yourself. That said, I never want to look like the bad guy. I don't even want to think that I may have done something to make someone possibly dislike me. It makes me feel terrible. (Though if they dislike me for something I don't feel is my fault, fuck 'em.)

I don’t know what my problem is. I don’t hate men. If I cross that line now it would be based on what I’ve heard and not what I’ve experienced, and that’s a pretty short sighted way to live. I know this. I do find myself making sweeping generalizations about them, but a lot of that is due to making excuses for not dating and idly if not ignorantly repeating what I’ve heard other women in long-term relationships say.

Maybe I’m afraid of dating because I might end up crossing that line? That’s just silly.
Maybe I’m afraid because I’ll end up hating myself? That sounds more like it. No one can point out my short comings better than me, and knowing that my standards are high coupled with needing the spark foreshadow having to feel guilty about blowing guys off for no other reason than my own desire to find the one and not bother with any others.

It’s all so energy and time consuming. That right there probably marks me as either being selfish or just not ready to be in a relationship. I’m not sure I believe either of those things. I just want to skip the whole get to you know you part, and fall right into the comfort zone. That said it would be really weird to just meet someone and have him come over, eat my cookies, throw his socks on my floor and goose me when I did the dishes.

Maybe it’s that I feel spread thin right now and don’t have the energy to devote to one more thing, albeit my actual personal life. I’m trying like mad to get a new job because the present one is dragging me down! Spending my days trying not to be dragged down is exhausting in itself, but dealing with the treatment from my superiors when it gets politically bad is absolutely infuriating, and only adds to the exhaustion.

Then there are the creative projects I hold dear to my heart but can’t pour myself into due to the above. It’s such a ridiculous cycle considering life is what you make it. If I must drag my ass to work I might as well do it with a smile, it makes things more pleasant for me and other co-workers who I actually like. Of course there’s the distinct possibility that yet again I’m just justifying my four year theory. However, none of that extends my actual day to give me time to do all I want to do. (Plus I am undisciplined, reading blogs and watching tv instead of writing, composing and creating. Death to these evil distractions!)

Can the right man for me please step forward and render this all moot? I know there’s more than one of you out there. Where are you?