Hey, Hey, You, You!

Maybe I don't wanna be your girlfriend.

This weekend I got to see Mr. S again because the Missus went off to see her boytoy. Woo! I was happy to see him, and I always enjoy his company. But I don't like being taken for granted. See, he waited until late Saturday afternoon to suggest that we get together, evidently assuming that I had no plans for the evening. Grr!

He also brought up the girlfriend thing. Again. WTF? I don't see why he keeps doing this. He's never once asked my opinion or what I wanted out of things; we don't discuss or settle anything. He generally just makes a bunch of declarative statements "we are this" and "we're not that" and then on to the next topic. My ego would like to think that he's trying to convince himself as much as me that there's nothing emotional, but knowing men and their ability to compartmentalize I doubt it is the case.

This session included a slight deviation from the script, in that 1) he called me his best (female) friend and 2) he said he was attracted to me. His actual words were "you're pretty fuckin' hot too". Although definitely SQUEE!-worthy on its own, I find it somewhat bittersweet when the last compliment he gave me was Pretty Eyes. Last August.

Emotional Lottery on Mr. S: "Too bad you can't just have a legitimate normal relationship."

Heaven forfend.

Trying As Best I Can . . .

I have this theory about my life. I stole it from Newton, really, but that doesn't make it false. The theory goes like this: For every good thing that happens (to me), there is an equally worse bad thing about to happen (to me).

People sometimes call it paranoid, but it's never failed me yet.

In the back of my brain I've been percolating the idea of Chelsea Girl's SlutFest for a good long while now. Not so much the SexxySexx but the explicit self-permission to take what she needed. That is something that I have long struggled with: virtue, in my mind, is the absolute denial of what I want. Diets? Virtuous. Celibacy? Virtuous. Frugality? Virtuous. Frigidity? Virtuous. Because this pursuit of virtue is the textbook definition of neurotic (as well as completely unsuccessful) I decided to try indulgence for a while.

Cue good things.

+ I used Teh Intarwebs to find myself a cock to play with last week, attached to a guy I can more than tolerate. Although he is too much of a gentleman to say it outright (or perhaps just scared I will hurt him), I am 95% sure that his interest in me goes no farther than, "Pussy? Ok!" And although it is the exact opposite of the relationship that I want, it is better than Mr. S's mind games.

+ Speaking of which, I got to see him too. We had ourselves a nice little scene involving his belt (oh how I love that strip of leather!), restraint, and my face against the tread of the stairs. Hot stuff, I tell you.

+ Oh, and two days later I got to play with that cock guy again. Time to buy more condoms!

And the result:

* The Nexus of Evil reminds me painfully of its presence.

* My truck broke down. In the middle of the night. An hour from home. Tow cost? $250.

* My business was dealt two very nasty blows this week with the potential to sink me.

I am a simple creature, and Pavlov's behavior modification works well. I go out into the world, bad things happen; I keep to myself, nothing outright bad happens.

Now how am I supposed to go out again?

The Spinster Life

Argh! It is difficult to post anything when you can barely manage to get out of bed each morning. I had a hot little rendezvous with Mr. S almost two weeks ago now . . . That depression clamped down on me with a python's steady patience ever since has nothing to do with that. No, Siree.

I've been doing some high-quality rumination lately on what, exactly, I'm doing wrong in this life. While on one hand I am happy to take the righteous path and proclaim that I *do* like who I am and a pox on the people who don't . . . righteousness can't wrap its arms around me in the middle of the night and whisper that everything's going to be ok.

I am 28 years old and I have never had a boyfriend. Forget the pining and palpatations of True Love . . . Never have I known one of my sexual partners to even so much as look forward to my company. Yes, I am well aware of how sad that statement is.

Recently I stumbled across two articles that definitely have not helped my frame of mind. No, no, no.

In an article at The Root about dating, Kim McLarin says:

"I have yet to meet a man . . . over the age of forty who has never been married who is not broken in some serious and probably unfixable way . . . I don't mean damaged; we're all damaged: scratched up here, dented there, lumpy where the patch was made. No, I mean broken – or possibly just mal-manufactured on the assembly line."

Now, I'm a good ways from 40 yet. And I'm not a man. But I do think it's a fundamental truth that those of us who can't seem to have relationships *are* broken. I could be the poster child for mal-manufacture!

The other piece that makes me want to take a gun and shoot myself is this article on settling. Is that the only relationship I have to look forward to? No heart swells, no giddiness, no passionate sex . . . just someone who doesn't loathe me enough to kick me out of bed in the morning? I worry that she will be me in 15 years, although she suffers from Grass Is Always Greener more than I ever do. And despite recent cultural shifts, I think in the trenches there is still a special distaste (among men, in our culture, on this planet, take your pick) for women over 40 and having a child neither improves nor worsens the situation.

So I am reading this crap, and spelunking for my self-esteem ("in the toilet" would be a vast improvement ... I think it's sunk somewhere below the Earth's crust), and dealing with the No Emotions Zones (TM The Pervocracy) erected by the various men in my life, and . . .

And no wonder all I want to do is go back to bed.