Manless

So recently, while playing the sims and making an AI me a very happy woman by marrying and having a happy life and big family, I decided that I am more than happy with my AI self created man.  More so than I think I would be with a real man.

I don't understand men at all.  Just like they say they don't understand women, I don't understand them.  I kinda understand my ex husband but I think that it more familiarity with his routines and thought patterns than with him as a man.  If I lived with anyone for almost ten year like I did with him, I would know them almost inside and out as well.  So no, not as a man, just as a person.

I have realized that the male population of Charlotte, NC perceives something wrong with me.  Maybe I talk too much or maybe I don't talk enough.  Maybe I'm too fat for them, maybe I'm too black for them.  I don't know and frankly, right now... I don't care.

One, I will always be a little or significantly overweight. I do not come from a family of thin or even slightly overweight women.  Every single woman on my moms side and those we know on my father's side had a little more weight than people with medical degrees deem healthy.  To that, I just want to point out to no one in particular, the women in my family tend to live very long lives so our weight and lack of twigness is NOT a hinderance to anyone in the Foriest or the Wilson family.  The only way I will ever be one of those anorexic, malnourished stick figures that guys drool over now is with extreme plastic surgery and or liposuction and I don't want either.  I like looking like I know how to throw down in a kitchen.

As for the second, me talking... I don't have a lot of experience talking to men.  I can talk online, I can text, but I cannot talk on the phone or in person for hours on end.  I cannot talk about myself like some of these vapid females out here.  I don't understand how men can sit and listen to a girl talk about every single little thing in her life.  I am personally much more comfortable listening.  Not just to guys.  I just prefer to listen.  I always have.  When guys make me talk about myself, I stumble and stammer and find myself at a loss for words because I have nothing to say about myself.  Now give me a good topic to debate on and I can talk up a storm.  Ask me about baking, I can talk your ear off.  Music, books, writing, jewelry making I can talk about.  Ask me to talk about myself and we have a problem so if that's what men are judging me by, screw that.  I might as well accept singlehood forever cause I will never be one of those girls.

I have found that some guys think that my closeness to my mother is a problem.  We are closer than a lot of mothers and daughters but one thing that guys need to understand, is that aside from my kids, my mother and my father are all I have left.  My mother raised me by herself from the time I was six years old.  She is my hero and I would love to be just like her in some senses. She and my kids usually are the most prominent things on my mind.  Give me a reason to put your on that list.  Don't just assume that there's no way you'd make that list.

I've had something with a total of four men here in Charlotte.  The first was a total flake.  He had looks going for him and absolutely nothing else.  The second didn't have looks but he had conversation.  He literally had me walking on clouds by just talking to me.  He unfortunately screwed everything when he expected me to come to his house for a quickie and lunch before I really knew him like that.  The third guy here had a kind of trifecta.  He had looks, he liked to play rock band, and he was good in bed.  Unfortunately, he assumed that all I wanted from him was sex.  Again, talk to me, try to get to know me.  The fourth guy here I had less than anything with him.  I played my hand at the wrong time and stupidly let him know I liked him.  Like all men, he put that to his advantage and tested it.  I failed miserably for reasons that he never disclosed, really, and I made the choice to stop texting him because I had developed a crush and crushes are dangerous.  They give people power over you and when they simply aren't interested it only hurts more.  Mostly because you start to sit and examine yourself what could possibly be so wrong with you, that he won't even take a chance.

There is nothing wrong with me.  That is not saying that there is something wrong with the men around here, just that there is nothing wrong with me.

I have all the qualities that I admire in women:

1. I am a kickass mother.  My children regularly brag about me.  Yes I have a big head about it because I know that I am loved and that I have done something in the eyes of my children to deserve that.

2. I am a good daughter.  If my mother were to say that she wanted me to drop everything and be there, I may question why and maybe offer a solution that doesn't involve me running across town, but if she needed me, I would and am there in a heartbeat.

3. I am a moderately good Christian.  Yes, I cuss like a sailor when provoked and I ca hold a grudge like an old woman but I can also let go of it and pray for you.  There's no hands like God's hands and if I put my troubles in his hands, he will take them away.

4. I feel like I am a good friend.  I have friends that do nothing but call me to tell me about the shit in their lives and I listen.  I may or may not offer solutions but I listen.  When they finish venting on me they feel better.  I have friends that like me for me.  What they see I have no idea but they like me for me.  So I must be doing something right.

5. I am strong.  I have been through a lot and I'm still standing on my own two feet.  Yes, I have been committed once almost twice but I'm here and I'm doing my thing. Without behavioral drugs.  I have dealt with a person I promised to love before God cheating on me and hurting me in ways no one can imagine.  I have dealt with being raped, I have dealt with a child that treated me the way his father treated me, I have dealt with girlfriends of said ex that think I am inferior to them because the man they are sleeping with didn't want me. (insert Toni Braxton moment here... "Trick don't you know I had your man?  He wasn't man enough for me")  I have faced near death moments and looked my own end in the eye several times.  While I didn't laugh in the face of death, I did walk away stronger than I was when I stepped in front of him.

So if you don't feel like your time is well spent getting to know a woman that would more than likely be good for you, I really don't care anymore.  As far as I am concerned it is the loss of every guy out there that thinks I'm not worth it.  And I am better off without the drama of trying to prove I'm worth it.

So to that end I have officially stopped looking.  I have officially stopped expecting.  I have stopped hoping.  And I have stopped wanting it.

For years I promised myself... I won't turn 30 without being in a relationship... I won't let this Christmas pass without being in a relationship, I won't celebrate New Years without someone to kiss, I won't celebrate Valentine's Day without someone, I won't turn 31 without someone... I won't turn 32... 33...34...  35 is coming and I think I might save up and treat myself to a vacation by myself.  I will learn the most important thing a single female should know:  How to be okay by herself.

No more asking friends to set me up, no more thinking that the guy that smiled at me in food lion might want to talk to me, no more.

Just No more.