What Would Elizabeth Bennet Do?

I'm going to ask myself that every time I find myself getting all worked up over a male. My friend Anne and I went to see Pride and Prejudice this afternoon, and I was reminded as to why she is one of my favorite literary heroines (even though this movie didn't hold a candle to the A&E version). Elizabeth is sure and certain of herself and doesn't waste her time wondering what others (men) think of her. She has her principles and values and and holds true to them. It is this quality that makes her stand out from all other women and attracts Mr. Darcy to her.

I went on my second Match.com date last night. J2 and I are definitely NOT a match. We didn't have anything in common, and he talked about his parents a little too much (I found out he still lives at home--big red flag in my book). He doesn't drink at all (we met for coffee and he ended up ordering orange juice mixed with pineapple juice???), so I found myself starting to talk more and more about alcohol and drunken escapades as the night went on. I was trying to make myself seem as incompatible with him as possible so I wouldn't have to hurt his feelings.

I e-mailed J1 yesterday to thank him for our date on Wednesday, but I haven't heard back from him yet. I really enjoyed talking with him and would like to see him again, but I'm not going to worry about it. If he doesn't write me back, then he's not worth my time. (How very Elizabeth Bennet-like of me!)

I hate to admit it, but I'm very excited about my date with P on Sunday. He and I have been e-mailing a lot, and I just get a good vibe. I'm trying so hard not to get my hopes up, though, because I don't want to be disappointed if he ends up canceling on me or something. I'm such a pessimist that I always consider that possibility.

On a side note, I just found out that K is coming to Amber's New Year's Eve party tomorrow night. Wonderful. He's coming after the wedding I was supposed to attend with him. Hopefully I'll be good and drunk by then (and looking absolutely gorgeous and flirting with Amber's hot neighbor). Okay, that's not very Elizabeth Bennet-like behavior.

Now I must go and get ready for tonight. I'm taking my friend Kristen out for her birthday. We're going to get all dressed up and go to SushiSamba. There's nothing like getting all dressed up to make you feel good about yourself.

So Many Men, So Little Time!

It's 12:32 a.m. I just got home from my first Match.com date.

Tonight it was J1 (I have to call him that because there are two J's). We went to a wine bar and had a great discussion. He's an MBA but is actually not a Republican! I didn't know these types of people existed! We spent three hours (and drank three glasses of wine) talking about my favorite topics of discussion--politics and religion. He was also very nice and polite. When I arrived, he stood up and gave me a kiss on the cheek. He also drove me home and gave me another kiss on the cheek.The verdict is: defintely want to see him again!

I have a date with J2 tomorrow night. We're meeting for coffee (he's the guy who doesn't drink). On New Year's Eve, I'm meeting my friend Amber's "hot" neighbor at her party, and on Sunday, I have a date with P1.

I'm also in e-mail negotiations with two other prospects--T and P2. I think I'm beginning to really like Match.com!

I'm So Borrrrrrrred!

Okay--I'm in a better mood today. Drinking three glasses of wine and dancing around your room to the remix version of Gwen Stefani's "Hollaback Girl" while your cats stare at you like you're insane is a good cure for depression.

I'm one of the only people in the office today, and I'm so bored, so I figured it was time to add to Holly's suggested list of books for a "single man" category on Amazon.com:

1) MANners: A Book of Etiquette for Single Men [LARGE PRINT EDITION] by Alyce Derian
Simple guidelines ranging from grooming, to where to meet women, to "under the covers" etiquette [as in FOREPLAY--take a hint, K!].

2) Mothers, Sons, and Lovers: How a Man's Relationship with His Mother Affects the Rest of His Life by Michael Gurian
Discusses the troubled relationships that result when men do not adequately separate from their mothers and fail to move into "manhood" [Ohhhh--is THAT the problem with all my past boyfriends?].

3) Other Men's Wives by Freddie Lee Johnson
Man receives "mysterious DVD" that shows his wife having sex with an unidentifiable man and suspects that it is one of his two best friends [Okay guys, see how that would make YOU feel!].

4) The Wimp Factor: Gender Gaps, Holy Wars, and the Politics of Anxious Masculinity by Stephen J. Ducat
An exploration of how male anxiety has come to define our political culture [Two prime examples--our very own federal government and the Catholic Church]

5) Housebroken: Confessions of a Stay at Home Dad by Davie Eddie
The guide to fatherhood in the post-feminist age [a.k.a. "now it's your turn!"]

Any other suggestions out there?

An Addendum

I had one single message on my answering machine when I got home this afternoon:

>>[Male voice] Hi. . . uhhh. . . you sound pretty sexy, but I think I have the wrong number. . .

I don't know whether I should be depressed that the only message I received was a wrong number or flattered that a complete stranger thinks I have a sexy voice.

Post-Holiday Depression

It's the day after Christmas, and I'm back in the city. I feel depressed, and I wish I didn't, because the cause of my depression is someone else's happiness.

This afternoon I visited with a childhood friend of mine and her new baby daughter. She just seemed so happy--she has a wonderful husband who is truly her best friend, and her daughter was just adorable. I could see how much she loves that little baby and how she brings so much joy into her life. I am so happy for her but also so envious.

Then I found out that one of my cousins got engaged last night. Her fiance is also a wonderful person, and I'm thrilled for both of them, but of course, I'm also envious.

I feel like I've spent most of my twenties struggling with who I am and who I want to be. Do I want to be the successful career woman? Do I want to be Super Mom? Do I want to be completely free and independent--able to fly to another continent at a moment's notice? Do I want to give up a little of that independence for the security and responsibility of having someone else in my life?

I'd like to think that I've come closer and closer to the answer as I've grown older and learned from past experiences. And I think I've got it partially figured out--I just want to be happy.

I think I spend so much time thinking about what choices and decisions would be best for me that I forget to consider whether or not these choices and decisions make me happy.

So what do I want?

I want to meet someone who I think is extremely wonderful and who treats me with pure love and respect. And if I ever do meet this person, I do want to start a family with him. I don't want to completely give up working to raise my children, but I also don't care about being the publisher or vice-president of a company. I just want to keep writing and editing because it makes me happy.

I know that there are so many other women out there like me who feel the same way, and I sometimes wonder, "What is it that distinguishes those of us who have such difficulty finding that life partner from those who seem to have no trouble at all?" Is it just pure Darwinism, as in "you are not a prime candidate for reproduction, therefore you will not find yourself in that situation"? Or is it that our "other half," to quote Aristophanes in Plato's "Symposium," was just randomly placed farther away from some than from others?

Who knows? All I know is that I feel lonely and I hate myself for the fact that I feel lonely because I shouldn't. I have an amazing family, two loving cats, and wonderful friends all over the globe. Shouldn't that be enough?

I just can't help feeling like something is missing and I won't be totally and completely fulfilled until I find it.

Words of Wisdom

1) If you need mini-muffin pan liners for your holiday baking, you should buy them in October. Otherwise you could end up spending four hours searching for them and coming home empty-handed.

2) When you go to put on your lip-liner in the morning, make sure it's your lip-liner and not brown eyeliner.

Coming soon...an addition to Holly's list of books for the single man!

Eeek! I Want a Companion, Not a Slave!

I logged onto Match.com today to find the following message from a prospective suitor:

>>>Morning.

>>>I read your profile and found that you have many of the qualities I am searching for in a woman. Pretty, smart, and funny. What I am looking for is woman who does not mind a guy that wants to pamper her... pay for manicures, pedicures, and do things around the house for her. It is critical to me that a woman be treated like a Princess and I will go the extra mile or 10 to see that it is done that way.

>>>Over time I am looking for a woman who will make me do all the housework and give me the pleasure of paying some of her bills. I know this is different but I find it highly exhilarating to do this for a beautiful woman.

>>>If interested drop me a line. :)

Okay--that scares me.

The World According to Amazon.com

Attention fellow single ladies (if there are any more out there)!

Just when you thought you were doomed to a life of unintentional anonymity, of being a social wallflower, of constantly being overlooked in the world of coupledom--salvation comes in the form of a new subject category on Amazon.com:

Books> Subjects> Literature & Fiction> Women's Fiction> Single Women

Now is that a sign of achievement and importance, or what? How can you be considered obsolete when you're an entire category on one of the most successful commercial Web sites in the world?

Out of curiousity, I took a look at some of the best-selling titles in this subject, and (along with the two Bridget Jones books, of course) here's what I found:

Undead and Unreturnable by MaryJanice Davidson
This book seems to be about a high-maintenance single female vampire (I guess there are divas in the supernatural world, too). Didn't seem worth reading (though I guess I wouldn't mind taking a chunk out of the necks of a few past boyfriends).

Diary of a Mad Bride by Laura Wolf
About a woman planning her elaborate wedding. (Okay--doesn't this defeat the purpose of the SINGLE women category?)

The Girlfriend Curse by Valerie Frankel
About a girl who always seems to be the "last girlfriend"--the one who makes the guy really understand and appreciate women so he can go on to shower this newfound knowledge not on her, but on the next girlfriend, who he ends up marrying. (Holy crap! How did Ms. Frankel end up writing my life story? I might actually have to read this one.)

Something Borrowed by Emily Griffin
Nice girl has outgoing best friend. Best friend is engaged to hunk. Nice girl ends up sleeping with best friend's hunk and realizes that he is the "only" man for her. (Whatever happened to female solidarity?)

So, if I characterize my single self according to Amazon.com, I must be a blood-sucking, wedding-obsessed, "always a bridesmaid" nice girl who secretly lusts after her best friend's man and is willing to destroy the friendship to get him.

Not a pretty picture, is it? No wonder I have such horrible relationship karma.

Tidbits

Sooooo sleepy right now. I've been on the Internet all day looking for an article on school spirit/pride that was written by an African American or Hispanic/Latino female (darn state textbook committees and their ethnic count regulations!).

This weekend I went out to dinner with my friend Emily, who was actually a summer intern at my old company. While she was there, she ended up helping me out by updating website content for me after I gave her a brief lesson in the basics of HTML. When we were at dinner, she told me that the work she did for me led to an interest in website development, so she switched her major from business to information systems management. She is graduating in the spring and already has a great job lined up in her new field.

I suddenly came to the realization that I had influenced someone's life in a positive manner--that definitely made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside!

Yesterday I attended a staff meeting for Chicago Dance Magazine, a new publication I'm doing some writing for. I also received copies of the first issue with my first article--I love seeing my name in print, even though I'm not sure I agreed with all of the editor's changes. I've decided to get back into ballroom dancing, which I did in college, so I'm going to be the magazine's resident ballroom expert. I start lessons in January and I'm just praying that I won't be the only single person there.

Last night I had my first phone conversation resulting from my adventures on Match.com. The guy seemed pretty friendly and outgoing. We had a nice conversation and are going to go out sometime after Christmas. The only thing I'm concerned about is the fact that on his profile, he chose the option "I don't drink alcohol." What does that mean? Is he an alcoholic? Does he abstain for religious reasons? What normal 29-year-old guy wouldn't indulge in an occasional drink? I'm not looking for a lush or anything--I just really enjoy drinking wine in a social setting and am not really sure how I should act when we do go out.

Of course, he contacted me, and I'm assuming he read my entire profile in which I repeatedly mention my love of wine, so hopefully he won't have any issues with that. I just think it's kind of odd.

Just Your Typical Wednesday Morning

Sometimes I have to agree with a comment my father once made about me: “How can such a smart girl be so stupid at times?” (Note: this was after I decided that wax paper would be a good substitute for parchment paper and smoked up our entire kitchen when I put it in the oven.)

Well, this morning I got to work and went about my usual routine of pouring a cup of coffee and making a bowl of instant oatmeal. While waiting for the oatmeal, I opened the refrigerator and pulled out a quart of half-and-half to add to my coffee. For some reason, I decided to shake it.

Note to self: Make sure top is screwed on before shaking half-and-half bottle.

As you may have guessed by now, half-and-half spilled all over me and all over the floor.

While I was cleaning that mess up, I started to notice a terrible burning smell coming from the microwave. I ran over to it, opened it, and proceeded to let a HUGE cloud of smoke out into the room.

Second note to self: Make sure you add water to instant oatmeal before heating it in the microwave.

Now I had half-and-half all over the place and I was frantically waving my arms trying to dissipate the white haze that had engulfed the office kitchen.

At this point, the stench had wafted into my coworkers’ offices, and a bunch of them came down to the kitchen to see what was going on. My boss was one of them, and I’m sure she’s probably wondering why on earth she hired me. Luckily, everyone here has a sense of humor, so I just ended up getting a bunch of laughs.

But one thing I didn’t get was breakfast. So now I’m starving.

Friday Night

I was supposed to go to a friend's party tonight, but due to the fact that there's seven inches of snow on the ground, I decided to stay home. As tempting as it was, I tore myself away from my computer (and Match.com), and had what I can only describe as a multicultural night: ordering takeout from Chinalite (I think the delivery guy missed me over my past few months of coupledom), drinking an entire bottle of New Zealand Sauvingon Blanc (it's kind of hard to spell right now), and watching the movie Under the Tuscan Sun (courtesy of my new friend Netflix).

Now I have a burning desire to jump on a plane to Italy, buy a villa, and start a career as a freelance writer.

I've also been doing some thinking (as most of us are wont to do when faced with an evening alone). I've decided that the thing that bothers me most about the whole K situation is the fact that he broke up with me instead of vice versa. I think the fact that I didn't feel a spark at first and gave him the benefit of the doubt made me think that he couldn't turn the tables on me. I also think that I'm mourning the loss of that feeling of companionship--of always having automatic plans on Friday and Saturday nights. Maybe in the end his intimacy issues would have driven me away, but for now, at least I got the benefit of being part of a couple.

I know that you need to be happy within yourself before you can find happiness with someone else, and I was that way before I started dating K. I think I just got a brief taste of the good aspects of a relationship, and it was snatched away before I had a chance to experience any of its faults. I think I thought that after my horrible breakup with S (the boyfriend who got engaged to his cousin's ex-girlfriend five months after our 2 1/2 year relationship ended), I was finally getting the nice, normal relationship I deserved.

I just guessed wrong.

When I opened my fortune cookie tonight, I was greeted with the message "Wise men learn more from fools than fools from the wise."

I wonder if I'm supposed to be the wise man or the fool?

The Bathroom Is Determined by the Gender of the Parent. . .

. . . NOT the gender of the child!

Earlier this afternoon, I left my office suite and went down the hall to pee. I was going about my business when the door opened, and someone walked in with a talkative little girl. The person began to change the her diaper and talk to her.

That's when I realized the person was a man!

Now even if this person couldn't read, there are symbols on the doors that ANYONE can understand! I didn't know what to do, so I sat there for approximately 10 minutes, waiting for him to finish up and get out of there.

How awkward!

Empty Vessels Make the Loudest Sounds

I am pissed with a capital P! This past weekend I was baking cookies with my friend Amber, who introduced me to K. She informed me that the weekend I was in Pittsburgh, her fiance had K and some other buddies over to play poker. Apparently K went on and on about how he "gave it to me good" when we were dating.

NOT!

I cannot believe that he could be so immature and juvenile! Isn't that something guys do when they're insecure and in high school?

As a matter of fact, I suspect that he may have major inadequacies in that area, so he should be the last one boasting.

Plus, it makes me realize how he really couldn't have cared that much for me, roses regardless. No mature male talks locker room trash talk about a woman he really cares about.

Amber assured me that her fiance and the other guys saw right through his bravado, and I made sure Amber knew he was full of shit.

I despise him.

FedEx and the City

Nicely-decorated apartments, nights out on the town, designer clothing, long weekend brunches--the women of Sex and the City make the single life seem so glamorous and exciting. It’s almost as if the unavoidable pitfalls associated with singledom don’t exist. Why don’t we ever see Carrie Bradshaw and co. struggling to lug huge packages up their brownstone steps, trying install (or uninstall) air conditioners without accidentally pushing them out the window, or spending lonely Friday nights trying to assemble furniture from IKEA?

Last Sunday, I brought a huge box containing an unassembled storage cabinet down from my parents’ house in the suburbs. I had to have it sent there because there's no one around to accept a FedEx delivery at my condo, and I'd have to drive out to the suburbs anyway to pick it up after the three "unsuccessful" delivery attempts. K was supposed to help me get it the day he broke up with me, and my parents couldn’t help me out until this weekend, so I stubbornly decided I’d do it myself. My dad helped me put it in my trunk, and with the two of us lifting it, it seemed relatively light, so I thought I could ignore my mom’s warning about back injuries and get it from the car to my living room by myself. I parked my car (illegally, of course) in front of my building, turned on the hazards (a Chicago sign for "don’t tow me, please—I’ll only be here for a few minutes"), and popped open the trunk. With a deep breath, I bent over the box and tried to lift it.

I couldn’t even get it off the bottom of the trunk.

Shit.

My next brilliant idea was to open the box and just go back and forth carrying up several pieces of the cabinet at a time. I made one trip up, balancing a few white pieces of pressed wood in my arms, and then, as if whoever was watching me up in the heavens wasn’t amused enough by my plight, the situation got worse. It started to snow.

I made two more trips back and forth, but now I was all wet with newly fallen snow and so were several batches of furniture parts. I decided that the box must be light enough for me to handle by now. I managed to heave it out of my trunk and then had to put it down on the ground in order to close the trunk. Big mistake--it takes a lot more leverage to lift something up from the ground then from a surface three feet higher. By this time, though, I was desperate to just get the entire box out of the snow and in to the entry way off the courtyard. I managed to use all my existing strength to carry the box from the curb and up the four brick steps to the courtyard entrance, where I had to put it down again to unlock the courtyard gate (darn safety measures!). When I tried to lift it again, though, my arm muscles just gave out on me. They literally started twitching. So then I tried to kick the box down the walkway. All I managed to do was stub my toe.

Cursing K the entire time, I bent over and started heaving my entire body against the box, slowly pushing it down the walkway. I saw several neighbors peeking out of windows at me, but do you think any of them volunteered to help? I’m sure they were greatly entertained by my situation--especially when I slipped on the wet snow and fell on top of the box.

After about 8 minutes, I managed to get the box to my entry way. Then I had to open a heavy door and heave the box inside. I still had one more door to unlock and open to get to the stairway and two flights to climb before I reached my condo, so at this point, I went back to process of carrying pieces up the stairs bit by bit until all I had left was a big empty box, which I am happy to say has now provided days of fun and entertainment for my two cats. At least someone appreciated my efforts.

So why don’t we see any of these types of scenarios on Sex and the City? Of course, if we did, Carrie would be wearing Manolo Blahniks instead of grubby running shoes, and a drop-dead gorgeous man would conveniently appear out of nowhere to help her. After which, the two would probably hit it off together and at least get to go on one nice date together before we learned that he had some weird fetish, or issues, or broke up with her on a Post-It note, or . . . .

Okay—maybe I’d rather carry the box all by myself and get hurt physically instead of emotionally.