“Have you met a man yet?”
The very question that makes any single woman’s eye roll.
We know it is well-meaning, we know offense is not meant.
But seriously, if I had found someone who made my heart set aflutter, you’d probably know about it.
My answers range from “no, its been that long that my vagina has grown over from lack of use.” This tends to end conversations quickly, as no one wants to discuss a hairy muff.
Or, “nope, I am now a celibate lesbian,” or “I’m just waiting for him to appear, on the edge of a rainbow with a pot of gold.!
The last two responses tend to involve people tilting their head in response and generating a sympathic clicking noise with their throat.
Frigging hate the sympathy tilt and click almost as much as the dreaded question….
To clarify.
I am single.
I am not “still” single.
I am just single.
Through choice?
Probably more through apathy. At 41 with a failed marriage and a couple of failed short term relationships behind me, I have come to accept that there are somethings I’m not that good at – being one of two seems to be high on that list.
Have I tried online?
Clearly,
I am a single parent, with three kids – to whom I morph into a taxi driver at 3pm until my shift ends at 8. I work from home, on my own. My interaction with the opposite sex is somewhat limited.
The bloke who works in the local Sainsburys is happily betrothed. The fella in the Co-Op always has food in his beard, and the Amazon man merely ditches and drops since that unfortunate incident with the dressing gown.
So yes, I’ve tried online.
However, most people tend to check their dating apps when on the toilet. The knowledge that my next potential suitor swiped right during a bowel movement tends to off put me off a little.
Wipe and swipe ain’t my thing.
Do I need a man?
Christ, yes – today I do – it has been a catalogue of disasters, the door handle fell off, the toilet flush snapped and the eldest child’s curtain pole fell out of the wall.
I am currently living in a house that has a door wedged open, a bucket by the loo, and a blanket cloth pegged to the window.
I need a man, or a woman, to come perform a DIY intervention.
Do I need a man to be happy?
I have a life full of happiness. Some days I could choke on it. I have a couple of jobs I love, three kids who I adore, a menagerie of animals and a fitness obsession. The last time I was really sad was when I was in a failing relationship with a fella I was trying to get to like me more than he could.
But then someone asks if I have a man – and I feel I ought to look? In the same way when someone asks the time and I instinctively check my wrist.
Then well-meaning Vera down the road, tells me how she met her lover online on an obscure site and how life has never been better.
Later, after I have re signed up to a dating site and waded my way through a bucket load of misspelt messages, badly photographed penises, and profile pictures that must have been lifted from Crimewatch; I block Vera on Facebook for doing the twat action of announcing she is in a relationship by changing her status icon.
I mean, seriously, be freaking happy, enjoy the taste of love, don’t drag it into my feed.
Wow – even I can sense a small bit of bitter in my mouth there.
Do I want to be in love?
Who doesn’t – who doesn’t want that all fulfilling glorious sensation of loving someone and being loved in return. I want it, about 3 days before my period, I actively crave it.
Can I be arsed to look for it?
The fact I am writing this post answers that question….
My friend says I am fussy.
I see it as selective, I’ve felt the anguish of a heart being broken and I am not sure I want to take that risk again.
Should you ask?
Crack on, you won’t offend, you may get to hear about the state of my muff….
Odds are I’ll be a single pringle…
If it changes, I’ll eventually let the world know, odds are it wont be on Facebook.
Until then I’m happy enough being me, just me.
With a perfectly working muff….
(I think)