In one of the few episodes of Sex and the City I've seen, Carrie attends a wedding and laments, "two people are committing to a life together and I can't even get a guy to sign a card with me." I've been thinking about this a lot lately, as I just attended three weddings in just as many weeks. I love weddings, so this is not a complaint by any means... but it does cause me to stop and ponder my current situation. Like Carrie, not only have I failed in finding a man who wants to commit his life to me, but I can't even find someone who wants to sign his name next to mine on that congratulatory greeting card. I've found someone who threw a chair on our first (and only) date, someone who took me on a shopping trip to Diesel so I could watch him try on clothes for an hour, someone who later dated my roommate, someone who sent me a breakup playlist, someone that hurt me so deeply that I picture him being dismembered in various ways when I can't fall asleep at night... but never anyone that I would even invite to be my date to a wedding, let alone with whom I'd like to spend the rest of my life.
And so I'm left to ponder why men do the things they do.
EXHIBIT A:
I met Kevin at a bar in December; we talked for a couple of hours and he asked for my phone number. I started dating someone shortly thereafter so while Kevin and I chatted a couple of times, nothing ever came of it. But when I was dumped and Kevin texted me, I acted on it and agreed to meet him for a drink, something he said he'd been waiting on for months. When the time came for said drink, I was stood up. I didn't hear from Kevin for four months until today when he texted to say he's back in town (I wasn't aware he had left) and would like to get together.
EXHIBIT B:
My roommate and I attended a wedding in November. At the very beginning of the night, she picked out a gentleman that she thought was cute with whom she'd like to dance. By the end of the night, they had not only shared multiple dances, but hung out in the hotel bar for a while. He said he would like to see her again and invited her to visit him in Boston sometime. Except he never even asked for her phone number!
EXHIBIT C:
Another friend of mine has been asked out multiple times by a guy who does not remember that they have already dated!
And this is just the tip of the iceberg, folks... and yet I try to decipher that pesky opposite sex again and again. Whoever said men always say exactly what they mean and don't send mixed signals is full of shit. And that, my friends, is why ladies are left to read into things: because men are cryptic little devils.
But I know that women have their idiosyncracies as well. Allow me to introduce The Fire Hydrant Theory: Instead of telling a guy how they feel, women have begun to use men's Facebook walls as a means of staking their claim, hypotheticcaly pissing all over the wall to show ownership the way dogs stake claim on fire hydrants: "Back off, ladies! I have 'poked' and posted a link to a picture of a cute kitten and sent a clip of a movie with the message, 'LOL! Brad, remember this???" so that the world knows that Brad hung out with me! And we share a love for adorable kittens! Plus, the added bonus of a poke's sexual inuendo...hands off, ladies. This one's mine!" And so poor Brad is left soaked in the urine of a crazy chick's Facebook mania.
With two genders this cracked, how will anyone find someone who wants to sign a card with them?
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Sometimes your words just hypnotize me...
Craig and I went to high school together and at the time, I felt as though he was kind of my male equivalent: we both had close friends in the popular crowd but were by no means card-carrying members of the cool squad ourselves. We were both "athletes" in the sense that we played a sport, but weren't the varsity stars. Neither of us really dated, though we both nursed crushes on individuals that were just out of our reach. Craig and I were your classic "in-betweeners" and I thought we really understood each other. I was talking to Craig on Instant Messenger one night and he began asking me questions like "what does it feel like when a woman gets turned on?" Since women don't get erections, he didn't understand how our bodies respond to sexual stimulation. I answered his questions but it was all very innocent.
Then Craig asked me if I'd assist him with an experiment he had read about. He wanted me to hypnotize him so that he could only get an erection when I spoke a certain trigger word. His penis would only respond to that one word, and only when spoken by me. Craig admitted to having fantasies of me whispering the word to him in the hallway at school and thus being completely at my mercy. I was a mix of flattered and terrified, but realized that this fantasy had nothing to do with sexual desire for me personally, merely that I was the person he felt comfortable admitting his sexual fetish to and he knew I wouldn't make fun of him or reveal his desire to others.
While I don't shun most sexual fetishes (to each his/her own), I do think his request was a strange one to make to a high school girl... especially one he was not romantically involved with and had never even hung out with outside of school. It was a very raondom request, even given the conversation that had preceded it. Nevertheless, I told Craig I'd be happy to comply with his request... of course never intending to follow through! I just didn't want to say "no" because then he might think I wasn't cool and... sexually awesome, or something like that. He brought up the matter a few times after that, but only online and I always replied with a line like, "oh yeah... we should totally do that... sometime... I'm really busy this weekend... working on the Homecoming float and all..."
Yes, I found the request odd, but I did not think Craig was odd. I thought it was cool that he felt comfortable being so open with me.
So the hypnotism never took place and Craig and I went our separate ways after graduation. One night when I was a freshman in college I was talking to him online and he told me that he gave the hypnotism a try with a girl at his university. He said it didn't work, and that I should come visit him because he really thought I'd be able to accomplish it. I reminded him that since I went to a different school, I wouldn't see him on a daily basis and he therefore would never be able to get an erection. He said he still thought it would be fascinating if I randomly called him and said the trigger word and hung up, giving him an instant boner. This time I declined.
Craig and I eventually lost touch, as tends to be the case with high school friends when people go away to college. But that was not the last of Craig. During my junior year of college I was walking through a friend's dorm on our way to play in the snow on a very blizzardy day. I was wearing three layers of clothes underneath my giant puffcoat and certainly looked like the Michelin Man when, lo and behold, I see Craig walking towards me. We had a very brief encounter during which he told me he was visiting a friend and had completely forgotten I also attended school there.
Later that night, Craig IMed me to tell me how sexy I looked when we ran into each other. Sexy? Really? In four layers of clothing manufactured to incubate body heat? He then proceded to ask me out and I declined, finally realizing that Craig did not find me trustworthy and a kindred spirit, but rather was a horny boy that for one reason or another thought I would be desperate enough to accept his strange advances. Now I do indeed think Craig is odd, and he is definitely not my male equivalent. Sometimes I am way too generous when giving people the benefit of the doubt... especially men whose bizarre tendencies I mistake for cute and flattering.
Then Craig asked me if I'd assist him with an experiment he had read about. He wanted me to hypnotize him so that he could only get an erection when I spoke a certain trigger word. His penis would only respond to that one word, and only when spoken by me. Craig admitted to having fantasies of me whispering the word to him in the hallway at school and thus being completely at my mercy. I was a mix of flattered and terrified, but realized that this fantasy had nothing to do with sexual desire for me personally, merely that I was the person he felt comfortable admitting his sexual fetish to and he knew I wouldn't make fun of him or reveal his desire to others.
While I don't shun most sexual fetishes (to each his/her own), I do think his request was a strange one to make to a high school girl... especially one he was not romantically involved with and had never even hung out with outside of school. It was a very raondom request, even given the conversation that had preceded it. Nevertheless, I told Craig I'd be happy to comply with his request... of course never intending to follow through! I just didn't want to say "no" because then he might think I wasn't cool and... sexually awesome, or something like that. He brought up the matter a few times after that, but only online and I always replied with a line like, "oh yeah... we should totally do that... sometime... I'm really busy this weekend... working on the Homecoming float and all..."
Yes, I found the request odd, but I did not think Craig was odd. I thought it was cool that he felt comfortable being so open with me.
So the hypnotism never took place and Craig and I went our separate ways after graduation. One night when I was a freshman in college I was talking to him online and he told me that he gave the hypnotism a try with a girl at his university. He said it didn't work, and that I should come visit him because he really thought I'd be able to accomplish it. I reminded him that since I went to a different school, I wouldn't see him on a daily basis and he therefore would never be able to get an erection. He said he still thought it would be fascinating if I randomly called him and said the trigger word and hung up, giving him an instant boner. This time I declined.
Craig and I eventually lost touch, as tends to be the case with high school friends when people go away to college. But that was not the last of Craig. During my junior year of college I was walking through a friend's dorm on our way to play in the snow on a very blizzardy day. I was wearing three layers of clothes underneath my giant puffcoat and certainly looked like the Michelin Man when, lo and behold, I see Craig walking towards me. We had a very brief encounter during which he told me he was visiting a friend and had completely forgotten I also attended school there.
Later that night, Craig IMed me to tell me how sexy I looked when we ran into each other. Sexy? Really? In four layers of clothing manufactured to incubate body heat? He then proceded to ask me out and I declined, finally realizing that Craig did not find me trustworthy and a kindred spirit, but rather was a horny boy that for one reason or another thought I would be desperate enough to accept his strange advances. Now I do indeed think Craig is odd, and he is definitely not my male equivalent. Sometimes I am way too generous when giving people the benefit of the doubt... especially men whose bizarre tendencies I mistake for cute and flattering.
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