The Questions . . . .

So I keep getting bombarded with these questions.  I mean I get them from just about everyone I encounter, whether I know them or not.  I can tell that it’s really the thing they want to know most from me, so they make small talk until they get the courage to ask.  And just so you know, they do not offend me.  I simply don’t understand the fascination behind them.  The questions I’m talking about are: “So are you dating?” “Do you think you’ll ever get married again?” “Why are you single?”  And like I said, I’m not offended at all by the questions.  I really just don’t get it.  Why the fascination with my status?  To be honest, I really don’t get the fascination with romantic relationships at all. 

Now before you go calling me a cynic or some other embittered woman name, let me clarify.  I don’t think there’s anything at all wrong with romantic relationships.  I think healthy ones are great.  What I just don’t understand is why so many people spend their entire lives allowing one type of relationship to reign supreme, and why a woman who either isn’t or doesn’t want one is such a threat.  Maybe threat is too harsh a word, but it certainly does something to people when they hear me say that I am currently not interested in dating.  And while I don’t read minds, based on the responses I receive, I don’t think they actually hear what I’m saying.  I think they hear me saying “I don’t ever want no man! Ain’t nothing a man can ever do for me!”  All while I snap my fingers in a Zorro formation and swing my neck from side to side, with my hand on my hip, making my backbone slip.  And that’s not what I’m saying at all.  What I am saying is that I am not interested in dating right now.  I like men.  I probably will eventually want to be with one, but for right now, I’m happy to be in the state I am.  Here’s what I’ve learned in my life thus far.  I’ve spent a considerable amount of time not loving myself.  I looked for someone else to tell me I was loveable and worth a damn.  And if that person happened to be of the male gender, then by Gosh as declared by him in whatever state he was in, I was truly something loveable.  That is . . . until I stopped doing whatever he wanted and then I became something else.  I married very early in my life.  I was 24 years old.  Four years later, I gave birth to our child.  And during the entire nine years we were together, I was miserable.  And I was miserable because I wasn’t being true to myself and I kept looking for him to make me feel better about myself.  And I suspect that he kept doing the same.  So now that I find myself single, I’m happy about it.  It’s the first time in my adult life that I can focus on me—figure myself out and love it all—without having to think about someone else.  (Well as long as you don’t count my daughter, but that’s different!).  So I’m enjoying getting to know me and fall in love with myself. 

I also now know that you can only attract who and what you are.  So I got some ‘splaining to do with myself before I attract the guy I want for me into my life.  I’ve got some T’s to cross and some I’s to dot before I even consider bringing another into my equation.  And since I’ve spent so much time talking, I’ll go ahead and answer the questions for you.  No I am not dating.  I’m not sure I’ll ever get married again, but I know that should I consider it, he’ll be one helluva man!  And he’ll understand that simply because we’ve said those three words everybody longs to hear;  “I love you” for you challenged ones; that now we possess one another.  In my opinion, love does not possess, but frees.  So the man who gets me will be a man who understands that I am and will continue to be exactly who I was when he met me and that loving him will not make me his possessed item, but just the woman he happens to love.  But until I meet him, I’m happy to be in a relationship with me.  It’s going really great and we’re both really happy.  And happy people attract more happy people so I’d say things look really promising.  And in the words of Forrest Gump, “That’s all I have to say about that.”