The Checklist
By Kelley Bowles
I recently received an e-mail from a younger male friend of mine. I’m
33, he’s 23. We’ve been friends for a long time, but there was
also an interval when our feelings ran deeper, which is why this correspondence
hit me harder than perhaps it should have, and probably why the response
I fired back was so long and heartfelt. Also annoyed. Defensive. Pissed,
if we’re being honest here. But long after the e-mail had made its
journey through cyberspace, I re-read it to find what I thought was not
only a therapeutic explosion of feminist angst, but a kernel of worldly
truth that deserved more exploration.
Once again, I am 33. Divorced for seven years, I’ve been navigating the single again highway for what feels like forever, with some luck here and there, but so far nothing that’s proven itself in the long term. What has happened, however, with every guy I’ve dated, is a crystallized clarification of what it will take to make me happy. The man I married oh-so-long ago was a good man, but we didn’t have much in common philosophically, sexually, or in how we liked to spend our time. The fact that he was a good man wasn’t enough, although I wish I wouldn’t have had to destroy a marriage to figure that out. What can I offer here except the usual platitudes on youth and stupidity? So I learned I need to hold some common ground with a good man. Check.
The next guy walked heel-to-toe on common ground. We were both artsy and liberal. We talked for hours about shared philosophy. We had excellent sex. What we were not was great friends, and that eventually killed it. The lack of friendship not only made me uncomfortable talking with him about certain issues, but it also made me feel unsafe and unsupported in my own skin. So I learned that along with shared commonalities, I need a protected haven within the relationship. Check.
The last guy had it all. We had cosmic conversations, wonderful times, amazing sex. And he was my friend. When I had an idea or a thought or a problem, he was the first person I called. When I finished writing my first novel, he not only read and critiqued it, but constantly praised me for my efforts and shared his pride in my ambitions. I loved him dearly, but most of all I loved the me I was when I was with him. Unfortunately, there’s a huge item on the relationship list I hadn’t even considered: Timing. This wonderful man was ten years my junior, and smart enough to realize that continuing in a long-term relationship at this point could cause big regrets down the road. I’m ready for children; he’s just moved into his first sans-roommate apartment. I’ve married, divorced, traveled, bought a house, gone back to school, basically completed a substantial portion of that "things to do before I die" list. He still has a year left of college. While we both felt a huge loss, and I didn’t want it to end (because I believe the only real regrets we have are those risks we don’t take), I still understand why it happened. Timing. Check and check.
So I’m on the singles highway again, holding this e-mail from my young pal, feeling pissed. You see, the letter expresses sadness from my friend that I still haven’t found the right man for me. He suggests that the reason I haven’t is because I live in a small town, and that the smarter, talented, more interesting people flock to the big cities. Maybe I should move, he suggests, because I could easily find someone as funny, intelligent, and good-looking as myself if I only lived somewhere else. Of course, I thought, the problem isn’t ideology, or cosmology, or philosophy or theosophy. It’s geography! According to him, going to Denver is all I need to do to "catch me a man." I’ve heard this idea before actually, from well meaning people, but dismissed it under the same umbrella of stupidity as girls who go to college simply to get that MRS degree.
This time I didn’t dismiss it; I raged and railed against its injustices. I took the e-mail to show to my friends; I cried, we commiserated. Maybe there’s a small part of me that worries he’s right, that I’m cutting myself off from opportunity by staying in my comfort zone. Maybe I’m feeling still fragile from that last heart-wrenching breakup. Maybe I wish this friend was 33 instead of 23.
Sheee-it. Maybe he should just acquire a clue, because the kernel of worldly truth is this: the process I’ve gone through to realize what I need in a relationship has led me to an inevitable conclusion. What I need in a relationship is the understanding I don’t need a relationship to thrive. The thought of moving to "find a man" goes against any and every fibre of my being as an independent and self-sufficient member of humanity who doesn’t require any other person to "complete" her.
Not that I don’t want to have a long term commitment with a man who fits me. Believe me, I do. But I don’t think going somewhere else that statistically has a larger number of educated or liberal or open-minded people is necessarily going to feature the guy I’m looking for. I don’t think dying my hair and skin purple and being the exotic singular purple person on a male-only planet of orange people is going to do it. I think living my life is going to. I think learning as much as possible about myself, while concentrating on helping and interacting with others, is going to. I think trusting that things happen for a reason and in their own time is going to.
The fact that I’m 33 and can realize some things
that arrogant young men have not yet learned, I think that’s
going to do it. Check and double-check, boldface type.
Kelley Bowles is a High School English/Drama teacher,
and is a Spokesperson for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.
She has a B.A. in English, from the University of the Pacific, Stockton,
CA (May 1992), and a M.F.A. in Creative Writing, from LaCrosse University
(August 2003, Summa Cum Laude).
Her published works include:
~Short story, Fiction, Horror. “Woebegone” Crimson online
magazine, Volume 12, December 2000.
~Creative Non-fiction, Inspirational. “Whatever it Takes.”
Teachers With the Courage to Give, ed. Jackie Waldman, Conari Press, May
2002.
~Creative Non-fiction, Inspirational. “A Bluebird’s Lesson.”
Chocolate for a Woman’s Soul Vol. II, ed. Kay Allenbaugh, Simon
& Schuster, May 2003.
~Creative Non-fiction, Inspirational. “This Town, My Home”
The Rocking Chair Reader–Coming Home, ed. Helen Polaski, Adams Media,
October 2004.
~YA Novel, Fiction In Vision's Shadow, PublishAmerica, June 2006