independence

another new year resolution: memorize a few john ashbery poems just because they're so lovely and surprising and funny and brief.

 

i can count the single girlfriends i have on 4 fingers. the rest have all partnered up, almost entirely from online dating, in fact. i had dinner with a few girlfriends and one of them was talking about a guy who broke up with her because he said she didn't need him enough. "if i left you tomorrow, you'd be just fine." she's wildly successful and independent. "of course i would," she responded, which is how i'd have answered the same statement if put to me.

 

but then i met my friend julie for lunch. in talking about another friend of hers she said, "she just talks about how happy she is and how fine she is being single. i think she's putting guys off by not wanting them badly enough." and maybe she's right? but it just got me to thinking about needing men. or not being able to get a man if you don't make him feel needed. growing up in a single parent household, i've never needed a man myself. i've never once thought about the fact i wouldn't have to work hard and always have to support myself. i've never been the type to feel broken or not good enough if someone didn't like me.

 

seems like a man should like a woman who is self-sufficient and confident and content. maybe i'm underestimating a man's aversion to strong women? the "you don't need me enough" guy seemed to think that if she didn't desperately depend on him for things, that there's no way to be sure she wouldn't just leave him someday, which sounds much more like insecurity issues on his behalf than any issues on hers.

 

who knows.