Free at 44

My friend Katrice is newly divorced and doing pretty well. She has gotten a new job and a new apartment. Her makeup game is on point. She is going out more, hanging out with friends, and meeting new people. I am proud of her! Divorced people will tell you that picking up and moving on after that situation can be hard, emotional, and even traumatic. However, Katrice seems to be moving along just fine. She has made time for reading and taking time for herself. I mean, I wish my everyday letdown was as wonderful as her after divorce glow up!

"So, have you met anyone exciting?" I asked during our weekly weekend call. 

"Nope. I'm done."

I snickered. "Done? So you don't want to be married again? You don't want a partner?"

"Nope," she repeated. "I have loved and have been loved. That is enough for me."

These words have rang in my head since she said them. I am hoping that she isn't serious. I mean, she is only 44! She is too young to be calling it quits! It's funny, I remember being a kid and thinking that 40 was just as bad as being 140. But now that I am over 40, I realize clearly that 40 is nothing. People are living into their 100s! So what, she is going to be 105, not having had a companion in over 60 years?! It would be different if her Black had cracked or if she was bitter, but she is neither of these things. She is a gorgeous, hot, professional lady. How could she commit to calling it quits?

Not too long after I asked myself that question, I answered it. Dating in middle age can be a hot, dramatic mess. Outside of having to compete with younger women, you now are dealing with other singles who too have been kicked down and beat up by life. In her sitting this part of life out, she doesn't have to deal with the inappro-pro pics, lies, reemerging exes, time-wasting. Last time I checked in on her, she was taking in a good novel and drinking a hot beverage. I believe they call that solitude. Doesn't that sound amazing?

I have heard a lot of conservative men online talking about the "Female Loneliness Epidemic". They are excited about it and think that women are getting what they deserve for being picky when they were young. However, these men are confused. I am seeing a lot of middle-aged women who are alone but not lonely. Katrice is always racing off to dinner plans and social events. It's like she put down having a spouse and picked up living her best life! 

Even with this being said and her saying that she plans to kick it solo, I would still like to see her with someone. She is dope and deserves happiness with someone new. It doesn't look like that is coming down the pipeline anytime soon. She is enjoying being free. 

Don't Speak

In most of my friendships, I feel like I am the chaser. I am the one that calls and checks in and sees how everyone is doing. I like talking on the phone and catching up, but everyone in my life is busy with their kids, relationships, and work, so they don't be having time like that to chat which, I'm going to be honest, makes me sad. I feel like I am by myself all the time, most likely because I am. But I have grown tired of being the one always reaching out. It makes me feel stupid and like a nuisance. So recently I decided to just leave folks alone until someone calls me. My biggest fear was confirmed: no one missed me. Sigh. I'm so tired of feeling like my feelings are hurt all the time. Tired of solitude. It all just makes me want to lay down someplace. Don't worry ya'll. I start therapy again next week. 

Loneliness Loves Company

Sickles called me again on "mistake". I was at home working on a script when I got another phantom Duo call. I answered it and it was him. He told me that he hadn't meant to call me. "Awkward," he said, shaking his head into the camera. Yeah, it was a little awkward. But only because the last time he called me on "mistake" he was jacking off into his phone camera.
I hung up the phone but was unable to shake the sight of him. He looked tired and a little older. He also looked burdened  and sad. Against my better judgement, I called him back.

"Are you okay?" I ask him. 

He was walking around his apartment, aimlessly. "Yeah. Why?"

"I don't know. You look a little sad." 

"Oh naw, that's only because I just got through smoking weed."

"Oh." I'm not a smoker. Do people typically look sad after they smoke?

"Do you feel okay?" I inquire. 

"Yes," he answers. 

"Have you been praying?" I question. 

Yes," he responds. 

He then switches up the convo. "You look pretty."

I identify this immediately as BS. My face is fatter than the last time he saw me, and I was wearing my sleep bonnet. 

"I have my bonnet on Sickles," I respond. 

"Yeah, but it looks like you are ready to take it off and let your hair down." You see, Sickles has always been a huge fan of my fro. 

It was then that I wished him well and cut the conversation short. I'm lonely. He is obviously lonely, and loneliness LOVES company. Especially this time of year when it is cold outside and everyone is boo'ed up. But I'm too old for cuff games and situationships that are going to go nowhere. I have to be more intentional and not fall in to talking to someone because they are interested and I am available. This could mean that I am alone and lonely for a long time. I have to believe that there is something better for me out there. There better be! I'm wasting perfectly good cuff time wishing for something real. 

The End of Third Ryan

It is now fall. My lukewarm hot girl summer has come to an official end along with my pointless, going-nowhere crush on Third Ryan. You remember him? The nice guy from my writing group? Well, he has a crush on one of my good friends and that is simply a road I would rather not go down again. I've been going down it since the 6th grade afterall.

I am so, so tired of investing in the time needed to get to know men who aren't interested. I mean truly, I am exhausted. I could fall asleep right now while typing this post! And what I am even more tired of than that is the unhealthy way that I deal with unrequited love. I don't pray it away or dance it away like Solange. No. I transfer it away to another unavailable man like a loser. 

So, once Third Ryan casually proclaimed his love for my friend during a cute conversation that I had thought was otherwise going well, I decided to start the transference process. Sadly, I decided to transfer it to another man in writing group, Jack. Jack is annoying but hot. To even my own surprise I could not sustain the crush, so I transfered my now two-times-over RyanJack love to a man named MaxTheBody, a male bodybuilder that I found during a thirst search on Instagram. My crush on him will end soon enough, just like my crushes on that IG male dancer and the IG fetish trainer that makes adult movies with his wife. 

Not too long ago, someone asked me if I never found love, would God be enough. I originally said no, but I am parachuting towards 40 at a speed you won't believe. I don't think I have a choice! Hopefully God likes long hugs and slow dancing to 90s R&B. I have always wanted a boyfriend that could do a box step to Forever My Lady by Jodeci. 

The Last Dating Mohicans

There are a lot of obstacles when it comes to dating in your 30s, obstacles that I would have never imagined as a woman in my 20s. There are men dealing with divorce, men in relationships that think they are single, men still living with their exes to save money, men with side pieces, men with secret children, men with whole secret families, men who only want to date barely legal women, men who want to be Peter Pan. I mean the laundry list of issues goes on and on and on. But I am finding that the biggest obstacle facing single 30-something women is fighting that sometimes all-consuming urge to settle.
Here is something that I think that they should tell children in elementary school not to discourage them but to prepare them: loneliness is a BI$#H! It will make you do some stupid things that you would not normally do. For my single homegirls inching towards 35, it can cause them to do things like entertain losers that they are completely too good for. They say that if a woman is single over 30, there must be something wrong with her. But I am here to say, if there is a man over 30 that is single, watch.out. I find the single 30-something man to be both crazy and bold; pulling laughable foolishness out of their hats at the drop of a dime.
BFF1 just ended a relationship with a guy who has moved his ex in with him to save money. BFF2 was basically told by her on again off again beau that he's still interested in her, a little. Whether or not they get back together depends on where he gets into grad school. BFF3 just broke things off with a man that didn't understand why she was upset that he had a plethora of other girlfriends. She was over 30 after all. She should be happy to be with a man at all. NOT!
My friends knew that these guys were losers, but they chose to settle because they were tired of being lonely and I get it. But I believe that you should settle because, while you are settling, you are presenting yourself as in a relationship to the potential love of your life.
Cuffing season has come to an end. Valentine's Day has passed. If you are single, the urge to entertain that late night text pall that wants to come over and watch a movie at midnight may be very strong. But I encourage you to resist this urge and stand firm. Mr. Right is on the way. We have to believe this ladies. There is no shame in being the last of the dating Mohicans if the loves of our lives are right around the corner.

For the Love of Drake

I don't know what the temperature was the other night where you live, but it was COLD in Atlanta. The real chill, however, came from being single and over 30 during a night when I should have been roasting chestnuts with a hottie.
So I did the unhealthy, emotionally draining thing that I do all the time when I am lonely: I went through my phone, eager to text one of my merry band of losers when I remembered: like an idiot, I had erased all their numbers! I blame Instagram, getting me all hyped up on that 'new year, new you' BS. More like BM! Who am I kidding? I am the same emotional, overwhelmed, confused person I am romanticly that I was when I was 13 in love with my gay boyfriend. There is no new me!
Disappointed, I laid back and put in my headbuds, prepared for Spotify to rock me to sleep. And somehow, someway, as I fell deeper into the playlist hole, I ended up fully engaged in an endless stream of Drake. In the story of our love, I will pinpoint this as the beginning of our romance.
I have always been aware of Drake, like I have always been aware of table corners and broken glass. He was on my radar briefly when he said "BBW" in a song, but then away he went again. I found him to be very whiney, and I was freaked out when he did that exhausting love speech to Rihanna at that award show.
But listening to his music, late and alone, during the longest wintry night in the A, I felt like I'd known him forever. All these years, from So Far Gone to More Life, he has been bellyaching about the same things I have here: unrequited love, love lost, crushes, crushes gone bad, friend issues, absent dads, etc. It's like he has been reading my journal or something!
"I think that Drake is my soulmate," I told Gia Tortilla during one of our hours-long talks about nothing. I then explained to her why I felt this way.
"Maybe he would be a good boyfriend for me too!" she exclaimed.
Sigh. That's what I get for introducing my new man to my hot, old friend too soon.

Seeking out Community

Last night I talked to one of my friends for almost an hour and a half who was seriously suffering from the lonelies, or as I like to call it, 29itis. Not only was she sad that she didn't feel like she had a home, but she was also sad because she felt like she didn't have anyone to really hang with. Honestly, if you are almost 30 and you have never felt like this, after most of your friends have married and had kids and gotten into relationships and forgotten about you while your family feels you're too old to be showered with love, then I don't get it. Any way, I gave her Fran's wise words: you have to seek out community. You can not sit around and mope and wait on happiness to find you or for magic friends to fill your life, you have to actively work towards creating the community around you that you want. She doesn't want to do it, but who does? We are no longer in college, where you can just walk to the cafeteria and make new friends. This ish is going to take work! Thumbs down to the TV shows and children's books that told us that our lives would always be ready-made with the support we need and a deep breath and a thumbs up to those who are tired of complaining and are shaping their lives to what they want them to be.