(My cousin challenged me to a vocabulary quiz yesterday. The only question I blew it on was that "nonplussed" does NOT mean to be unfazed by something; rather, it means to be stunned or bewildered. And THAT I am!)
It is 2016. The age of "safe words" to let someone know when to stop a sexual activity. How did we get to this place that we would NEED safe words?! But if this is a part of today's lexicon, how is it that a 40 year old man who has an 8 year old daughter, a friend of a friend who has been in my presence five times (groups of friends, in passing at a coffee shop, a walk at a public park), can decide it would be "healing" for me to be in an instant relationship with him...that my life doesn't need to be "messed up" anymore if I am? And how is it, in today's world, that during an IM conversation (not even in person!) a 40 year old man cannot accept hearing the word "no" (no, I don't want a physical relationship...no, I don't want overnights...no, I don't want that kind of relationship with someone I barely know, as I know firsthand how badly that can turn out)? Seriously...what if some boy couldn't respect the word "no" if his daughter said it?! And how is it that a 40 year old man can try to turn that around, telling me that I would be "brave" to give in and try letting him spend the night rather than letting fear get the best of me? And when I say it's not fear, but rather disinterest in this and/or lack of readiness for this with him, how is it that he can have the balls (ego?!) to tell me that I am acting like Mother Teresa, making a moral argument based on virtue, simply as a "guise for sheltering fear and prohibiting growth?"
And when I suggest that my bravery is not in doing something that makes me uncomfortable, but is in clearly stating how I feel, and I suggest that there should not be ANY response to NO other than "sure, I respect that," how in the HELL can he say "If my feelings make you feel guilty or you feel threatened or you feel the need to be defensive rather than the need to reflect to me that you understand MY feelings, that shuts down communication. It tells me that it's not safe for me to communicate with you, because when I do, if you don't like it, you'll be hurtful." Um....hurtful, because I say that this is MY body, and MY body is not interested in that? Um...not safe for HIM?
And what kind of a$$ won't LEAVE IT ALONE when you remind him that you are grieving for your just deceased dog, this is your first full day to be with that (rather than having to work), and while you might be willing to have a civil conversation in person at a later date rather than IM now, you don't have the energy for it and don't trust that you will speak respectfully if the conversation continues in this moment, in this fashion? Why am I so flipping nice (this doesn't even deserve a conversation at a later date!), and why does that attract such idiots, rather than attracting nice people in return??! I need to turn into a bitch.
I don't want to be part of this dating world, where people want to have sex with you then not even be your friend, or they want to act like your friend in order to get you to have sex with them, or....I don't know what's next, but I just don't want to be part of it. No. I'm saying no to all of it right now.
