When I was little, I was aware of the universal limitations that existed for girls, but it was the 1970's, and posters everywhere shouted out "Girls Can Do Anything!" I adopted that as my motto: I desperately wanted to play Little League baseball, even if it meant playing on the Farm Team. I wanted to wear a cast so bad that I flung myself off of the top of my swing set over and over again. I climbed trees. I wore no pink. The only dresses I wore were corduroy jumpers. I begged to join the Boy Scouts, loudly and frequently citing the fact that "it says nowhere in the manual that you have to be a boy."
I have since developed more of my feminine side, but to this day I feel more comfortable around males than females. If I find myself suddenly left alone with a few women, I start to feel trapped and a wee bit panicky. I just don't know what to say. With a guy you can just say something along the lines of "So, what the hell is up with you?" and begin a conversation. With women there seems to be so many hidden rules and regulations about what to say and how, and 9 times out of 10 they'll just say shit about you when you turn your back so why bother? Women have too many hidden agendas for me. At least with men, all the cards are laid out on the table.
Why you'll never see me at a "girl's night out"...
1. I don't screech. There is nothing more annoying than the high-pitched squeals of glee when two or more women spot each other across a crowded room. What is wrong with you? Are you deflating? Or can words just not express the sentiment of "hello" as well as the imitation of the mating ritual between a pair of rhesus monkeys?
2. I don't see the need to carry a pocketbook everywhere
I go. I can't do it. I just can't have a small little faux-leathery
bag dangling off of my shoulder for hours on end. Ten-to-one the
strap will keep falling off said shoulder, leaving you to have
to continually grasp and place said strap back onto your shoulder
over and over again. And what is in there that you really need?
Do you really need an entire bag of miscellany to simply go to
the grocery store? To go anywhere, anytime, all I need is my wallet/ID,
car keys, and sunglasses. If I really have to carry some type
of bag, say to walk around Boston or New York, then it's gonna
be my bike messenger bag. I carry either the bare minimum or everything,
and if I'm shopping, say, in Boston or New York, at least I have
a bag in which to carry the $60.00 worth of comic books and other
assorted fun stuff which will inevitably be purchased. Due to
the lack of usable pockets in most women's clothing, however,
I do own a little black hand-held-type evening-ish bag for times
when we go out to dinner or to a show or something, but again,
all I put inside it is my wallet/ID, car keys, and, if necessary,
sunglasses. According to most women, I should also be carrying
lipstick (and if I were single, a condom), but:
3. I haven't figured out how to keep lipstick on for more than
15 minutes at a time. Though I examine all of the many wonderful
colors every time I set foot into a Sephora, I have altogether
given up on the concept of me ever being able to wear lipstick.
Is there a trick to this, besides constantly thinking about your
mouth and/or touching up your lipstick 300 times a day? I do actually
own several lipsticks, you know. Once in a while I'll even put
some on, thinking that it will last beyond 10:00 AM, but alas.
Most of it ends up on my coffee cup, some of it on my water bottle,
a little more of it disappears from lip-licking and/or subconscious
face-touching, and the rest of it, I believe, just vanishes into
thin air. I was sincerely exited about the introduction of "lip-tints"
to the lip color-wearing public. The Stila one, which I was actually
on a waiting list at Saks for, and which the salesperson told
me would last for three whole days on my lips due to the vegetable-based
tint, and which I paid more than $20.00 for, was none of that
and more. Sadly, it too disappeared from my lips in a matter of
just a few hours. Benefit Benetint is the only one that even halfway
lives up to my expectations. I wonder if the women from hundreds
of years ago who crushed rose petals to color their lips and cheeks
had this same problem.
4. I don't own a lot of shoes. Avery is always telling
me that women he talks to have many more pairs of shoes than I
do. I know, I've read In Style Magazine, I've seen the shoe closets
the likes of a small apartment that some women have. Believe me,
I've spent my share of time in the shoe department of Nordstrom
too, and if I had a spare $1,000.00 lying around gathering dust,
I'd probably have more shoes. As far as I'm concerned, a couple
of pairs of sneakers, one or two pairs of wear-to-work shoes,
the clunky boot and the sandal just about covers it for me.
5. I don't like to shop. Like most men, I have to know what
I need before I venture into a store to purchase it. I'm not one
to leisurely browse the sale racks or wander around the mall for
hours on end; at least not without incurring a headache to beat
the band and a foul attitude to boot. I'm also not an "off-the-rack"
type of clothes buyer, so searching for, say, a pair of pants
which will fit me in the waist without being six inches too long
tends to become more of a frustrating hassle than a pleasant,
problem-free shopping experience. Shopping for me usually goes
along the lines of: find six things that may fit, wait in non-moving
line for dressing room, try on the six things, find out none of
them fit, leave with the thought that you just spent an entire
45 minutes doing nothing. I envy guys, I really do. Not only do
they have better-quality, nicer looking, cheaper clothing to choose
from, they basically only have to shop for staples: a couple of
pairs of khakis and/or jeans, a few t-shirts, a couple of overshirts,
shorts, button-down dress shirts and ties for work. Add a sweater
or two to that and all seasons have been shopped for. End of story.
6. I don't drink light beer, nor do I put ice in my wine, or my
scotch. Since I have moved back to Connecticut, I rarely see
a woman drinking anything other than Amstel Light or hear one
asking for a "Bud Light bottle" while batting her eyelashes
at the bartender. The last time I was at a brew pub (The Union
in Glastonbury), there were young women with Amstel Lights as
far as the eye could see. At a place where they make their
own beer! Why? Why, I ask, must you subject yourself to such
watery yup-slosh? I can't even fathom the putting-ice-in-the-wine
thing. Is it because it's not cold enough? Too much concentrated
alcohol? Having a heat flash? What? And as far as scotch goes,
the only way to drink it is neat. If you think that it
"tastes like gasoline," you're obviously drinking the
wrong brand.
7. I don't coo over babies, or engagement rings. No, he's
not cute. No, I don't want to hold him. Yes, baby talk demeans
both you and the baby. So your fiancee spent two months
salary on that ring. Hooray. Do you think you'll keep it after
the divorce?
8. I can't paint my own nails. Again, like the lipstick thing,
I peruse the new Urban Decay nail colors from time to time, and
own more bottles of nail polish than I do lipsticks. I've attempted
to paint my nails more times than I can count, and each and every
time, save maybe three times in my life, it ended in disaster.
Most times, I got bored after painting three fingernails and rushed
through the rest, which resulted in one of two things: either
having three OK nails and seven gummy, smeary looking ones, or
after several attempts at trying to get it right, stripping all
of the nail polish off in a fit of rage. Either way, I ended up
totally wasting several hours. If I ever did manage to
paint all ten of my fingernails in a halfway decent manner, I
usually couldn't handle waiting the eon or so it took for them
to dry, would try to carefully go about business as usual, and
end up with lint, cat hair or any number of other small, household
items sticking to the semi-wet polish. I got sick of wasting entire
evenings trying to paint my nails the color of a cockroach or
the blacktop, so I stopped. To hell with colored nails.
9. I own no valuable jewelry. Nor do I want any, as I think
it would end up stolen or broken, or I would constantly be worried
about it being stolen or broken. I'm not a delicate, lounge-around
type of girl; I've already gone through three engagement-type
rings, and even the one I have now is no longer a complete circle.
This is not to say that I don't walk past the diamond solitaire
necklace case when the mood hits me, but when you can get the
faux stuff for half the price, and no one besides an appraiser
with a magnifying glass can tell the difference, then why spend
the money?
10. I will never replace the word "fuckin'" with "frickin'"
or "freaking." Just say "fucking." Haven't
you been watching the Sopranos? "Fuck" is now used in
casual conversation so frequently, it's lost all its sting; and
besides, you're no angel anyway.