My take on the Times’ Modern Love

That’s right, Arielle and I are back with another edition of Single Girl Confidential! But this time, instead of talking about being single making us fat or making out with guys, we’re both sharing our POVs on a recent New York Times’ Modern Love column.

The column, can be found here, and I shared it with pretty much every single friend I could right after TKTC sent it to me.

Arielle, had a different opinion on the article (her post is here), but there were a lot of things in the article that I could connect with.

The article is about a woman in her 30s coming full circle in her lack of dating experience as a potential suitor asks, so when was your last relationship?

Recently, someone asked me that same question. And I didn’t lie, but I didn’t exactly answer. Because I was embarrassed.

Knowing this person was previously in a long-term relationship, I was embarrassed to admit that my last one (really, relationship of any kind) was not recent…at all. Plus, I was embarrassed that I don’t have much dating experience. And later, when I really thought about it, I realized how paltry it is.

Why feel embarrassed by this? Well, it’s the inevitable question the author and I were both asked once, “what’s wrong with you?”

The short answer: NOTHING.

But for a long time, I thought there was SOMETHING wrong with me. My friends regularly dated guys, but not me. To try and fix the unknown problem, I went through a long period of dyeing my hair various colors, cutting it to various lengths, losing/gaining weight, changing my personality, sampling with make up and nitpicking things in my life because clearly, ONE of these items was keeping me from meeting Mr. Right.

And after all of that, he still never arrived. As friends got engaged or married, I was single and they kept telling me, “it’s going to happen,” “you’re too studious,” “men are intimidated by strong, independent women.” But it didn’t make me feel better. Finding solace in single friends helped but in the end, the article said it best, “I still asked myself, “What’s wrong with me?”

And it was after reading this that I started re-evaluting a few other things. For one, I stopped watching the Millionaire Matchmaker and unfollowed Patti Stanger on Twitter. While I know she says/does things for effect, I realized that her main message is about changing yourself looks/personality-wise to be what men want, not necessarily what you want. Sure, a push is needed sometimes, but I just don’t connect with that message anymore.

After years of trying to be someone else, I’m comfortable being me. Petite, red haired, big boobed and hipped, slightly awkward and a little dating naive.

And if I meet a guy who can look past my poor dating resume and love me for me, I’m open to having him in my life. And if not, I’m just fine being single. That’s something I wish the author in that article would have said because there is NOTHING wrong with being single. At all.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *