Dripping with the drippies

If the past couple months are any indication, it’s going to be a long, cold winter. And I’m not talking about Chicago's weather.

One would think this vibrant, beautiful city bustling with the energy of smart, cultured singles would be dripping with available men. From my perch on the singles branch, however, it appears instead only to have available drippy men. And a lot of them.  Men who, in their thirties, still talk about the Ninja Turtles. Men who play video games...every night. Men whose response to "what do you do for fun?" is regaling me with stories of the gym. Men who patronize me by professing how "noble" it is to be an educator - how brave I am to teach at a school with such a diverse population (in case you didn't know, that is code for...gasp...black kids). Men who, one day after they get rich and retire, might, too, become a teacher. You know, "give back" and all. Drippy...drippy...super. duper. drippy.

Perhaps, as a friend told me after listening to me whining about waking alone again in cold sheets, I need to adjust my standards. “Sure, you want to ____,” she said. “But you want to meet someone and be attracted to him immediately. You want him to be sexy, intellectual, and witty. You want him to make you laugh, make you think, be emotionally available, and be good in bed. (snort) Yeah, good luck with that”.

Sigh.

She’s right. I demand all of those things. Are they really standards that are that high? Too high? And, in the words (and pitch) of Jon Lovitz from Saturday Night Live, is that sooooo wrooooong? Look, I have a child at home. A small child. I have a job and have another 150 children there. I'm busy. And a lot of the time, I'm tired of being the glue that holds it together. When those moments hit, a bottle of wine, a book, and my bed seem a helluva lot more appealing than an evening of drinks and cavorting with strangers followed by a long, late cab ride home. And frankly, I have enough friends. Not interested in shallow conversations -or sex- that may lead to inauthentic friendships. Been there. Done that. Got the friends and the t-shirt...not.i repeat.not interested.

So I'll pull out my heating pad, stick it between my sheets, and awake in the mornings alone but warm. I'll whittle down the stack of Russian literature on my nightstand  and maybe start penning the book of short stories that wake me in the early hours of the morning. And even if the winter is long and cold and filled with solitude, at least it will be rich and deep instead of shallow and oh so drippy.