It’s been exactly one year now since I’ve had sex, and you know what? I do not miss it. The dry spell has been voluntary, after all. I love the lack of complications and, to be perfectly honest, with the exception of The Guy and the adorable Canadian from 2022, for the most part the sex has been ‘meh.’ They just don’t try very hard anymore.
In other (related?) news, my hormone lab results came back. I’m actually post-menopausal.
I’m having lunch today with someone from work and I am dreading it. He’s not on my team; he’s not even in my department or at my office, he works in an entirely different building. We met because I saw him and his coworker in the break room and thought I’d be friendly, say hello, and strike up a conversation. I make small talk with them any time I see them, but then one of them cornered me one day and asked for my number. I gave it to him, I guess mostly so I could meet up with him and tell him I’m not interested in what he wants, which so far has been to text in real time and talk on the phone. He even offered to come over and help me move furniture and put the books back on the bookcase.
Um… NO THANK YOU to all of that.
I’m dreading it because I’m getting the feeling he might want to be more than “friends.” So I’m going to follow through with lunch and a walk in the park and take that opportunity to make it very clear that I am not interested in dating or any other romantic or sexual activity. I can’t even be the “friend” he wants me to be. I’m not a licensed therapist. I’m just someone who has been single for almost 12 years. He framed it as needing someone to talk to because he’s recently divorced, so I’m going to keep the focus of our conversation today on that and, I don’t know… how to be single? How to be single and happy? Because I am extremely happy being single and wouldn’t have it any other way. I love not having to share my space with anyone (except my son of course). I love not having to clean up after anyone (except my son) and I love not having to answer to anyone.
I love my freedom.
It does come with a price, of course. Everything costs me twice as much as it costs couples because I’m a single-income household. I do everything single-handedly; everything from working 40 hours a week and paying the bills to meal planning and grocery shopping and cooking. All of the yard work, household maintenance and repairs– all me. Sometimes it’s difficult if I need someone strong to help me move something. I either have my son help me, or if it’s a big-big job, have my son’s BFF come over and I pay the both of them to do the thing.
Anyway, when I meet up with the coworker today I’m going to dress down and casual and not attractive at all. I’m going to keep things light and casual and keep all of the focus of the conversation on him and his divorce and how awesome it is to be single (and emphasize how much I love being single and never want to be in a committed relationship again). If he asks if he can come over, and I’m going to decline. I will probably also look at my watch and if it’s past 2:00pm, say, “Gosh, look at the time! I need to go, something I do every Sunday closes at 4:00pm.”
It would be all wrong, anyway. I really hope his intention is to only be friends (even that I’m not sure I’m comfortable with) because he has way too many strikes against him. 1) I don’t know how old he is, but he can’t be more than 30. 2) He has very young kids, and even if I did date, I wouldn’t be into someone with young kids. His are toddler young and I’m so done with all of that. 3) He works where I do. That’s a hard pass. 4) I don’t date, at least not now. If I do start dating again, it will not be with the intention of getting into a relationship, it will be with the intention of making a good friend and maybe eventually it might lead to sex, but nothing more. 5) Absolutely no cohabitation or marriage. Nope.
My focus at the moment is on replacing everything the cats destroyed. The tablecloth and place mats are done. The furniture will be delivered sometime at the end of the month. I’ve left a message for a local company who replaces window screens and patio screen doors, and I’ll be having my bedroom window screen replaced as well as the patio screen door.
I’m also rearranging a few pieces of furniture and will likely be rearranging my living room/dining area when the new furniture arrives. That has prompted me to clean out my bedroom closet which I did yesterday and it took a full seven hours. I pulled out the piles of random clothes shoved in the back and organized them by size into flat storage bins that fit under my bed. Then of course I had to clean out under the bed, which meant I also had to clean out the coat closet and reorganize the garage shelves a bit so I could store things that were in my bedroom closet and under the bed. I threw out two full trash bags of stuff, took a giant box of clothes to Goodwill, then took a trip to the Metro South Transfer Station for e-waste recycling.
Another goal I have is to simply get things up off of the floors. Today I’m going to install two ukulele hangers on my bedroom wall where the bookcase used to tower. Then I’ll put their cases in the closet now that there’s room. I put the guitar cases up on the top closet shelf in my son’s room. I’ll probably put the guitar amp somewhere else, and that leaves the stationary bike and telescope to contend with. I’ll decide where to put those when the new furniture gets here.
I’m also going through the condo and getting rid of old knick-knacks and over the course of the year I’ll move from one closet to another, get rid or more things, and dust off and reorganize shelves. I’ll tackle one thing at a time in my bedroom. There’s the dresser and closet (the biggest jobs of all and done), my desk drawers, the nightstand, and filing cabinet. Scan, shred, recycle, repeat. It’s a process that takes forever and I can’t keep up with it. I think my bedroom is what has the most stuff because it’s also my home office.
Doing a purge and deep cleaning is hard work, but it’s a good thing. I never want to acquire so much stuff I can’t keep it dusted off or move freely around my spaces. I want to be able to find anything I need and not have to shuffle through a pile of clothes to get to it. The closet is lovely now. I do still need to dust off the shelves; yesterday my main focus was the clean-out and reorganization.
Man, I really do not want to have to go anywhere today. I also don’t want to have to let anyone down. I just get this weird feeling he wants something. I don’t know what it is, but I can’t give it to him unless it’s some really sound advice on how to be happy alone. That doesn’t come naturally to most people and it didn’t for me until about 10 years ago. Sometimes it literally takes therapy to get there. A lot of people feel the need to be coupled simply because they don’t enjoy their own company and are too afraid of getting stuck inside their own heads. That’s a huge red flag; that’s someone you definitely don’t want to date.
In other news, I deleted more social media and other accounts:
- Strava
- Goodreads
- Quora
- Petsmart (not social media, but I got an email from them the day I picked up my cat’s cremains and I just could not even)
Then I renewed my memberships with the Oregon Mycological Society and the National Parks Conservation Association. I’m also running the volunteer committee at work now and will be participating in volunteer work at a local park next month.
Single != lonely or bored, that’s for damn sure.