no balls of which to be belle

It was ironic to me to be called out for boy craziness in that last post (of all posts). The night I chose solitude and spaghetti over company for company's sake, the night I chose stillness. Anonymous 1, this is for you.

I am tired. I know it seems the more casual kisses you accumulate, the better you should feel about yourself. Not so. With each one I get further and further from the magic I'm looking for.

I started dating after Peter, to null the void. I thought if I filled my dance card I could stave off the inevitable sadness that comes when the man you thought you'd marry . . . politely declines. I started dating because Non-Date, who had been lodged in my heart like a chicken bone—for years, bailed on me. (Almost immediately after finally making a move.) Admittedly, I've been a bit of a bandit. I've had more dates than a Medjool thief in Morrocco.

Then again, I'm not sure what I've been doing can be called 'dating.' With very few notable exceptions, I've gotten some random sidewalk smooches to show for myself and not much else. Hardly my childhood ideal of courtship. So, before y'all get the idea that it's been nothing but wine and roses around here, I thought we could do a little year in review, to recap. In chronological order:

The Bartender. First kiss. We went dancing. He lives in Florida. An innocent 24 hour flirtation, like a pleasant flu: mild and sweet like that Get Out Of Jail Free card in a Monopoly Game. Rated as PG as a Steve Martin movie.

The Pilot: First grown-up. I sat next to the man on a plane. We exchanged emails. After one very chaste dinner and drinks in the Village, we're now pen pals.

The Foodie: First real date. I got to wear a dress and heels and revel in the fact that I knew which fork to use. While he was decidedly a fan of my witty reparté, when I wouldn't put out, he stopped calling. Hardly a guy to write home about.

The Finance Guy: First younger man. A hiccup. He is briefly and obliquely mentioned in a post about the weather. He voted for McCain/Palin and he wants to be in Human Resources when he grows up. We smooched twice, maybe three times, politely. Again, I'm still not writing home.

The G.I.Q.: First . . . among firsts. Okay, now we're getting somewhere. It started here, with the xylophone cortinas (Christ am I vague when I want to be) and I'm still waiting for his vice grips to fade. It was my first (and only!) you-know-what after Peter and I was shocked when it continued here and made me feel like this. You know the rest, for better or for worse. And now I can't see him without feeling as though someone has stuck their fist through my sternum.

The Photojournalist: I mean, really. He hasn't been in the city since he took my number under the scaffolding on Mulberry Street (some forty five minutes after he met me). I'm not holding my breath. He has 1300 Facebook friends.

Planter Guy: First mistake. Some pseudo new age jerkoff who used his "we need only fear our fear itself" philosophy to guilt me into bed. Needless to say, it didn't work.

The Cinematographer: The guy has an M.Phil. from Oxford. But I wanted to be alone.

So there you have it folks, I threw open the French doors, set my nets a-seining, and what happened? Eight minor kisses and a broken heart. This is supposed to keep me warm at night? I remain uninspired and under-affirmed. My melancholy, my sense of the machine, comes from looking at my life through the chink in the fourth wall and thinking: none of this matters.

So, sure, I should be flattered. Good lord, if this many douchebags want to lock lips with me, I must be worth something after all! But I just don't believe that to be the barometer.

When I say I think I'm fundamentally unloveable, it is because of all the dead horses and dysentery cases littering my romantic Oregon Trail. I have always been loneliest in a room full of people. And this phase of my life, this beast of a Quarter Life Crisis, is no exception. I'm not calling myself fat hoping the benevolent powers of the Internet will rush to persuade me otherwise. I'm not fishing for compliments here. I am grappling with the darker, weaker parts of my nature and, yes, it appears, doing so right out in the open. Judge me however you will, I'm sure I deserve it.

Bottom line: No man, to the best of my knowledge, has ever truly loved me back.

You say I should try being alone. That, in this Charybdis of chance encounters, I am "wailing in misery," surrounded by glass slippers left like tokens on the bedstand, ungrateful. I have two things to say.

First: I am neither wailing nor miserable. Just another postlapsarian broad with half a brain trying to maintain her dignity in the jungle of boy meets girl. And second: Prince Charmings?! Plural? I beg your pardon, but, is there anyone anywhere on the above list that even remotely qualifies for that title?

I'm no Cinderella. And, except as pertains to the G.I.Q., I've kept both my damn shoes on, thank you very much.

Maybe I should continue to cultivate myself like the house plant of a single girl I am. Regular watering, re-potting and a sprinkle of dessicated bird poop. Learn to love me before I try to love anyone else. The list of platitudes goes on. And I'm trying, I really am. Hence my surprise—because Saturday was the first in a long list of nights when I felt I did anything right. I claimed something unclaimable, wooed myself with my own domestic prowess, made myself a metaphorical meatloaf. Lord knows I've felt more alone amid the aforementioned 'gentlemanly' attention than I ever did camped on my couch.

But jeez, if I missed Prince Charming along the way, someone please let me know so I can do my best to rectify the situation. Otherwise, these clowns just come out of the woodwork. My confidence is by no means bolstered by their spurious advances. If this is dating, I'll take alone.

All I'm saying is: I would hope to hope for more.