Of Women and Men

A couple within my social circle recently broke up. The girl came to me for solace and advice, either of which I was really uncomfortable in giving. I didn't think I was equipped to give her good advice and that her course of action should be determined by herself. Wisdom dictates that to guide her on her path, I should not be telling her what she should do, but by asking pertinent questions and by her thinking through the answers, help her to shed light on her situation. Solace and comfort, well, I hesitate to say that I'm capable of providing either to someone in grief.

By providing a listening ear, inadvertently, she started me thinking about relationships again, something that I've been trying to hide in the mental closet. What is love? Talking about it and mulling over it has given me no insights. If it's something that you're meant to feel and know instinctively, perhaps I lack the faculty for it. How did it feel for her, to perceive that she was more in love with the guy in question, than he was with her? Would she have been better off not getting verbal reassurances of love if he could not give her any, if she was feeling content and happy with his company? Would he have been better off? How did he really see her anyway? Questions I can't really ask directly, as it is somewhat awkward.

I am somewhat fascinated by the love lives of friends since part of me hopes, that by listening to them talk, I might get some insight on my own life. Sadly, it has sprung more unanswered questions that I don't know how to begin answering.

In social settings, it is best to mingle in a group of evenly mixed genders. In social groups where one gender dominates, I've noticed that men and women behave differently, and often for the worse. Even so, for reasons I cannot entirely put my finger on, I'm more comfortable with men than women. Perhaps it is because I had a lonely existence at school -- I was in an all girls' school for the most part of my early education and I've never quite fit in. I was enrolled in a degree where men greatly outnumbered women and there, I didn't exactly fit in either. Still, I think the propensity to seek out men in my life came about because the males in the earlier part of my life have been kinder to me on average.

Not all men I've dated have been able to accept this and I'm not too certain that any of them have. One was quite clearly threatened by it quite early on. I gave him up because I treasured the friends I have more.

Yet, I've never been quite happy with my love life. Perhaps I haven't met the right person. Perhaps, as a friend suggested, that the problem stemmed with me and I needed to get my own life sorted out, that I wouldn't be happy with anyone so long as I remained the way I am. Or perhaps I'm not cut out for the normal, expected life.

I don't have the great friendships that some people apparently have, and for that, I'm somewhat envious. I don't have that small, close knit group of best friends, something that apparently women have, the notion as popularised by the Bridget Jones story. Still, I enjoy the friendships I have. Sometimes I have been disappointed and wished some things panned out differently, but if I were to describe how I felt about my friends, it would have been "mostly contentment". That's something I haven't really felt about my romantic relationships. Instead, I experience a complex, unidentified emotion that has elements of resentment and anger mixed in with some fondness and the occasional longing for that person's company.

I guess I have been very close to it once upon a time. A certain domestic bliss with the apparent beloved for some of the times. One who lived apart from me but spent a great deal of time at my place. A certain simple comfort from just doing simple, everyday things with that someone, like cooking together. Still, there was something lacking, and if I walk down the aisle today, it would be more from social pressure to do so, than with any great satisfaction with the man I've involved myself with.

What to do? Perhaps a part of me is never quite content to be by myself, especially at my most vulnerable, which is why time and again, I'm tempted into relationships even when I think it might end in grief and emotional instability. I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel for myself, so I wonder why that poor girl thought that I could help her. Would it have been better for her if I'd turned her away?