I’m relieved

when I try something new

and I don’t like it.

My friend told me, “It’s not easy to get married.”

“Sure, it is,” I said. “Most women can’t wait for their special day.”

“But you have to get them interested in you,” my friend said.

“True.”

“And then they have to want to date you.”

“That’s not that hard,” I said.

“Why don’t you have girls around, then?”

“Every man has a hobby. Women have never been mine. I like to look at them, but when I interact with them, they only confuse me.”

“See, that’s your deficiency.”

“Well, I know I’m not perfect.”

“Far from it!”

“Well, for some men, women come natural. For men like me, that’s just not true. There’s a kind of man, who desperately tries to pin down any woman he can. I’m not him. I believe in doing what comes natural.”

“And what’s that?”

“Writing.”

“That’s like masturbating!”

He dated his girlfriend and got her pregnant. Then they got married. He found himself a competitive job and his hair fell out. Mine did too. I collected it in a tiny envelope, to remind me of my youth. No wonder I was still single. I got an apartment and embraced the silence. He got a house and mortgaged himself to the hilt. I got fat and he got fat.

“What do you have?” He asked me.”

“I don’t know,” I said.

He had a smirk of satisfaction on his tired face.