.play nice.

i don't know why it is easier for me to talk to women than men. i am a different person in the company of women. women are easier to be with, most likely because i am well practiced in talking to them. i grew up with a sister and i spent four years at an women's college.

with women, i am myself. i am offensively honest, babbling, and insecure. i'm a chandler with my incessant attempts at humor, a monica with my neuroses and lurking competitive urges. i'm trusting and fearless in my friendships with women. i'm compassionate and concerned.

with men, i'm another person. i'm sweaty-palmed and shy. i'm angry and on the offensive. i'm jumpy, armed, and ready to fire. my self-consciousness overcomes, and i'm never pretty enough, cute enough, bubbly enough. i don't know how to put on makeup, let alone which color blush to buy at the store. i battle my own belligerence as well as my fear of saying something that might put them off. i don't know how to be a girl.

why not just act the same around everybody? why not make the same jokes, tell the same anecdotes about my cats and rattle off a list of hypochondriacal self-diagnoses? it's a nasty catch-22, because everybody tells you to be yourself. but myself isn't as cute as it should be. i never touch a boy's arm and throw my head back at his witty jokes. i always try to pay the bill.

is it that women expect less of me, or have expectations that are more realistic and well rounded?

is it that men expect me to play the girl, to listen more, and to talk less?

maybe i'm just mean. maybe i'm just abrasive. maybe i'm looking for a reaction from men that i don't need from women. maybe i want adoration, arm-grazing, and chivalrous concern. i don't know how to be cute-sexy or sexy-sexy or funny-sexy or maternal-sexy or any of those things. i'm not coy. i'm not graceful. i'm not a lady. i threw up a little bit in the shower this morning brushing my tongue and told all of my co-workers about it first thing over coffee. i bite the shit out of my nails, and the tips of me are consequently crusted and stubby.

i don't own a push up bra. i don't own a low-cut shirt. my jeans are all baggy. my shoes are birkenstocks, and i finally went out and spent fifty dollars on a pair of peep-toe wedge heels a few weeks ago. i've worn them twice: both times i've wobbled, stumbled, and wanted to shrink into my shirt collar. i felt like a whore.

but where does it get me, the bitter, bitchy accusational tone i take with all of these unassuming suitors? it certainly doesn't make men feel flattered, funny, or necessary. my default behavior around men is emasculating.

perhaps it's a power dynamic in play. my sour attitude announces: no sir, you don't get to be the big man around me. it wards off condescension. it's a verbal moat that drowns men who aren't ready to give me the power, the upper hand, and the check. maybe i just want to be equal.

but it's a tall order, in my head. i want equality and flirtation. i want to make the jokes and call the shots, but if I have goose bumps you better give me your jacket. is it a wonder i'm single?

just beyond those cranky conversations with men i don't know, just a short drive home and through door number 33 in my apartment building is quite a different person. it's me, on the couch, alone. the first thing i do is crack a beer, kicking cats from under my feet and turning on the radio. i keep an ashtray by the window and i don't usually go more than a few days without crying.

i saw a dove the other day, alive but lying in the gutter. i pulled my car over and rolled down the window to offer help to the group of folks who had picked up the wounded bird. it was docile, and i assumed it was domestic. we put it in a bush, with the encouragement of the bearded man in army green who stroked the bird's belly with his thumb and assured me that the bird would rather recuperate or die alone and in peace. so we left it. i rolled up my window and drove away. and i wiped my eyes as i started my engine, still seeing the round, soft shape melt like vanilla haagen-dazs on gray asphalt.

it's alone, on my couch, with my beer, that i lean back into cushions and hold my gut against these vivid assaults that i face every day. i can tell the story to my girlfriends, tell them how i cried about the dying bird and how every time my dad calls i'm afraid it will be for the last time and how the sight of children in rain boots makes my stomach drop out from under me. but these aren't the things i say to boys.

maybe it's about vulnerability, and i'm just not comfortable picking my scabs in front of men. maybe the very experience of trying to impress, but trying so hard not to try so hard, and wanting so much to be wanted, maybe it feels a little more exposed than i can handle and it's all i can do to wield callouses like weapons. maybe my behavior around the opposite sex is more defensive than i even realize.

but in a world where doves die in gutters and friends are our most precious currency, it's worth figuring out how to be sweet to people instead of vicious.