non-Sex in the City

SJP and the search for other not so essential items

2008-09-17T00:52:00.000-07:00

So this story begins with Sex and the City. The ‘Sex and the City’ movie to be precise. I’m no big fan; only ever watched maybe…oh I dunno…one and a half episodes in full myself. (If you need more proof, look at what this blog is named after…I couldn’t even get the damn TITLE right…!). And let’s face it, it is all the rage at the moment.

The series was never was for me. The sex scenes outrageous, Sarah Jessica-Parker’s outfits even moreso. But if there’s one thing SJP’s character gets right, it’s catching up with her girlfriends.

The other day my own girlfriend was yelling over the background noise into her mobile and hence directly into my ear, “Ani!! We have been waiting for you at the popcorn queue!! Where the hell are YOU??!” and there I was…standing, mobile perched between shoulder and head, a different handbag in each hand, and face so full of guilt, Sally might as well have been right there in front of me, to catch me red-handed with sale stock instead of in front of the cinema where I’d promised.

Never mind the fact that she was told I was already on the way there. I had to make a decision fast: red heavily discounted pleather modelled on the new ‘forget Granny, go Nicole Ritchie’ ridiculously shoulder-breakingly big style, or a charcoal non-discounted leather and unabashedly sensible bag. Screw it. I thought. No, I did not buy one. Nor did I buy both, which I shamefully admit is the decision-making method I have been known to resort to when attempting to thus, decision-make.

If there’s another thing those New York girls know what to do, is shopping – for the right one.
And so, while running frantically through the shopping centre, dodging through late night female shoppers and their spouses in tow, I thought, ‘Nope…just like the fantastical pair of jeans I’m waiting for, the perfect handbag is going to choose me. Choose ME damn it. And when it calls out my name, and begs me to not leave the department store without it, that’s when I’ll bring out Little Miss VISA.

Darn it. That perfect handbag is going to find ME…it will be made of the finest handcrafted leather, so soft that fingers will long to remain close to its touch. There will be pockets and compartments and a deepness to it that didn’t swallow my arm along with my multivitamins, but enough to hold my precious things safe. It will be comfortable to wear and hold close. It will smell divine, the way good handbags should.

That’s when it hit me. Handbags. Jeans. Perfume. Men. I was sick and tired of looking. Had I been looking? No. I rephrase. I was sick and tired of putting up with the ones that were available to me.
I shared this new idea with one of my friends.

“It’s not that I’m being picky per se-eeeeeee…” I spoke slowly and watched her facial expression carefully, as this friend was known for being more than honest with me. I think it’s called ‘being frank.’
“It’s just that I think I’ve realised that I’ve got better things to do in my life than be on the constant look out for that perfect one. You know…THE one! I mean, why not wait for him to find me!!”

“There’s nothing spectacular in what you’re saying Ani,” she replied matter-of-factly picking expertly at the remains of her fried chicken wing. “And I say GOOD ON YOU GIRL! Mind you, you could be waiting a long time…but hey, we’re still young!”

Satisfied that this latest revelation of mine had passed the approval of one of my closest friends. I left the topic at that. Still, I couldn’t help but internalise that ‘Humph’ I felt at the words ‘we’re still young’. Easy for you to say, I thought. You don’t belong to a community where everyone your age is married, expecting, or about to do either one. But let’s leave this particular gripe for another blogspot.

I must confess. On the way through an airport lounge, a beauty products store drew me in with its warm lights, orange and blue undertones, and heavenly organic fragrances emanating – right across from my departing Gate 9 – oh, how convenient. With passengers already boarding on my flight, I only had enough time to march through quickly and check out the new perfume range before spraying the nicest smelling one as a tiny spiff on my wrist with not much thought.

The whole weekend I was away interstate, it lingered. The whole time I was back home in Sydney, at work, driving to places, going out, the scent reminded me it was there. It wanted me…and quite frankly, by the end of the week, I wanted IT!

After much tossing (of that particular trenchcoat, on and off) and turning (of my left wrist so I could smell the scent), it was decided. After years of gifted fragrances and trendy scents that one in three high school girls owned, I had chosen my Eau de Parfum.

And what of playing the waiting game for the right man? Or rather, ridding your life of games altogether and just getting on with your own albeit single life until, God-willing of course, your partner-to-be appears only to say “I want to be with you because you are the one wonderful being I want to spend the rest of my life with”.

Look, I’m not saying this is a foolproof way of landing your man if that’s what you unattached girls are thinking. I couldn’t even confirm that next month I myself will still want to be holding on for my Prince Charming! I’m merely reminding us all of a way it may happen because all this shopping really does my head in. How many times do we have to sit through that awkward introduction of that ‘oh so wonderful friend of a friend’s cousin’s sister-in-law’s neighbour’s SON who would get along just splendid with you’? Or get exasperated that it’s been the ninth wedding/dinner party/National Day concert/baby shower that month that you didn’t meet one single single semi-decent man? I don’t know about you, but I barely have the time for my favourite family and friends let alone the energy to expend on a mission for Mr. Right.

Is he going to appear if we are on the constant search? Or worse yet, will he magically transform out of the one we are considering being with but who has no ambition nor commitment nor respect for us? Uh uh. Sorry darl. No magic dust is going to change that frog.
After all, if there’s one thing the Sex and the City girls know what to do, it’s that finding the best man comes second to finding my best self.

Look we all succumb once in a while. I still head straight for the blue spectrum of jeans racks; whether in an expensive clothes boutique or a second-hand store, whether I have a half-day to shop or ten minutes left on my lunch break, armed with that tiny spark of hope that THAT pair which were made for me are there. It will not be classed a ‘skinny jean’ or be so snug as to cut off my circulation. It will give where it’s meant to give, but sturdy enough to keep its shape. It will sit in that in-between spot – so DARN difficult for jeans manufacturers to architect! – not so low as to encourage a game of butt-peek-a-boo, not so high as to limit food ingestion. This pair of jeans that I dream of will make me look and feel mighty good!

And you know what ladies? Yes, I may NEVER find this pair. I have resigned to this fact - after first wrestling it with much strength, copping a few punches, jabbing it a good one square on the jaw, and then losing to a 7-round total knock out. This fact being that this perfect pair of jeans may indeed remain an unreachable, fantastimagical part of my dreams.

But as a conclusion on this search for jeans and other delightful items: for now, that’s ok. Much, much later down the track, I just hope to find a bloody good tailor.

Me the man-hater

2007-05-24T07:43:00.000-07:00

I hate men. Yes, this had been my life slogan for at least the past four months. Not in a Germaine Greer-ish “What use do we have for these creatures?” sort of way. Quite simply, I had a strong dislike for them. Think of hate in its raw, fundamental form, as in the way you hated sharing your favourite doll in kinder. It’s not complicated but instinctual. After I explain to you the reasoning behind this, perhaps you will see why.

My work as a social worker is, needless to say, tough stuff. At times I am thrown into situations where it feels as if I am the last lifeline this child or that family have at having something right in the world. Of course, with the appropriate debriefing, and the conscious reasoning one makes with oneself after a long week at work, you tell yourself this is far from true. But you can imagine the stress and burden of responsibilities that come with the job.

Now it is far from statistically valid or scientifically reliable research, but I had done some calculating. A lot, and I’d even go so far as to say most of the issues that came to me in the last few months just happened to be directly or indirectly related to some stupid mistake a man made. There was even a whole fortnight where it seemed as if all the fathers, husbands, boyfriends, sons, uncles and ex-boyfriends of my clientele had sat around one weekend in front of the telly and decided just for fun, “Hey fellas! Let’s go out there and create some problems for the people who love and care for us…. BONUS!”

I understand this was a strong call to make. And I’ll even admit I – an unattached female -could have been biased at times as lone research director, experimenter, data collector, and analyst for this project, somewhat skewing any chance of real accuracy. However, I like to think that I am simply sharing the evidence as reported.

Enter my social life. Or rather, the social lives of everyone else around me.

Imagine after a long day of family mediation, calls to emergency accommodation, fighting Centrelink for deserved financial benefits, said single female settles down with a hot cup of tea, her favourite slippers and a well-worn couch. Now imagine one of her best friends on the other side of this couch telling her the man who chickened out after she had already committed to studying, working, living with him overseas had just called begging her to remain in contact with him….as friends, friends who talk to each other every single night.

Replace this best friend, with another girlfriend and push time forward, to say, twenty-four hours. Girlfriend number two, was not short of needing comfort after being told by her newly-wedded husband that he didn’t want to be a father anymore. Great news, considering she is now three months pregnant.

And so this pattern seemed to repeat itself give or take a day or two in between. Some days the setting was a phone conversation in my car. At other times, a café table and four empty coffee cups. The story was the same each time, just swap the characters and choices of beverage; men not thinking properly equalled men doing dumb things.

And this was not the end of it. It seems that once the human picks up on a repeated set of sequences, it’s all it ever perceives! What started out as a curious and insanely entertaining observation grew into some diabolical ugly multiple-headed monster…with bad breath.

You know when you think of a certain car, perhaps one you want to buy for yourself next and you know exactly what it is, down to the number of doors and colour of seats. Then all of a sudden, everyone in freakin’ town has one! You could be out on the freeway, or parking at a shopping centre and there it is, again and again. Another clone of your car innocently making a right turn around the roundabout.

Well it was as if God had turned on a switch, and suddenly half of the human race was running around with their brainpower on the last bullet of battery life.

My own family I worked out, were rife with these organisms. I counted a cousin who was still with her husband who wanted ‘both his women.’ An Aunty who had to find out about a parallel family complete with children, wife and plasma screen. And another cousin trying to escape physical abuse.

The television and papers were no better. Gun shootings and million-dollar frauds, war and genocide, prime ministers and presidents who didn’t know how to quit!!!! I was going crazy. I was one screwed up little bunny. I had become a tired, disillusioned, male-hating version of my former self.

I didn’t care anymore about continuing my research or pursuing a publication. The evidence was all there. I had a substantial sample size. I no longer studied the subjects with careful scrutiny, hoping with all might he would turn out to be one of the good ones, an outlier, an anomaly in the pool of numbers. The one that later might just stand to overturn my hypothesis and prove me wrong. Because each time I did, MAN 6HUY8-09 would turn around and leave his wife and kids. Or MAN 3UIO5-01 would say yes to testing the latest, and therefore by far the most unsafe, nuclear power plant … in the MIDDLE OF A 2000 YEAR OLD COMMUNITY OF HUMAN BEINGS!!

Michael Moore had said it, and now my life had confirmed it; all men are stupid. All hope was lost. There was no point in living life under the delusion that the opposite sex could ever do something right. Or more specifically could ever do something right for me.

Yes, for me…

I suddenly knew why it had all become too painful, too familiar. It had gotten personal. There I was fighting to find every specimen with that particular part of anatomy to show the world, well, to prove to myself really, that all men are bastards. Morons. Imbeciles. Idiots. You name it. Any endearing term you have heard after the expression “All men are…”

Because it was much easier this way. Why bother trying to find out what it was that was wrong with you, hence rendering you man-less, when all you had to do was find the fault in the other party. And heck, we’ve already covered the fact that this other party had a lot of them.

Sadly, in doing so, I overlooked many, many wonderful men. My friends, my friends’ partners, my own father and grandfathers for goodness sake. Husbands and mates of mine who did their thing, and worked tirelessly, often in the quiet background while a few notorious dickheads stole the limelight and dragged down the collective reputation of the male sex.

After this revelation, things thankfully took a quieter turn. I started noticing fathers in the playgrounds again, and the incredibly patient men in the waiting rooms holding the hands of that important woman in their life.

Man-hating is a disease ladies. Fortunately for me, my latest bout lasted only several months. And I say latest, because I’m sensible enough to realise that I may succumb to the illness every now and then. I have a couple of friends for whom I’m afraid the affliction is long-term. Blame age. Blame bad experience. My very close cousin, who might as well be my big sister, is married with two children. And you guessed it… a man-hater. Yes you can still be happily married and fall ill. She is not afraid to remind her husband that she will leave at anytime with the kids if he dares to cross the line. And she constantly berates the whole male species all in the name of imparting sisterly knowledge to me, bless her soul.

Oh and it’s contagious. My advice is to limit your contact with man-hating sufferers as much as possible. At least until their symptoms die down and surpass the infectious stage (usually identifiable with the absence of verbal diarrhoea). Lastly, wash your hands clean after every meeting, because the grime can stay on you for days.

And so after months of tiresome, if not slightly flawed, work, my research project came to a resounding halt. The only conclusion to be made was that the subject was on the other side of the microscope all along. With one more footnote to make: the editor of this journal article would like to acknowledge the existence of women who do awful things just as the men do. This is where women-haters come in, and that’s a whoooooole different story altogether…

x Ani

The quest for imperfectionism

2007-01-22T19:25:00.000-08:00

It is a worry. It is an epidemic. It has become a social travesty, and things don’t seem to be looking hopeful. The question is “Where are all the good men….?”

You don’t need to be single to join in this conversation. Even your wifey friends are commenting on the lack of substance in the pool of available males (for you). In the community, outside the community, on this Earth. And while they quietly pray to God they have found their ‘one’, they too lament with you, because dammit, they want to see you happy with a fine man and making lots of happy babies.

Is this where I see myself anytime soon? I don’t think so.

I’m twenty-four, Indonesian, living at home with two siblings and parents, three cats, not-so-bad job and a car I’m still paying off. So, what do I have in common with you? I’m a Muslim woman living in Australia. And like all you ladies, I happen to be part of one helluva kick-ass group of people; we have brains, we have pride and we have guts.

Whether you believe in settling early, settling for nothing less, career-making, or match-making, apart from a few rare exceptions – and these women do exist and have every right to – we all imagine some time in the future to be waking up next to somebody. That one person who is the last thing you see before you sleep. The one who makes you stop looking.

Back to the question about the existence of these creatures, who are sounding more and more mythical as time passes – “Ahhhhh, yes my dear child…there was a time when the ‘wonderful, perfect man’ existed… Respectful, noble, generous, warm…some were even gentlemanly! They lived in abundance back then. Enough to share around even. What a fine time that was!!”

Look, I’m not delusional. I stopped dreaming about this ‘perfect’ man a long time ago. Somewhere in between the time I was told a five year old could “not really love” Travis, the twenty-something year old who couriered packages weekly to my uncle’s shop and the time Jude Law was allegedly admitted to cheating with … oh God knows which one.

What I do know exists is the man who is perfect for you. Ok, so he leaves the toilet seat up, and he still buys you plastic flowers because “they will last forever!!” even though you have hinted again and again that you prefer the fresh ones even if they die after a week. And he has to be reminded by phone, SMS, in person, and by phone again to buy milk on the way home. But he fits you. He is your complement. He strengthens your weaknesses, and he depends on you to make up for his.

Perfectly imperfect, one might say.

Let’s find out what men consider perfect. A Muslim male I work with, young enough guy, was quite shyly giving me the criteria for his future wife, of whom he was on a hard-earned search for.

“I’d like her to be practising, ummm, sense of humour, intelligent…”

“So you’d like her to have a brain…?”

“Oh yeah, I don’t want her to be a village girl or anything. She can’t be a sack of potatoes!!” (Quote, unquote).

His checklist was fair enough, I said. Ok then, so why not go for Heba…? A girl we both knew. Heba was clever, witty, gregarious, a funny girl and very, very gorgeous.

To this he replied with some difficulty, that he was (insert uncomfortable cough) looking for someone a bit more…traditional. Upon seeing the shock across my face, he then added, “Well, you know…how do I say this…? Er, more girly.”

I could not believe what I was hearing. If this guy thought someone like Heba, with her good (very feminine) looks, funky sense of dress – we all know young women like her, they wear a headscarf and look trendy enough to have walked out of a Sportsgirl catalogue – was not girly, God knows what men thought of me, a short-haired, runners-wearing, loud woman whose make-up regime consists of lip-balm and moisturiser.

Darling, I wanted to tell him, go out and find your sack of potatoes!! First, you’ll have more luck finding one for yourself, and secondly, you’ll find the vegetables a lot more accommodating.

I was reminded of my girlfriend whom, after exchanging more than one phone conversation had finally met the man with whom she had been ‘matched with’ according to the notorious community match-maker.

The meeting, with families present, went perfectly. He couldn’t have been more wonderful. Funny, good-looking, successful, but more importantly, said friend and potential hit it off instantly. Or so we all thought.

“What?!! He is NOT interested?!! What the hell happened on Sunday then?” Surely this could not be the same man whose glowing report I had heard about just days earlier.

Ah – but it was. My girlfriend WAS perfect, but dear matchmaker he had asked, could he possibly find someone like her but who came in a Size 8.

Truly infuriating.

These stories do make me wonder, what are other single women like me doing/acting/saying/behaving (circle whichever applicable) wrongly that might make it that bit harder for every Tom, Deen, and Haris.

And the answer was simple; nothing.

We weren’t freaks. We weren’t incapable, meek, playthings that waited in the corner until it was our turn to speak.

Sure we could play clueless, and act needy so men would possibly feel that their existence was worthy in our lives – but what a life that would be!

No, we were doing just fine. If our independence, stubborn streaks, voicing of women’s rights was too much for one man to handle, then Allahu-ahlam, we are going to go about our merry ways until that perfectly imperfect man is brave enough to spot a good woman when he sees one.

Until then, I have plenty of non-attached friends…we can all go live in a big house somewhere and be as non-girly as we like.

Ani