Babes in the Woods

Risking the wrath of certain feminist friends of mine, I'm typing this with my tail between my legs and pulse quivering. But the thing is, I'm chuckling just thinking about what's on the tip of my fingers, and anything worth a chuckle is always worth a post.

Coincidences, a mass case of bad luck, or just a bad year - a large number of us (us = me and my girlfriends) over the course of the first few months of this year have suddenly found ourselves 'bitterly' single. I hate to admit to being bitter over a break-up, but I'll admit for me and my other girls that yes, we are very bitter. The rancor easily arises when there's another woman involved. And a lot of us have been cheated on, so there are broken prides and bitter hearts all around.

And in the midst of all this, we try to be there for each other and comfort each other. 'My boyfriend was rottener,' 'But mine was gayer' ... downplaying each other's sense of loss and at the same time, adding to (screwing up?) our vocabularies. Us girls are good that way, being there for each other and passing the tissues around and creating new, no-worder words.

And when you get a lot of free, bored, single women together, you get a lot of those things called 'Girls' Night Out.' Because we balk, yes, us brave girls who fearlessly tackle merciless deadlines and tantrum-throwing clients, actually balk at the prospect of going home and stepping foot inside empty apartments. And we turn up at a lot of places we never would've turned up otherwise if empty apartments didn't intimidate us so much...

So we turn up here and there all over this ferocious jungle and we order our drinks and kiss each other's cheeks and give the meanest stares to any guy who dare to let a straying eye wander our side. And you don't want to see the scorn with which we trample the poor, few intrepid souls who dare to actually approach us and hope to join us - hoping to be included in the table, the conversation or the dance! It's a good thing those poor souls can't hear the volley of expletives and uncomplimentary adjectives and nouns generously thrown after them behind their backs.

And we sit there, the high priestesses of heartbreak, undiluted, unpolluted and talk about the more important stuffs life has to offer because we have no time for petty, stupid, childish stuffs like romance. We talk about important stuffs like -

- how much a half-boiled egg costs in Russia 'in Russian Roubles'...

- or if we'd like to sit on a lemon tree. And if yes, which branch we'd like to sit on, top, middle or bottom branch...

- how much we'd like to have a butler like Jeeves...

- trying to figure out the science behind the disco lights. 'Yes, I think a double convex lens!'

- arguing about who's gayer - Batman or Superman. (My bet's on Batman by the way. What do you think? I think Robin explains it all. Anyway, I'm taking votes. My friends are biased, they are way too fond of the Batsuit and the Batmobile to vote for him over Superman whose costume isn't quite as attractive as Batman's.)

- which divine member of Il Divo we'd most like to spend a night with. (Carlos Marín, Carlos Marín, Carlos Marín!)

- what's cooler - besides the ones in our rooms - the ability to walk through walls or the ability to see through them...

Yeah, deep stuffs.

So we amuse ourselves this way for a couple of hours at the most. And then, we all start to get a little listless and I, being an open speaker of mind, usually am the first to finally blurt out that I am very envious of the couple very obviously in love sitting all draped over, around, above and beyond each other in the corner. A little sickening but still envious. And one XXian tells me to shut up.

'Feel sorry for her. The guy's probably cheating on her and the dumb chick has no inkling of it..' she says.

'We don't need any member of the species called men. We're happy without them. Our lives are complete, we function better, we are rid of one of life's little clutters.' One XXian says. We all join in and chirp about how happy we are without them and how well we sleep and how we don't wake up in the middle of the night anymore - alone and missing those rotten liars.

So back to Russian Roubles and Romanian leus. Back to the history of mankind and the electric bulb and the flat iron. I'll let you in on a little secret - we act confident and proud and touch-me-not-y, I swear if you walk in and see us sitting there, on our high chairs and with high-heeled feet and legs confidently crossed, I'll bet even a poor actress like me would fool you. But our eyes hungrily roam around the room looking for ex-boyfriend, and when in the right mood, even a possible replacer...And no matter how hard-boiled we look, one right word or action and I'd be spilling my heart out and calling you master. And I'm pretty sure my friends are no different.

But we keep up the pretense.

'Men will soon be obsolete. With cloning, we can wipe them off the face of this earth. Haha.' says one XXian.

'Haha. Super. Haha' I say.

'Yay! Let's wipe Y out, we'll have only XX, no more dirty Ys in the Xs. Haha' pipes in the rest.

In girlish enthusiasm, we call a couple of XYs and warn them of their impending doom.

'Your shelf life is almost over. Find a religion, make your peace with God. Haha.' we tell them.

'C'mon ladies, the world won't be half as fun without us' he says.

We 'bleh-eh' him and hang up.

Talk some more about John Wilkes Booth and Nathuram Godse and the coral snake and the Greek Islands and the natural vegetation of Mizoram. Inside, I miss ex and me's nonsense, non-intelligent chatters. And I wonder how long I'm going to be able to fake this. Then, a small voice, whose owner I couldn't identify, says 'You know, he's right.'

'Who? Nathuram Godse?'

'Nah, XY of the recent phone call.'

And here, we usually split - No-more-guys Vs Gimme-them. But they're my friends and I know them well and I know inside, both groups equally miss those bastards. And that XY-of-the-recent-phone-call is right after all. It's just no fun without them. Lousy SOBs though they may be, they make putting on makeup and buying nice dresses and shoes and smelling good so much more funner (er..no worder again?).

So in the end we all agree and we leave the jungle house with a general love for all mankind in our hearts.

We wait for a rick/taxi to wave down and we hear a voice behind us -

'Hey babes, want a lift?' - the geeky looking head to whom the geeky-sounding voice belongs to says, showing us for what reason I can't fathom, the 'rock-on' sign, also called the satanic hand sign, also called the brim.

We have love for mankind now so we politely say 'No thanks :-) *smile*'

'Then how about a nice long drive?'

'No thanks!!'

'Then how about we just chill? How about it babes?'

'Listen we said NO! Why don't you just fuck off jerk??'

**sigh** Vicious love-hate cycle this!

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