Kiss the Boys By Cleo Eleanor Rigby picks up the rice in the church/Where a wedding has been, Lives in a dream,/Waits at the window, wearing a face/That she keeps in a jar by the door,/Who is it for?       I like to imagine myself as a voice of logic and of reason (except for that whole Snuggle Bear thing…), but I’ve decided to, in keeping with gender stereotype, stray into more emotionally charged territory with this article. You see, I keep having these nightmares that I’m Eleanor Rigby. The Cap’n assures me that not everyone in the world knows who Eleanor is…I think that’s just because he hates the Beatles. A lot. For the sake of clarification I’ve invited my friend Captain Obvious (no relation to Willard) to help me out: Eleanor Rigby is a character in a song entitled “Eleanor Rigby.” I think it was on the Beatles’ white album…but I forget. I’ve printed significant lyrics above.       Cyber confessional: I am a horrible female friend. Most girls find me strange…which is cool because I am. The term “female friend,” however, implies a somewhat specific and definitely more nebulous relationship…i.e. the “not girlfriend” of a guy. This is the type of relationship at which I do not excel…at all. Just the other day I was trying to compile a list of all my guy friends I have not made out with…. Short, short list, my friends. Peopled largely (there are a few exceptions to this; you both know who you are) by guys who either prefer other guys or girls a tad closer to their own age.       Any perfectly honest guy will tell you that “would I have sex with this person?1” is a question he asks himself upon meeting an attractive female…or any female. Or at least perfectly honest guys have told me this. I do not personally know for I am neither. Girls aren’t entirely like this. Entirely…Maybe it’s just that our brains are complex enough to allow us to ask ourselves two questions: the aforementioned and “is he The One?” The first question is pretty easily answered… The answer to the second one is always, always pending.       This is a sometimes-unpleasant reality, but it, as far as I know, is reality. Especially among those horrible “Christians don’t date” people. Bleh. I’ve gotten pretty well used to this fun little relationship factoid, and, as I mentioned, since I like to consider myself both logical and reasonable, I try not to let it run my life. Well. There are two girls I hate because they’ve both been engaged (at separate times) to a guy friend I had a little crush on when I was fourteen and don’t keep in contact with anymore, but aside from that… and it’s not ______________________________ 1Hint: Christians usually pretend the question is “would I make out with this person?” but let’s be honest, shall we.

like I really hate them. I just don’t like them very much and wish they would die, preferably as painfully as possible.       So this is a screwy situation, if you can imagine. It’s a situation that leads to what I like to call the “swirling vortex of asshole-y self-loathing.” You hate his girlfriend; you hate yourself for being such an asshole. You flirt; you hate yourself for making an ass of yourself. You start to imagine he like likes you, and you wonder how to let him down gently; you hate yourself for being a self-deluded, egotistical asshole. As the great cinematic classic “when harry met sally” has taught us, inter-gendered friendships are tricky things.       Attention Gossipmongers: Cyberspace’s answers to Heloise and Abelard2 (by which I mean, Cleo and the Capt.) have called it quits so we could be “just friends.”3 And we meant that…or at least as much as any flawed and self-deceived individuals might mean something on our po-mo suckfest of a planet. If you’d like an in-depth analysis of everything that may or may not have gone wrong: I’m a dog person, he’s a cat person. He was raised not to believe in Santa Claus; I still have difficulty distinguishing “reality” from the rest of my existence. Once we were on a walk, and he wanted to go back because his unpacked luggage was taunting him. Once I lost a pair of earrings and found them three months later (after my ear-holes had closed up) when I got around to unpacking my suitcase. He’s actually much smarter, better adjusted, and more psychologically healthy than I am, and I got intimidated. There just wasn’t that transient, indefinable thing called chemistry. I could keep on…but I think you get the idea.       So I find out he is apparently not “The One.” Which can get as depressing as hell (unless you are a devout Satanist and find hell a cheery environment and/or a Texan who enjoys the climate, then the analogy begins to break down) after a while. On the other hand, I realized that losing the old BF sucks…who else is going to tell me I look nice when I’m wearing a dress that makes me look at least ten pounds overweight?…but losing one of the best friends I’ve ever had, that sucks worse. So we’re keepin’ it platonic these days.       During this stage of the unfolding melodrama that seems to be my life, I have made an important discovery that seems to me to be pretty universal. No one wants to be Eleanor Rigby. I must confess that I knew that ending the Relationship (ooh…big ‘R’) was the right thing to do…honor and honesty dictated doing so. But frankly I didn’t have the balls to bring it up. Little piss-ant. So the Cap’n brought it up, and it became a mutual decision. Though I’m unquestionably emotionally closed off, I did manage ______________________________ 2I know these footnotes are extremely obnoxious for all concerned, but I just pray that someone got that little joke I squeezed in. I think it’s the funniest, most slyly sarcastic thing I have ever written and none of you yahoos will appreciate it. If this historical/literary illusion makes sense to you, you are my new hero. 3Cheer up, as far as I know the Captain and Tenille are still together.