And for a relatively long time (like 5 years) I wasn't in a relationship. I don't think I dated more than once or twice during that time.

Then I lost a bunch of weight, gained some confidence, and met a guy at work. We lived together for 3.5 years. Then he decided to cheat on me with his best friend's wife. The breakup was painful but quick, and during the angst of that I was contacted by a guy who I dated in college. We've been in a long distance relationship for about a year and a half, and I am very soon moving to be nearer to him (and to take an EXCELLENT job).

Pros: I have learned to function very well on my own. I replace toilets, faucets, light fixtures.

I try to do the things I want to do right away rather than waiting for someone to come into my life to do them with.

I do not need anyone to support me financially, and have advanced fairly well in my career.

I don't have to account to anyone for anything.

I enjoy my own company, and am rarely bored.

Cons: I would have liked to get married and have a child or two. I am now probably too old to have kids (or it would be difficult, at any rate). If I had made this my goal, and dated and looked with that in mind, it would probably have happened.

I am kind of self-absorbed. Because I know I CAN take care of myself, and don't expect others to take care of me, I do put my own needs/wants first. Sometimes, in a relationship I have to stop and think about what the other person might be wanting. Sometimes I don't take them seriously enough.

There are a lot of advantages to not dating, but you have to be clear that if you just wait around for a relationship to happen, it MAY not happen. You definitely have to live your life as if it won't. If you really want it, though, you probably will have to put some effort into it, and be a little creative.

This is, of course, all anecdotal--but I just want to say that this DOES happen. Where others are saying that the LW might have lied about how she found the letters and e-mails (might have really been snooping) I know that the husband of the woman my boyfriend was cheating with found out exactly that way.

She was having trouble with her e-mail, and asked her husband to fix it. He went in to do so, and found a passionate e-mail she had written to my boyfriend.

OTOH, my (now ex) boyfriend never did admit to anything, although I asked him more than once what was going on.

I was a little too trusting. When he said that nothing was going on, I believed him. I was able to keep the moral high ground by NOT snooping, but I would have preferred to have the chance to kick his ass out of my house. As it was, EVERYONE knew before me (the chick started broadcasting it after she admitted the affair to her husband).

Charming, no?

Ew.

GG Allin was PATHETIC.

Also a crappy musician.

However, he did shock people, even all those "hardened" young punks who thought they'd seen everything. And one thing about him--he MEANT it. It wasn't just an act.

In one of Milan Kundera's books, which at the moment I can't remember the name of, he posits 2 ways of attaining "individuality". One is by "adding" things to your personality ("I LOVE cats! I LOVE GG Allin! I HATE white bread!") and the other is by taking things away, paring your life down. Personally, I can't quite get into either of those. Parading my obsessions in an effort to be special always seems to me to be just that--an effort to be special. But I do HAVE those obsessions, and I enjoy them--so why not share enthusiasms with people I like?

I used to worry about being cool (and I was--to the point that things I thought were cool OTHER people would think were cool too--like Big Star, for instance, and "Threepenny Opera"). Now I worry about other stuff. I will admit, I DO laugh a little when I see kids with blue mohawks. Those were "over" even when I was a teenager in the '80's. Can we not think up something a LITTLE different?

I've been thinking about trying it with my black and white Sheltie. I'd love to do a routine to the White Stripes "Denial Twist"--I'd wear red, white and black, and my dog would wear red leg wraps--we would be cooool...

I remember lots of us having lots of sex when I was in college in the 80's. No man that *I* knew seemed to have a problem with women being willing. But then, these were new-wave and goth and punk and proto-grunge boys--not "man's men".

Go figure.

But I also don't hang out in chat rooms. Not due to any fear or anything--I just have no reason to do so.

BTW, I'm female.

You DO agree, then, that women's only real purpose (and therefore the only thing they should stay healthy for) is to gestate babies? (BTW, I would argue that it's not true that only women can "make" babies. At this point, only women can GESTATE babies--but it takes the contribution of both sexes to MAKE them.)

It's such a cliche to say that feminists "forget they're women" and want to be "substitute men". What are you, like, 75 years old or something?

Personally, I'd be more alarmed about the CDC's proclamation if I thought that anyone was going to pay attention to it. But they won't.