Chapter Twelve: Stop Sabotaging my Solitude

"I found a pediatrician!" Susie pants breathlessly into my ear. She is a die hard hockey fan and people are screaming and roaring all around her. I can barely make out what she is saying.

"Did you say pediatrician?" I yell into the phone to be heard over the ruckus, "My kids already have a doctor," then I pause to process the audacity of this announcement, "And why are you calling me from the hockey game at 9:30 on a Friday night to tell me this?"

As if I had to ask . . .

"Not for your kids! For YOU!"

Oh Good God in heaven. Here we go again.

Ever since I left Dating Land, the girls have been trying to set me up. Apparently it is a cardinal sin to be single longer than a week when you are in your 30's. Honestly? My grand scheme was to stay successfully single for at least year after my divorce. My detour into Dating Land was totally unexpected, and I am vowing to stay the course this time around. But the Divorce Land girls are not helping.

"Susie, I told you. I am not dating anyone new. Stop trying to set me up."

"But he's a doctor! And he has hair!"

She must be drunk. Because since when did my dating criteria consist soley of a high annual income and a family history free from male pattern baldness?

"Susie!" I chastise her. "Stop it right now. I don't want to date anyone. I'm still not recovered from my Dating Land traveling companion and if anyone knows that it is YOU. You need to respect that."

An exaggerated sigh comes out of my phone. "FINE," Susie surrenders. "I liked him too, you know I did, great guy, but seriously, you need to move on already because if you seriously do not want the pediatrician I have an attorney in mind." She paues only briefly to scream something about a goal her team just made, but quickly returns back to her harping in my ear, "But I think he might be receeding slightly. Very Jude Law-ish though. It's hot."

She is relentless.

When I finally get Susie (i.e. Molly the Matchmaking Maniac) off the phone I go to bed (and there is a lot to be said for a queen bed all to one's self) and ponder the fact that everyone is trying to ambush my alone time. The past two weeks I have been bomarded with, "I want you to meet my brother/cousin/co-worker/uncle's best friend's sister's nieghbor's friend who is a pilot/doctor/attorney/business owner."

Is solitutde no longer sacred? Must I be dining with a complete stranger who paid for my steak in order to justify my existence? What's wrong with spending a comfortable Friday night in faded sweats in bed with my . . . laptop. (My writing, not porn, people.) Doesn't some of the best soul searching happen when people are . . . alone? You can't figure life out if you are constantly pining and searching for someone else to make you whole. That much I know.

There is lonely. There is alone. And there is solitude. Sure, I've been all three and more. I am only human. But I am also not depressed or dependent. Just divorced.

And trying to make the most of the quiet I am finding in this new life of mine.

In the meantime, I plan to tell the girls to stop sabotaging my solidtude. I don't want hear about the rich successful coworker's nephew who you showed my picture to and thinks I'm cute.

I don't care how much hair he has.

And I can pay for my own steak, thank you very much.