I heard that this past friday when I met a woman at the mall while I was shopping for a specific mp3 player that my nephew wanted. When this woman and I talked for a while, and she made the statement, I let her know that I was one of the good ones. She responded with, "you're a bit shorter and thicker than what I usually go for," before asking what I did for a living.
A good man is hard to find?
I hear that statement a lot, and I know it’s lie. A good man is not hard to find. I’m one of them, and I have a few single friends in the same predicament. Most women I know, are in relationships that they don’t want to be in. Either because they’ve been convinced that they can’t do better, or because they feel stuck with kids and huge bills that are both their names. It’s a matter of choice. I happen to know three women that have been made to feel they would be lost without the men in their lives, while the men were offering nothing worthwhile to the relationship. Some of us are not Shemar Moores, some are not six feet five and a hundred eighty-five pounds, some of us don’t have six pack abs, some are not high-powered attorneys. Some are mechanics, barbers, tow truck drivers or even maintenance workers. Some of us are good, single, hard-working men, looking for someone that makes makes our lives better just for being in it.
It’s better to be alone, than to wish you were.
A coworker coined that term based on her experiences, when I confided in her that I was tired of being alone. The first man she was ever in a relationship was about 2 inches shorter her. He was slightly overweight, and he came from a poor family. He was a chemistry major, and though he treated her like a princess, and she was happy, her college friends and siblings convinced her that they were no match; that she could do much better. She took their advice and sought someone better. She didn’t have to try hard because a quarterback on her college football team had his eye on her. He was tall, blonde, and very good-looking. He had just transferred from a rival college, and his parents owned most of the buildings in her local town. Because all her friends were jealous of the attention he was giving her, she felt honored that he would even look in her direction. They sarcastically called him Mr Wonderful.
A year after graduation, they got married. Almost immediately after they gave their I-dos, he turned out to be not so wonderful after all. She didn’t know how to drive and she lost her job as a bank teller when he was too lazy to drive her to work and the bus got her to work fifteen minutes late. When their first boy died within minutes following his birth, Mr Wonderful was at home with his dad and brothers, watching the Kansas City Chiefs beat the Minnesota Vikings, 23-7 in the Superbowl (in 1970). When their second son was born premature, she had to call her brother to take her to the hospital because the 1972 World Series was half way over and Mr Wonderful wanted the Cincinnati Reds to win (they lost). When their daughter, born in 1975 had to be rushed to the hospital because she went into Anaphylactic shock when Mr Wonderful, forgetting she was allergic to peanuts, gave her some. She ended up dying due to heart failure and circulatory collapse. Because they were both dealing their daughter’s death, the relationship was further strained. Then his parents’ real estate empire had collapsed when they were prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s office for being part of a mortgage fraud conspiracy group, and the house they lived in was seized and they had to live in a motel for a few months. Then in 1977 he went to the 7-eleven for cigarettes and didn’t come back until New Years Eve, 1981, acting as if he had only been gone for a few minutes, when he retrieved from his pocket, a packet of cigarettes. When she tried to divorce him he refused to sign the papers.
Anyway, she went back to her hometown to see her family over the Christmas holidays, and she saw her first college sweetheart at the mall. He was still slightly overweight, and he was happy. He was holding his daughter’s hand and she was holding her mother’s hand as they walked past stores, peering inside. Their son was on his other side, holding his hand. When she saw them and spoke, and was introduced to his family. He was a chemical engineer in Princeton New Jersey, and she was stay-at home mom and she sold Avon on the side, and they were happy and the kids were happy, and she felt a piercing in her heart, she told me. Saying that she wanted to kick her own self in her behind for letting her friends and siblings put the thought in her head that she didn’t want what she really did want- a man that treated her like a princess, instead of, like gum on the bottom of his football cleats.
When I hear that a good man is hard to find, I cringe inside. Not counting my mother and sister (who both say I'm the nicest guy to walk the earth besides my grandfather), every female who has taken the time to get to know me always has a rebuttal, "except you, Alieux. You're a good man." They happen to be friends of mine, who don't want to cross that line. They, of course, have no friends that they feel are worthy of me; 'that I can do better than them.' Even my exes try to return to me, having regreted their decision to leave me for someone they deemed to be hotter and finer, and not necessarily nicer. My friends used to call my apartment in Milwaukee, the home for battered women, because they would show up on my doorstep with black eyes and busted lips, needing a temporary place to stay because their new man beat them up. I would cut off my wrist before even thinking of hitting a woman. I believe my grandfather would crawl out of his casket tobeat my a** if I did that!
Some of us are not Shemar Moores, some are not six feet five and a hundred eighty-five pounds, some of us don’t have six pack abs, some are not high-powered attorneys. Some are mechanics, barbers, tow truck drivers or even maintenance workers. Some of us are black, white, asian, latino, indian, arab, persian. Some of us are good, single, hard-working men, looking for someone that makes our lives better just for being in it.
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