All joking (aside): Singled out: without Jenny McCarthy

Posted 2/7/13

We didn’t need to have girlfriends, but when girls did come around it was usually short-lived, and each trist’s conclusion was just another chance for a party (there were as many as three people present during our craziest nights) in the guise …

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All joking (aside): Singled out: without Jenny McCarthy

Posted

Of my six years in Sacramento, I’d say about a total of four of them were spent as a single man*, and for the most part, it was awesome.

I had the same roommate/best friend for most of those years and he, too, spent most of his days sans-girlfriend. This made for many awesome “guy nights” that played something like a drawn-out movie party montage complete with beer, laughter, fruit-chucking (NOT a euphemism!) and beer.

We didn’t need to have girlfriends, but when girls did come around it was usually short-lived, and each trist’s conclusion was just another chance for a party (there were as many as three people present during our craziest nights) in the guise of one guy cheering up the other.

In short, being single was always a lot of fun.

The same isn’t true in Powell. Oh, there’s still plenty of good times to be had, but the dating culture (no, I’m not changing the name of my column again) here is much different.

My two best friends here in Powell are married, and have been since they were three years younger than I am.

Not that that’s bad. Both are still able to hang out and drink and go to the mountains, but still, it’s different. My roommate in Sacramento never had to leave the bar at 7:30 to make dinner before his wife got home. And the only people I knew with kids were my friends’ parents.

But both these friends have great lives, and I don’t mean to besmirch them for successfully doing what I have so far been unable to do — trick a girl into liking me — even if their relationships do serve to illuminate my single status.

On the bright side, staying single has probably made my life easier in a few ways. I haven’t had to live in a constant fear of being dumped or, even worse, having to dump somebody.

NOTE TO LOCAL WOMEN: If you ever find yourself in the precarious position of being my girlfriend, please ensure that you are the one to initiate the inevitable end. This will likely be the case anyway, but I’d rather be viewed as not good enough for a Powell girl than to be perceived as a jerk who considers himself too good for the local fare.

When I met Westside Elementary principal Brent Walker, it was unrelated to my work and we were able to have a nice, candid conversation void of anything relating to education (my news beat). He asked me how I was liking Powell, how I was adjusting to small-town life, etc. At one point he asked me if I was single. Yes, I told him. A knowing look of pity spanned his face. “Good luck,” was all he could say.

If a married man, born and raised in Powell, can find little hope for me, what chance do I and my defeatist attitude stand?

Not that I’m in a rush to get married. As a selfish, irresponsible 20-something probably incapable of true commitment, I’m not exactly what a lot of people would call a “catch.”

But even if I was, who’s going to do the catching? I feel like my age puts me in a strange no-(wo)man’s-land in Powell. This town skews old, except for the college, which is mostly 18- and 19-year-olds.

And as much as the prospect of having a sugar mama and/or a plucky collegiate soccer player on my arm appeals to me, I know better. Barely.

Powell’s demographics put a single male of my age (25) at a disadvantage. Even moreso when you consider that I did not grow up in Powell, and don’t know every girl around, like my PHS-alumni friends seem to. The male halves of the three couples I most often socialize with went to high school with their female counterparts.

According to information from the 2010 census, there were 560 females between the ages of 20 and 29 living in Powell two years ago. There were 604 males in the same age range. So, assuming those numbers have stayed somewhat consistent, it seems that I really have my work cut out for me if I’m looking to find someone Dante-compatible.

Powell is a small pond, and one with an imbalance between the genders that creates more competition between the males (well, about 90 percent of the males if you believe the statistics) than the females. Women seem to have a little more to choose from, assuming the majority of people are looking to date someone within a five-year age radius.

Out of those 560 females, I would imagine that a large percentage of them are married. Others are in serious relationships. Others I wouldn’t find attractive and/or wouldn’t find me attractive. So out of the remaining, let’s say, half-dozen or so, I have to find the one who doesn’t mind if her significant other is at the very beginning of a career in a field not known for creating 1-percenters, and doesn’t mind that I don’t plan on stepping foot inside a church again unless it’s for a friend’s wedding.

Hey Mr. Walker, can you spare any more luck?

*Technically, I am, despite the fact that I cried during the last movie I watched and I identify as a “cat person.”

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