Last night I had an animated discussion with my flat mate, Alice. She was asking me why I am not going on dates with not just one man, but NO men. Alice asked ‘well are there any nice guys in the Catholic Church you go to? I mean...any chance of meeting a man there...’
‘Not that I am aware of...’ I said a bit despondently. It’s a bit hard to meet men in the foyer of the Church, and churches are not exactly pick-up joints.
’But Alice churches do hold weddings! Wouldn’t it be funny if I were to meet a guy in a church and then marry him in the exact same church?’
‘It would be hilarious. But I’m curious. Are there many men at the Masses you go to? I mean you're always saying you want to get married. How'ya going to meet Mr. Right?’
‘Ye-e-e-s’ I said thinking of the forty-something men that come to Saturday evening Mass and to Sunday morning Mass, these bald/balding men are chronologically too advanced for me, and even if I were so inclined, they have a wife and children surgically attached to them.
‘Alice, I’m not sure there are many single men going to Mass...’
‘Have you tried to talk to any of the single guys that are there? I think you should look for a nice guy with a rosary dangling in his hands.’
‘I wish! Well, it’s not quite that I don’t talk to them...it’s that they don’t talk to me. There are some suited, pinstriped twenty-something men that I see at the Communion rail, and I see them every week, but I never talk to any of them. Few of my friends are Catholic and I don’t have Catholic female friend to introduce me to male Catholics.’
‘Uh-huh. Doesn’t sound like you’re going to meet a Catholic.’
‘I’ve never had a serious Catholic boyfriend. I’m not sure they exist.’
‘But if you want one, someone must break the ice.’
‘Well, it’s like this, I can’t very well wear binoculars in Mass and then take detailed views of any nice types, then sidle up to them after Mass and say in a Southern American drawl, ‘hi, I’m livin’ in this crazeeee London town, lonely, and wondering if you would be so kind as to buy me luh-hunch. When you goin’ t’do thah-hat?’
‘Right. But I’m the type of girl who believes that man should do everything. From initiating the first conversation to asking me out to doing the proposing with the platinum diamond ring balanced on his forehead.’
‘Oh yeah – I definitely agree with that. The man does the asking out. That’s why that book ‘He’s Just Not That Into You’ gets it so right. If a man really likes you then he will do anything to get you.’
‘I suppose those men at the Catholic events, and talks and conferences that I go to just aren’t that into me. But it’s so difficult! Alice! ALL my hobbies revolve around my religion. I write a blog to defend the concept of chastity, I organise my day so that I can go to Mass, and say the Rosary. I read LifeSiteNews and look up pictures of Baby Jesus....There’s a possibility that I won’t meet anyone. I just know very few men who have these interests in common.’
Alice paused before saying the next part. She was going to bring up the M word.
‘Have you ever thought what you will do if you don’t marry? I was thinking about it today and I just don’t know what I would do! When I was ten, I always had this picture in my head that I would get married at eighteen! Now that I’m in my twenties and have never met a guy that I could see myself marrying, it’s beginning to seem very scary. That my twenties could go by laughing and going out with my friends and that I’ll not meet the one.’
‘I feel your pain Alice.’
‘You’ve thought about this Phil? What’ll you do if you don’t get married?’ My friend Alice is very practical and reflective. She always likes to know the details of plan b, if plan a fails miserably. Alice knows that my plan a is marriage.
‘Become a missionary in a developing country and for every child that I won’t have, I’ll help a hundred learn to read and write.’
‘Yes, you could go to Ecuador! Maybe Mexico? You might meet someone doing the voluntary work over there.’
‘Yes, until then, I’ll go around London with ‘husband hunter’ tattooed on my forehead.’
‘What will you do if you don’t get married Alice?’
‘I just don’t know! It’s always been part of my dream. ‘I’ll concentrate on my career. Build a good reputation...’
