....but he said "She's Just A Friend"

Morning divas,

You can agree or disagree, but I'm a firm believer that men and women can't 'just be friends'. They can be associates, colleagues, even close acquaintences but not a true friend in the familiar sense. She can't be one of the boys who is always around, calls and texts him back and forth and keeps it platonic... No. Hello no!

There are only three reasons why a man and a woman are supposedly "just friends". They used to have sex. They are having sex. They want to have sex.

I have a serious aversion to 'the friend'. Call it suspicion or call it experience. All of my life, ' the friend' has been taking my man. There is something about me that sends 'the friend' in to overdrive. There is something about my presence so threatening to 'the friend' that it compels her to finally complete her mission; remove me from the picture, and claim him for herself. And I know some of you divas can relate.

Freshman year in high school I had a burning desire for this kid in my spanish class. We had a mutual female friend. I was shy then (can you believe it) but I talked about him incessantly to my girls. "I'll hook you up. I just know he has a crush on you too," the mutual friend said. And it turns out that he did have a crush on me. And for a week or two he finally began talking to me and just when things were on the upswing.... BOOM. He and our mutual friend were boyfriend and girlfriend. What the hell just happened?

I had a crush on a guy who was a year ahead of me. He ran track. He was sort of captivated by me for some reason and rather than be my typical, bashful, adolescent self, I flirted back. Soon we began talking regularly, walking home together, and all that cute stuff that high schoolers do when getting to know one another. Well... he had a friend who had a huge crush on him. I knew this. She'd joined the track team just to be around him. When she caught wind of us spending time together she moved in quick. Within two weeks they were boyfried and girlfriend.

Having arrived home in tears, mom chided "Don't ever let these women know your business. If you like someone and he wants to get to know you, keep it to yourself." It was sage advice that I practice to this day, but it was incomplete. She should have told me to be wary of the female friend. It would take a devastating heart break seven years later before I finally realized this lesson on my own.

The "just friends" situation is difficult to maneuver, and could very well be the deal breaker for the unprepared woman. In most cases, when there is a female tag-a-long, she wants your man. He may or may not be oblivious to this, and it is much more difficult a situation if he is in the dark. You see, as women, we plot. It's in our DNA. We know that ultimately we must secure a man with whom to biuld a fort and bear kids and we are willing to do so by any means necessary. It's strategic warfare really. A woman will put the same amount of effort into conquering a love interest as a man will put into taking over a small country. Men have always underestimated this quality in women. That's why they're often so easily dooped...

The ally is a strategic position for "female friend" because it allows her to serve as his counsel and gather precious information. She knows everything about him. She knows all of his friends, she has complete access to him, and what's best... she is able to keep tabs on all of his romantic interests. She has his ear. She can manipulate his love life, insinuating her "friendly" advice on the woman she percieves as as a threat; eliminating that woman from the picture when need be. This woman/friend sets herself up to have mobility. She can float in and out of his life as she pleases. With her, his guard is down. His defenses are lowered. She suprises him with a bold move one day and BOOM, sister takes over the whole operation. Women have been doing this since the beginning of time. It is nothing new. Too bad most dim-witted women will shrug the woman/friend off, not wanting to seem insecure.

Screw insecurity.

I like to operate on intuition and experience.

In order to establish anything between a man and woman, they must first be friends. This is my mantra. However,when there is already a woman there guarding the friend post, I wonder, can he make space for you? It has been in my experiendce that he can't and won't. He is incapable of letting another woman in, even if he truly is interested. In the movie Brown Sugar, Taye Diggs character married his significant other, but never let her in the way he did his homegirl, and ultimately the homegirl destroyed the relationship. (It didn't help that she cheated, but perhaps that's because she was feeling neglected!)

So why would a woman go through the pains of taking the platonic route? It's safer and highly effective. Perhaps they used to date, it didn't work out, but she still has visions of them marrying in the next five years. Play the friend. Suppose he is highly desirable and she's worried that if she approaches him as an admirer she' ll blend in with the crowd. Play the friend. Suppose she's insecure and needs a stealthier route into his heart. Play the friend. Suppose she doesn't believe that the time is right for a relationship or there is some obstacle in the way of romance... like distance. Play the friend.

This summer I met an amazing older man. Let's call him Mr. X because he had rhetoric like Malcolm and a career that compelled me to keep him anonymous. Mr. X was a beautiful; chiseled asiatic bone structure, robust mauve lips, and fiery eyes. His face portrayed the intensity of a lion and his body was strong and lithe, like a runners. Mr. X was militant and cerebral; the type of man whose brain was always going, always creating, and constantly analyzing things. His intellect turned me on.

Nevertheless, Mr. X had a friend. A female friend, who was like a sister to him. A homegirl. In fact she, upon discovering that Mr. X was intrigued by me, even played Cupid. How nice of her! (ladies, don't ever let a woman do your dirty work) But my instincts told me there was something more. I felt like there was a always a third person in our pre-romance (as you will discover in a few lines, it never made it past innocent flirtation). The two of them talked all the time. He discussed his feelings and qualms (as he was significantly older) about me with her. I felt that with her constant input, she was turning the knobs of our relationship. This woman had too much power, and I knew early on this was not good.

A few weeks after meeting him, his homegirl contacts me and says that because I have alluded to my interest in Mr. X via my profile on a certain internet social-networking site, Mr. X no longer wanted to have anything to do with me. I was to him write him a professional e-mail at once, pulling out of the pre-romance, and agreeing to be professional acquaintances. She added of course, "Have I ever given you bad advice?" Well.... She did hook us up.

What a fool I was, in retrospect.

I discovered later that day that he did not think my slip-up was all that bad. "What's with the letter? You act like you murdered someone!" he laughs on the phone.

"Your homegirl told me you were appalled. She told me to write it."

"Oh no! Don't mind her. She's just very protective of me. We go way back."

Oh really... ?

A month later he vanished from my life without explanation and I ultimately discovered that it was because of his homegirls clever machinations. I was naive then. Very naive. But God will give us scenarios in order to teach us valuale lessons and from that point on, I would be ever weary of the friend.

Fast forward to 6 months later. My current interest is preparing to open for a chart topping rap star on my campus thanks to my negotiation on his part. He is standing amongst his entourage of good-natured, talented, charismatic, charming men... I mean, I like his friends. There are few there that I don' t know, so in between chatting wiht his friends and my coy flirtation with him, he introduces me to a few other people. And then a woman approaches and I notice that when she does, his body language changes. He stiffens. He looks away. He backs up about three inches changing our relative distance from initimate space to platonic space.

Hmmmm. I'm suspicious. And I've seen her before. She was at another event and he didn't bother to introduce us. She is also in a slew of pictures with him.

"Oh, who is this? Why don't you introduce me to your friend?" I said with the smile of a confident social butterfly.

"Oh yeah, that's my homegirl."

His homegirl. I am introduced and satisfied but I notice that when she is around my interest is much less interested.... So I bid them good bye, say have a good show, and go find my friends. I have a way of shrugging people off, you know, like I'm too good for this shit... but I don't know if that's a good thing in this case.

Half way into the rap stars performance, I stumble back stage. My interest and his entourage are still back there, watching the show from the wing, as are several of my other friends. He makes no move to greet me, so I hang out for a while with my friends. Eventually I walk over to him to tell him he had a great show and we get to talking as usual. I'm cracking jokes in his ear, making sure he smells my Obsession... penetrating his ethos.

She is beside us, looking disturbed. This woman is more than friend! Well, apparently she is his rap groups official photographer and she thought that she should take some photos of the group.... and of her and the group... and of her and my interest, while I was standing there. My, how appropriate?

Good, I think. This woman is good. She can think on her feet. What better way to get me away from him than to make me feel like a fifth wheel? She took one look at me; a beauty queens assurance, 4.5 inch Donna Karen heels, a killer silk Nicole Miller Tunic dress.... and she decided that I'd have far too much pride to be fifth wheel. And she was right.

I give a curt good bye and make my way over to my friends. I need to drink. I'm all confused. And hurt, much more hurt than I care to show or admit.

"Ayesha..." My friend says a few moments later, snapping me out of my blank stare.

"Is that his girl?"

I glance over my shoulder to see the two to of them hugged together and HYAH!!! It's like I've been drop kicked in the stomach. I feel myself deflating like a helium balloon, my ego shriveling like a dream deferred. For that one moment, I felt so hurt and humiliated and bewildered.

And then Ayesha returned. I left with my friends. Indulged in some food and some spirits until I was playfully off-balance. Dabbled in some debauchery. Partied some more. Passed out sleep. My defenses kicked in. The defenses that develop around a woman scorned multiple times. Let him go! Pay him like last months phone bill. My best friend implores that I lose his number. But why? Why should the homegirl win? I'M TIRED OF THE HOMEGIRL WINNING!!! I NEVER WIN! For once, I want to not lose to calculating woman. For once, I want the good-hearted, fly woman with genuine feelings and intentions to be the victor. For once, I want the man to use his head and his heart.. together. Just once! For once, I don't want to be bow out of the game because some manipulative woman out-witted me... or to spare my pride (it's very important to me)

Alas, my true feelings have interrupted my pride and now I'm in limbo. I like him but will absolutely not stand for a man stringing me along until he decides that he actually is in love with his homegirl ala Brown Sugar, for those of you who've seen the movie. I'm too good for that.

I hate to get you to the end of this rambling, wordy blog to tell you that I have no solution. But I don't. I honestly have no idea what to do except to shrug it off, become aloof, take a huge step back, and entertain other options. But do I like him more than that? Does he even realize that what he did was humiliating and disrespectful? Perhaps I'll stay in the ring and fight this time. Perhaps he's worth it.

No.

Perhaps i'm worth it.

Flyness and fun(ky days in the future),

-Ike