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I don’t know if I ever told my boyfriend that I live for stories–perhaps he just noticed the look of glee in my eyes whenever he started telling one. And so it became a practice. The other day he came with a good one that resulted in a 45 minute discussion about men, women and dating patterns. It was interesting and we couldn’t come to a real agreement on the subject, so I thought I’d share it with you all and you can tell me what you think.
So, a friend of my boyfriend, who we’ll call “J” is something like a dog. J has a girlfriend but consistently not only sleeps with other women, he takes them on full dates with the intention of sleeping with them. I share this detail because I don’t want you to sympathize with him when I get to the end.
Anyway, one day J is walking down the street when he, along with a few other men, notice this very attractive woman. He tells my boyfriend that she had a fat a$$. As you might assume with an attractive woman walking through a group of men, more than one of them tried to holler. But according to this dude, none of them were saying anything. And so when he approached with some substance, she gave him her attention. They talked enough for her to feel comfortable enough to accept a ride home from him.
During the trip, they started talking about weekend plans. Somewhere during the trip, she mentioned that she wanted to see a concert at BB King’s. And as luck would have it, J just so happens to moonlight there. Seeing this as his “in,” he pounced.
“Oh I work there! I can get you in for free. I was planning on going anyway.”
Homegirl agrees. And she and J make arrangements to meet up on Saturday.
The event started at 10 and didn’t really get poppin’ till 11. But since he would have to do some negotiating to get the both of them in for free, they needed to arrive early.
So Saturday comes and he texts the girl like, “I’m on my way to come pick you up now.”
She responds: “Oh. My cousin is going to come with us and she’s still getting ready. You just head down there and we’ll meet you later.”
At this point, he pauses the narration to tell my boyfriend that he hates when girls do this, invite third parties to a dating situation.
Anyway, with no real choice, he heads down to the venue, gets in and is waiting, and waiting and waiting.
At 1 a.m., J finally gets a text from the girl saying that she and her cousin are outside. He goes out there preparing for a fight. Now, he has to convince these freelance bouncers to not only let him re-enter but to do so with two other women, for free.
As he attempts to do so, the cousin is making things hot. As he’s trying to talk to the bouncers who are less than familiar with him, the cousin is basically beat boxing in the background, sighing heavily, exasperated.
After about five minutes, she finally makes an announcement.
“He can’t do nothing. Let’s go!”
And the girl, following her cousin’s lead, walks away without so much as a word about making other plans to see J.
Now, if you’re a woman reading this, you’ve probably already peeped game. The girl was in NO way interested in J. And instead of rejecting him outright, she invited another person to the date, put him off (showing up to the club hours late), and straight walked out of it after just a few minutes. For whatever reason, she didn’t feel comfortable being the bad guy and she solicited the help of her cousin to do the dirty work.
My boyfriend agreed that I had a point and might have even been right. But he attempted to argue that women have a tendency of letting their friends, family, associates–other women– talk them out of potential partners.
It took me a minute to put this particular story out of my mind, because that was NOT what happened here at all. But once I was able to do so, I agreed that yes, women do sometimes allow their friends to talk them out of pursuing a relationship with the opposite sex. But I also added that a woman who could be talked out of a situation was not all that interested in the man to begin with.
We went back and forth on this one and eventually started talking numbers. My boyfriend said that a woman could be 75 percent interested in a man and still allow her friends to dissuade her.
I screwed up my face and said, “Man, please.”
Women are so conditioned to find “the one,” be on the hunt for “the one,” look out for “the one.” That if there was even a hint that he might be it, she’s not going to let a friend stand in the way of that.
Then he shared another quick story to change my mind. A friend of his, a woman, has a girlfriend who is extremely attractive. Friend A is not unattractive, it’s just that when these dudes peep Friend B, they’d much rather take their chances with her. But Friend A is not pressed or jealous. As she told my boyfriend, it just is what it is.
Or it was what it was until Friend B spotted a man she wanted to get to know in the club. She gave him the eye and came over. But once he saw Friend A, the one who doesn’t often get that much play, he was more intrigued by her. And Friend A was liking him too. They were holding a nice little conversation when Friend B announced that she was ready to go.
Friend A was like, “Ok cool, just give me a couple of minutes.”
Friend B leaves for a little while but comes back in tears saying that she needs to leave now. Naturally, seeing her friend so upset, she leaves the club. But as she tells my boyfriend, she really regrets the fact that she let her friend keep her from getting to know a man who appeared to be a good dude.
I still argued that perhaps she wasn’t all the way persuaded about the man because she didn’t get his number before she bounced to tend to her hating a$$ friend. Her regret was more about pacifying her friend’s bad behavior or coming to realization that Friend B wasn’t as loyal as Friend A thought, not about this spectacular man she missed out on.
That was the regret.
So now I ask you, have you ever let a friend, family member or another woman close to you dissuade you out of getting to know a man you were really interested in? How did it happen? Do you regret it?
Veronica Wells is the culture editor at MadameNoire.com. She is also the author of “Bettah Days.” You can follow her on Facebook and on Instagram and Twitter @VDubShrug.
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