Is a Toxic Trip to the Post Office the Reason I'm Single?

I was twenty or twenty-one when I met Emaunel. A tall, good-looking but somewhat weird guy who liked to watch M.A.S.H. in his spare time. He wasn't supposed to train me at work, but he took it upon himself to share his workplace tips and tricks with me. He was taking every lunch break with me. I thought he liked me, until he got fired and didn't reach out to me.

I moved on, forgot about Emanuel, and dated someone else. After that relationship dissolved, I logged into Yahoo Messenger to find a message from none other than Emanuel. He was asking me on a date, to which I immediately declined. I wasn't interested in a guy who'd ghosted me for three months.

​Unfortunately, whatever had kept Emanuel away for all those months had resolved itself. He wasn't planning to take no for an answer and continued to message me. I'm not sure why I didn't block him, or why I kept responding. Maybe I was bored, but I remember grabbing a yellow pages phone book and searching for an address.

​I wasn't searching for Emanuel's address, but rather a place to send him to. I finally settled on a post office that would take him two hours to arrive at. I told him that was my address, and that he should pick me up from there. I didn't have a car, so he didn't question it.

​Cell phones weren't as advanced as they are today, so he had no way of knowing the address I gave him wasn't mine. He drove over two hours to the post office only for his car to break down. After he got his car working again, he drove to my work to tell me what I had done was clever. Another coworker told me that I was wrong because Emanuel really liked me.

​When I told a coworker this story, he said I would probably be married with kids if I hadn't treated Emanuel so poorly. While that isn't true, I did go on a date with Emanuel, and it was the worst date I've ever been on, but I did wonder if there was some truth to my coworker's statement. I was a menace in my twenties, mostly because it's easier to reject someone than it is to build a relationship with them.

​In fact, most of the men who liked me when I was in my twenties later confused their feelings much later. Some of them claimed they found me intimidating or that they were scared of rejection. I'm sure some of these confessions are lies from men who saw my recent social media pictures and thought I was cute, but I can't help but think some may have been expressing genuine interest.

​I think back to another situation, also with a coworker. We worked in the same department, and everyone seemed aware of his feelings toward me. Everyone but me. He'd save me a seat next to him at the company Christmas party, and he'd make me DVDs of movies he wanted to discuss with me. It was the sweetest relationship I'd never been in.

​When he finally got the nerve to ask me on a date, I thought he was joking. I told him that I couldn't date him because his hair was ugly. I can still remember the hurt look in his eyes. He changed his hair and started going to the gym because I'd expressed an interest in fitness. He kept 'pursuing me', but I wasn't interested in him.

​Although I never dated him, he changed something within me. I tried to avoid hurting others because I realized how difficult it must be to confess your feelings to another person. I became a more open and easier person to talk to. Most importantly, I haven't sent a man to the post office since I sent Emanuel.​

While I am remorseful for the way I treated interested men when I was in my twenties, I don't regret rejecting these men. There's a reason they didn't work out; they weren't compatible with me. They only served to teach me things about myself and dating. In most cases, they served to show me what I didn't want from a relationship.​

Singleness isn't the curse some people think it is. It's an opportunity. I can use those things I learned to better myself. I can also improve my relationship when I decide I want to be in one.