How to Be Single (8 page)

Ruby nodded sympathetically. “That's so sad,” she said, egging them on.

“It was a one-night stand. She got pregnant and decided to do it on her own. It was very brave,” said the slim woman with the blond highlights.

“But now, even with help from her sister and babysitters, it's a nightmare,” said the other slim woman, with the red highlights.

“A nightmare,” said the blonde, to emphasize the point. Ruby couldn't stop herself.

“Well, I know I could never do it. Could you?” Ruby said innocently. From the expressions on their faces, she knew the answer, but she decided to keep going. “I mean, could you even imagine doing it on your own?” She tried to appear as casual as possible, but she waited for their answers as if the Lost Ark was about to be opened.

“Never. Not a chance. It's too hard. Too lonely.”

“Absolutely. I would kill myself.”

Just as Ruby suspected—being a single mother is even more depressing than being single. But what about the joys of motherhood? The intimate relationship between a mother and child? The gratification of raising a human being from birth and putting them out into the world?

“But don't you think it would still be nice to be a mother? Even without a husband?”

“Not worth it. I'd rather die.”

The blond-highlight mom spelled it out. “Just imagine doing everything by yourself. Even if you had all the help in the world, at the end of the day it's still just you worrying if they're sick, deciding what school to go to, teaching them how to tie their shoelaces, ride a bike. You're the one who would have to take them sledding, who would have to organize all their playdates, who would have to feed them and put them to bed every night. You would be the one who would have to make sure they got to school on time, make their lunch, deal with their teachers, help them do their homework. You would get the call if your kid was sick in school, or in trouble, or,” she said a little more pointedly, “had a reading disability.”

“Right, and imagine if you had a really sick kid, like with cancer or something,” said the red highlights.

“Oh my God, just the thought of being in the hospital, having to call a friend or a family member to sit with you, alone, being that kind of burden on everyone. If I was single, that image alone would make me wear five condoms every time I had sex.”

“Then imagine being a single mother with a teenager.”

“Right, you have to discipline them, set boundaries, deal with drugs and dating and sex,
and,
add to that that now they hate you.”

“And if you had a girl, imagine going through menopause and seeing your daughter blossom and become sexually desirable just at the moment you're shriveling and drying up and becoming sexually useless.”

These ladies were getting really dark now, even for Ruby. She tried to appear unfazed and attempted to interject some optimism into the conversation: “Well, you might not still be a single mother by the time they're teenagers. After all, you could meet someone.”

In unison, the two mothers stared at Ruby. “Like you'd ever have the time,” the blonde said. And the redhead said, “Who would want you? These men in New York could have anyone they want. Like they're going to pick a woman with a child?”

Ruby's optimism now came out in a whisper. “Well, if a man fell in love with you, he wouldn't care…?”

The two mothers again looked at Ruby, as if she was a simpleton. The blond woman then asked Ruby, “Well, what do you think? Could you do it alone?”

Ruby looked out into the playground at children she considered for the most part to be adorable, well dressed, and well raised. She thought about the playdates and the homework and getting them to bed and the childhood cancer. She thought about how depressed she got just when a guy didn't call her after two dates.

“No. I couldn't. I could never be a single mother.”

The mothers nodded in agreement. Here in the children's park in the West Village, three women were in complete agreement about what they believed in:
Being a single mother would really, really suck.

Ruby walked all the way up Broadway. She was around Seventy-sixth Street when she made peace with the fact that she would never be a single mother. Guess she could check that off her list now. They were right, and they should know—it was too hard. So then the only thing left for her to do was keep dating. But how? It was so depressing. As she walked, she thought about Serena. Serena believed in God and spiritual enlightenment so much that she renounced everything and burned incense on her scalp. That was pretty hard-core. It made Ruby wonder what she believed in.
Should she pack it in, too? Should she just stop dating and start caring about other things?
It was not such an unattractive thought. But as Ruby walked and thought, she realized she wasn't ready for that just yet. She still had a little more fight left in her. And by Ninety-sixth Street, it finally came to her. She needed to get back on the horse, to love again. She needed to not be afraid to get emotionally involved again. She had to dive back in.

It was time to get another cat.

Now she was walking with a purpose; she was going to go back to the animal shelter where she had adopted Ralph. Her time for mourning was over.

The shelter was a two-floor concrete bunker on 122nd Street and Amsterdam, in a neighborhood that was a little dangerous. It didn't make Ruby scared as much as nostalgic for a bygone era. We don't have that many streets left anymore. By the time she got there, Ruby was proud that she was doing something as life-affirming as choosing to love again.

As she opened the door to the shelter, the smell of animals hit her immediately. It was a suffocating smell, one that made you want to walk right back out the door. But Ruby walked to the counter to a young Irish-looking girl with frizzy hair in a barrette on top of her head. The walls were covered with cheerful posters of animals reminding you “To love me is to spay me,” or “Give me an $8 ID tag today, save the $300 reward fee later!” The cement walls were covered with paintings of dogs and cats, but really it was of very little use. The place felt like a bomb shelter no matter how many puppies you painted on the walls.

Ruby told the girl that she wanted to adopt a cat and was buzzed through a door that led to a flight of stairs. The stench of animals got stronger as she walked up the steps. As she opened the door to the second floor, the sound of one dog howling filled her ears. It was a sound that cut right through her; a keening that seemed to be coming from the pit of the dog's soul. Its familiarity made Ruby dizzy.
That's the sound I want to make every morning when I wake up,
Ruby thought.

It was macabre walking through that industrial hallway, with that howling—very
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest,
but with dogs. Ruby quickly walked into the narrow room that had the cages of cats. She closed the door and the dog's cries were muffled a bit. She looked at the cats, one by one. They were all cute and soft and slightly lethargic. But she could still hear that damn dog losing it. Ruby stopped at one cat that was exceptionally adorable, almost a kitten with white and gray fur, named “Vanilla.” When Ruby stuck her finger in the cage, Vanilla playfully grabbed at it with her paws. That was that—she would adopt Vanilla. She walked out of the room to tell the man at the front desk about her decision. As she walked down the hall, the crazy dog kept baying. Ruby decided she had to take a look at that thing. She opened the door into the cuckoo's nest. She passed what seemed like cage after cage of pit bulls. She finally got to Loud-Mouth. Ruby looked at the description that was taped on her cage: “Kimya Johnson is a four-year-old white pit mix who was adopted out as a puppy. We recently found her as a stray, and we haven't been able to locate her owner. She's a very nice, friendly and snuggly dog, and appears to be housetrained. Well, her former owner's loss will be a new owner's gain. Perhaps that new owner will be you?”

Ruby's heart sank. Getting adopted from the pound only to be brought back again. Talk about abandonment issues. Kimya was standing up, her front paws on the cage, howling her little heart out. She might as well have been clanging the cage door with a tin cup. Just then a young girl of about sixteen walked into the room. She was wearing the brown uniform of a staff member, with a pin that said “Felicia” in blue Magic Marker, and underneath it, “Volunteer.”

“She's so loud, right?” she said in a thick Hispanic accent. “That's why nobody wants her. She's so loud.”

Ruby looked at Felicia. This was no way for a volunteer to talk. Kimya kept crying.

“She's so cute, though,” Ruby said, trying to be kind.

Felicia looked at Kimya and smirked. “Yeah, but she's too loud. That's why I think they're going to put her down tomorrow. She's so loud. Dang.”

Ruby quickly looked at Kimya. “Really? Tomorrow?” Her voice squeaked.

Felicia sucked her teeth. “That's what I heard.” She shrugged her shoulders.

Ruby was aghast. “Well…aren't you supposed to be trying to convince me to take her?”

Felicia looked at Ruby blankly, taking a nice long pause for dramatic effect. “Well, do you want her? 'Cause you can have her if you want her.”

When Ruby shot back, “My building doesn't allow dogs,” Felicia rolled her eyes, smirked, waved her hands in exasperation, and walked out the door.

Ruby stared at Kimya. For one moment, Kimya got quiet. She looked at Ruby, her black pink eyes pleading for help.

Ruby walked quickly out of the room and down the flight of stairs. She walked up to the girl at the counter.

“I'm sorry I can't adopt Kimya. I'm really sorry. But I really would get kicked out of my building. You have no idea how strict my co-op board is.”

The girl at the counter looked at her blankly.

“But I can adopt Vanilla,” Ruby said proudly. “And I'd like to volunteer here once a week.”

The woman looked surprised. She handed Ruby another form. “Great. Orientation is this Wednesday at seven.”

Ruby smiled brightly. “Terrific. Thanks.” As she waited for them to get Vanilla, she breathed a sigh of relief. She knew she would be great at convincing people to take unwanted strays. She would save the lives of dozens of dogs and cats. They needed her here.

Georgia went home that night, put on a pair of two-hundred-dollar jeans, a tight-fitting cashmere t-shirt top, and a pair of trendy little motorcycle boots, and off she went to Whole Foods Market to do some grocery shopping.

In the car that day, her new dating guru, Alice, told her that the Whole Foods in Union Square is a great place to meet really cute guys on a Saturday evening. You can sit and watch a cooking demonstration or stop at an organic-wine tasting or just go searching for homemade hummus and the love of your life.

As Georgia wheeled her cart around this high-end supermarket, she noticed that she felt great. It might have had something to do with watching Serena's funeral, because she felt centered. Optimistic. Dale had the kids all weekend, so she was free to just be a single person in the world; a single person who was attractive, fun, smart, and truly excited to be alive. How hot must that be? As she rolled by the organic greens, she realized that she didn't have to believe a single thing that she had ever heard about finding love in New York. There was no reason she had to buy into the belief system that there are no good men left, that the men in New York are all dogs, that every second that ticks by she gets older and less desirable. She didn't have to believe any of that. Because that was not her experience. She met Dale in New York, at Columbia. She was in grad school for journalism and he was a business major. They had been together ever since. So until she had personally experienced that there were no good men anywhere in the world, she would assume the opposite. As she pushed her cart past the overflowing mountain of cheeses, the French ones, the Italian ones, the ones that come in wheels, the ones from goats, she realized she can simply choose to drive around the entire landfill of presumptions and fears associated with dating in New York. Until it happened to her, none of those stories mattered. She was a blank slate, filled with optimism, unfettered with bitterness; and because of that she felt that she had an edge over most of the single women out there. Men were going to pick up on her joie de dating vivre, and it was going to be irresistible.

She made one lap around the whole store, taking her time enjoying the tour of healthy food. She was now standing over a row of organic beets, pondering how desirable she was going to seem to all of mankind, when a tall, slim man came up to her. He asked her if she had ever cooked beet greens. She looked up and smiled. He had curly brown hair, parted in the middle with just enough scruff on his face to look sexy, but not as if he was in a band.

See?
she thought to herself. It doesn't have to be so hard. She then sweetly explained to this cute gentleman that she had, in fact, cooked beet greens, and that they are delicious fried with just some oil, garlic, and salt.

“Wow, thanks. I'm trying to cook more, you know? Eat more greens.”

“Well, that's great. They're supposed to be very nutritious.”