Crazy Cat Lady

Who was it that told me the official number of Crazy Cat Lady status was five cats?

 I have three cats.

But I do live at the end of the block, by myself, and my last date was in August.  I was told that I'm safe of Crazy Cat Lady because I haven't made it to five cats yet, but in reality I'm an almost 38-year-old woman who lives alone literally at the end of the block (I actually live on the corner of two streets) with three cats and a dog.  Maybe I don't need two more cats.

 Maybe the dog makes up for two cats.

Maybe Puckett could count as two cats, thus giving me four cats and a dog and hitting the magic number of five.

Let's not ignore the fact that my three cats really couldn't care less if I added two more cats because they are so laid back (well, Willow isn't, but really she just follows what the other two cats do).  So if I did add two more cats, they would probably just fit right in.

I've tried Internet dating.  It actually serves to depress me more.  Honestly it's just a way to get ditched by perfect strangers rather than people you actually know.  I'm not sure which is worse.  I mean get to know me before you reject me, you know?

Okay so in fairness I may have posted a picture of the cats...

Most of my suitors in the past have told me that my three cats are rather disturbing.  One even said I have too many cats and I would be just fine if I got rid of Puckett and Willow and just kept Percy (to a guy Percy is the "cool one").  Of course, these are the same idiots who requested that should something happen to me, they should be the ones I'd leave Tess to (but not the cats).  Yeah, right. Tess is spoken for if something does happen to me, and the only person she will ever go to is the Cowboy.  Incidentally, he'd take the cats too if I asked him.  Any guy who is willing to take what they consider the "cool pets" and leave my others to languish on the vine has no business even considering a relationship with me.

The nerve of them.  Like I'd leave my dog to some douchebag.

To assume that Percy and Tess are the only ones of the four that matter is to not understand my heart. I love all my pets equally and none of them are more important than the others.  Puckett is my soulmate cat.  Willow is, well, Willow, and who are these jackasses to say I should get rid of any cat anyway?  These guys didn't offer me a diamond ring or a commitment.  Besides one cat - ONE - was planned.  The other two just sort of happened.  I'm a bleeding heart.  They are beyond my control.  I ended up with Puckett and Willow because I'm a sucker and the Dog and Cat Shelter knows it.  They are trained for it.  They see one coming a mile away and start gathering up cats that have been at the shelter too long to unload on one such as me.  Would these guys ask me to unload two extra kids if I had three children?

Only someone headed towards Crazy Cat Lady status would compare cats to kids.  I realize rationally that it is not the same thing, but I've never had kids.  I love my cats even if I periodically want to murder them (not really).  Requesting that I unload one or two is just a douchey thing to do.

It's not that I wouldn't like to find someone. I date.  When someone shows an interest and asks me. I mean, I gave the twenty-three-year-old from last summer a chance, mostly because he was cute and didn't think there was something completely wrong with me when I invited him to go see the Minions movie. I was on eHarmony and the two most eligible guys I "met" were a really great-looking guy who NEVER stopped moving and lived in San Diego (that's a little far), and a sweet person who identified as gender fluid, wore white capris to work, and told me I had too many issues to date.  I'm still not sure exactly what gender fluid is, and if one is gender fluid does it matter if the person they date is male or female?

Anyway...

Clearly I am doing something wrong, at least according to all the relationship blogs I read as well as the fact that all of my exes ran screaming from me without really giving me a reason why.  According to Evan Marc Katz (ha ha, very funny, even my favorite relationship blogger is a Katz), if you are a serial monogamist who keeps attracting morons, the common denominator is you.  He's not wrong about that.  None of my exes have anything in common.  They don't even have similar physical builds.  I've dated a sociopath (I'm not kidding - totally textbook), a drug dealer, a couple of ranch cowboys (including the Cowboy), an Adonis-looking firefighter with zero personality, and a Luke Skywalker/Harry Potter looking dork with conservative roots. To say nothing of the chameleon who now thinks he's a Harley guy and rides around town with a scraggly beard down to his chest and a leather jacket that says "Lone Wolf" on the back (talk about your red flags).  After much self-reflection I've realized the only thing they all have in common is their emotional unavailability, and since like attracts like, imagine my dismay and horror when I realized that I'm the one who is actually emotionally unavailable.  The dating blogs are always quick to point out everything one is doing wrong and yes, I guess I am emotionally unavailable though that is one more thing I'm trying to work on.  What nobody tells you is how to fix it.  "Yes, you are an emotionally unavailable nightmare thus your perpetual attraction to morons, but unless you put in your credit card information so we can charge you $400, we're not going to tell you how to fix that."

Don't get me wrong, I like Evan Katz. He's smart and insightful.   I just can't afford him.

Turns out it's really hard to be emotionally available when one really has no idea how to do it with humans.  The animals are no problem, thus the dangerously close to Crazy Cat Lady status.  Also, as much as some of us would like to think it, men really aren't dogs and dog training techniques don't really work on them.  Believe me, I've tried.  My dog thinks I'm the best thing since doggy treats.  For some reason men just don't share her opinion.  Again according to Evan Katz, men want to be with women who make them feel good.  My dog feels good around me.  Especially when I take her for walks and give her doggy treats.  Men apparently do not feel good around me, most likely because I'm emotionally unavailable.  If I'm emotionally unavailable but don't know how to fix it, the only men I'm attracting are emotionally unavailable men, and of course my emotional unavailability doesn't make them feel good about themselves because I'm always feeling insecure about their emotional unavailability.

And round and round we go...

Cats are infinitely easier.