By RTF Editor B.J. Hamrick

A few years ago I was walking along the sidewalk of a public building, minding my own business, when a woman came flying up to me and skidded to a stop. I swear — there were skid marks from her tennis shoes on the pavement.

She looked vaguely familiar, but as hard as I tried, I couldn’t figure out why. Maybe I was too distracted by the fact that I was standing in a very public place with a strange woman breathing in my face.

PERSONAL SPACE ALERT! PERSONAL SPACE ALERT! Who in the world are you?

“Oh my gosh!” she exclaimed as her hands flew up in the air, “It’s so good to see you! What are you doing these days? Where are you working? Are you in school? Are you STILL boyfriendless?” She stopped at the last question, as if it was the only one that truly mattered.

My mind reeled. Should I really let this stranger in on the non-existent details of my love life? I thought about saying several things to her. “Actually,” I wanted to say, “I had a boyfriend last week, but he moved to South Africa when he found out about my stalkerish tendencies.” Or, “I really don’t want to talk about it. It’s still too painful.”

But no. I had to tell her I was single. The truth. And guess what, folks? Nothing elicits more sympathy from the general public than the sight of a girl without a boy.

Seriously. I noticed  that when my non-single friends introduce me to people, they say, “This is B.J.” Then they lean over and whisper sympathetically, “She’s single”. And everyone nods sadly as if they’ve just learned I have a life-threatening disease like cancer or… well, I can’t spell the name of any other life-threatening diseases. But you get the point.

But do you really get the point? The point is, I didn’t want to tell the strange woman that I didn’t have a boyfriend, because I knew what was coming next. And all of my single friends out there know what was coming next. The inevitable, “I know the perfect person for you. He lives in Fiji, and I saw his picture on the Internet, and I’m pretty sure he’s single. Might be married, but it’s worth a shot…”

So this article is for all my single friends out there. I just want to remind you that you don’t have a disease. At least not one that I can spell. And I want to remind you that you shouldn’t talk to strangers who want to know about your love life. Because they might have bad breath. And that’s just scary.

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B.J. Hamrick is is glad that she found Mr. Right shortly after she wrote this piece. However, she tries to hold herself back from nagging her contended single friends…