The Nice Guys

• Lori Palminteri
• Uncategorized
• September 24, 2016

I didn’t really want to write this blog, but I feel like someone has to say it, and it might as well be me, because, let’s face it, I’m pretty brilliant.  If you’re sitting around thinking, “I’m such a nice guy (or girl), and girls (or boys) don’t want to date me, even though I’m the one they’re looking for,” you are so ridiculously wrong, it frightens me.

I can’t tell you how many times a guy has told me they’re undateable because they’re too nice.  And, I’ve had guys accuse me of not dating them because I don’t date nice guys.  Let’s start there.

First off, you don’t fucking know me, so don’t act like you do.  Second, I have dated some of the nicest (and cute!) guys I’ve ever met.  If you met them, you’d be stunned I’m not still with any of them because they’re great people.  I remain friends with them because they’re so nice, and I’m not really the jealous type.  I often think I’m doomed to be alone forever because no one should be given so many chances to be with decent humans and not have any of them work out.

I don’t date assholes.  I’m the asshole.  But I’m cute, and funny, so I’m really good at getting away with being a jerk.  Not everyone is so fortunate.  I never didn’t date someone because they’re “too nice.”  And every guy who has ever said that is not only not really that nice, but also totally delusional.  Those who mope around thinking their kindness is cock blocking them are sorely off the mark.  For example, I used to be friends with this guy, and I genuinely enjoyed hanging with him.  He was kind of depressing, but I enjoy depressing.  He complained about being single a lot.  I jest about my loneliness, but truth is, being alone brings me more joy than pain.  Anyway, one day we’re hanging out, and he makes a move on me, and I quickly let him know that’s not what’s going on here.  He proceeds to get mad at me.  And he says some bull shit along the lines of, “you’re out there searching for a good guy, when you have one right in front of you.”  Now, I’m mostly friends with guys, and about five years ago, I would have been made extremely uncomfortable and guilty in this situation.  But I realize now, he’s the one who should have felt uncomfortable and guilty.  It’s absurd for a woman to feel guilty because someone wants to fuck her and she’s not attracted to them.  And I don’t mean for trying to kiss me.  That’s fine.  Like I said, my best friends are guys, and there have been blurred lines of intimacy.  I’ve both accepted and declined advances.  But if I decline, don’t act like it’s some character flaw of mine.  I’m no longer friends with him, and you know why that is?  Because he’s not one of the nice guys.  If we’re friends, and you try to fuck me, and that doesn’t go as you planned, then you stop being friends with me, that does not make you the good guy.  That makes you a total jerk.

This guy, and many others I’ve seen, view themselves as this doting boyfriend who would be so much better than most self-centered boyfriends.  They see themselves as this sensitive romantic who cares so deeply about others.  But they don’t.  They really don’t.  They’re so wrapped up in their victimized hero version of themselves, that they’re blind to the fact that if they were really that giving of a person, that good of a listener, they wouldn’t have to be pitching themselves constantly.  Narcissism doesn’t bother me as much as groveling.  Shut up.  You’re annoying.

As I said, I have dated nice guys and my relationships have a faster turn over than Melissa McCarthy movies (and sadly, less hits).  I have accepted the truth about relationships. Some people are going to ignite something within you, and you won’t have that affect on them (or visa-versa).  It’s honestly one of the saddest truths you’ll ever have to accept in this life.  I especially always want what I can’t have, so I’ve been on many dates with good people and wished I was with someone else.  It’s not their fault.   It’s no ones fault.  There’s no need to get angry about it.  Emotions are unpredictable, and if there was a way to control them, trust me, I would’ve figured it out by now.  I’m a control FREAK.

I’ve had my heart broken exactly once, and I still have affection for said person, and I like having it there.  It reminds me of some sort of deep inner beauty that exists in all of us, even me, who usually acts like a cynical woman who’s been divorced several times.  It can make you feel lonely, at times, but loneliness doesn’t always have to be so sad.

My parents will tell you I’m the best catch in New York City, and lament my lack of a dating life.  But I don’t sit around wondering why I’m single.  I know why.  I put my career before other people.  I’m anti-social (true story: a week ago, I decided I was going to go to a bar in my neighborhood to “meet people,” I walked in, surveyed the bar, decided I didn’t want to talk to anyone and went home to read “The Terror” by Dan Simmons.  Great book.). I’m socially awkward, and mumble, and occasionally (okay, more than occasionally) “zone out.”

Really, the main problem here is, people don’t want to take blame for their own inadequacies or self created issues.  It’s worse with millennials too.  The entitled, “nothing is my fault,” attitude is intolerable.  The more I meet these types, the more I’m content with being single and dying alone.  It’s okay.