Boyfriends and computers.

Contrary to what my posts may sometimes indicate, I'm not one of those girls who usually longs for a boyfriend. I know this makes me sound callous, but honestly, until last year I sort of viewed boyfriends the way I viewed a good movie: great escapist qualities for when you're overly bored with life or when life is overwhelming and you want to think about things other than the things you really need to be thinking about. It's harsh, but it's true. I just wasn't in the market for long-term love.

Quite honestly, for the most part, I've liked being single most of my adult life. I get a surge of pride when I know I've done something well and on my own (or with the support of chosen friends and family). I get excited about the life and career I'm planning that consists of constant international travel -- a life and career that aren't really conducive to long-term romantic liaisons unless the guy is also excited about a life and career full of international travel. I like the fact that my schedule is subject only to my own desires and that I don't need to explain to anyone why I spent 9 hours yesterday editing Baby Sis' grad school applications instead of working and why that means I will spend parts of Saturday and Sunday billing hours. I like that I've chosen to advise the church youth group, so that now virtually every Sunday this summer will be spent doing things for church from about 9am until 8pm. I like that even though I'm in meetings and rehearsals Tuesday and then Thursday though Sunday, with an ocassional Monday or Wednesday thrown in for good measure, no one questions why or can reasonably ask me to drop one so that we can "spend time together." And I like that when someone's throwing an impromptu martini night, I don't have to pull the Married Woman's Standard of, "Well, Hubby/Boyfriend and I were going to do dinner tonight, so I can't. Sorry." (Because, apparently, dinner with a Hubby or Boyfriend is always an all-night pre-scheduled event.) And I like that when I go to get my LL.M. I'll be able to leave and return to the United States when I want to visit friends, not in some obligatory, feeble attempt to hold on to a relationship that should have ended with my residency in New City.

It's harsh, I know. But, it's the life I've wanted for some time. Since college at least. If I didn't actively choose this life, I'd be married to Shawn, my on-again-off-again from college, living in North Carolina, mothering his child, and working as something other than a lawyer because I never would have gone to law school.

So, this single life is an active, on-going choice. And it's not one I really regret. There are moments, I admit, when I really wish I was in a relationship. Like when I played games with some youth and Church Crush earlier this week and had the brief, fleeting thought that I could play games with CC for the rest of my life. But, it was a brief, fleeting thought. And not one I wanted to hold onto. He's great, but he's not for me. And I'm not for him. If I dated him, it would be disastrous because everyone in our church would expect us to get engaged in a few months and, well, I'd be looking to end things right around the time I leave for Europe.

But, beyond the brief moments of fancy during the midst of fun activities with really great guys, I only really long for a boyfriend when I need them for something. Like moving the stuff from my two bedroom apartment to a one bedroom and storage space. Or when my battery dies on a state route at dusk so that I can't even get my emergency blinkers to work and I have to wait over an hour for AAA to rescue me.

Or on days like today, when I'm not actually sure I know how to work my new computer and could really use someone else to worry about getting the wireless connection to work....

That would be nice.

Yes, I don't know how to use my new Mac. I've always been a Dell girl -- I believe since the Dude, You're Getting a Dell Guy in college convinced me that a Dell was the cool way to go. But, now that those new commercials convinced me that all the cool kids get Macs, I decided to be a lemming and get a Mac.

I thought I was making a good decision. LVL, Baby Sis and a few other friends have Macs and they love them. They rave about them. I think Baby Sis once considered getting married to her Mac in a quick ceremony in the Netherlands, but then reconsidered in fear that the Navy would quickly add that to the things you don't ask and don't tell about. So, I did a little research, set myself a budget, and bought a computer that seemed to be the perfect fit for my needs. I mean, I don't need much in the way of computers. My old one will continue to be my work computer and this new one is just for me to play with. Blog, Itunes and skype. That's all I really need.

But, now I can't get my computer to accept the password for my wireless server at home. We have a 128 bit encryption that I was quite proud of setting up myself earlier this year. I enter the code into the password space that my Mac automatically brings up itself and consistently get an error notice. I've reentered this password several times. Over and over and over again. And since I type around 90 words a minutes, I've been slowing down my keystrokes just so I can make sure each ever key is being hit at the right strength to get it to register. And nothing. I've changed zeros to Os and then back again and still nothing.

I'm stuck.

And now I want a boyfriend.

I want him to come in, tell me it's going to be nothing, and then spend the next hour going through the frustration of trying to make it work himself, swearing up the storm I rode out yesterday. Then, in one last desperate attempt to make it work before giving in and calling Time Warner and Apple himself, I want him to find the solution and make it work.

Because that's what boyfriends do in the movies. And that's all I really need a boyfriend for. To fix the things I don't want to or don't know how to fix. Is that really so much to ask?


(P.S. Fun stories from my "vacation" will be coming soon.)