He's Just Not That Into You.

It was Girls Night Out! For this month's Wow meeting, I had planned an evening to have dinner and see "He's Just Not That In To You," since I thought it would be fun to see a dating movie with The Girls. And I was right. There were seven of us ladies at Stonefire Grill, eating salads and talking. Some of the ladies didn't know each other and, after only a short time, started exchanging phone numbers and planning future nights out. I love to see that, how women so easily bond quickly with other women.

We grow up with little boys acting strangely around us and we don't understand their actions. The movie told a story about a little boy pushing down a little girl who asked him why he did that and he said "You're made of dog poo." When the little girl tearfully asked her mom why the boy said that, she was told "it means he likes you." Huh? So we grow up, date a guy, and spend countless minutes and hours trying to figure out the meaning of his actions or words, calling girlfriend after girlfriend, guessing what it all could mean. According to the movie and the book of the same title, it's really still just like when they were little boys, that what they say has often the opposite meaning and that they are just as unwilling or unable to tell us the truth. But maybe we are just missing the point by trying to read too much into what the guys say. "Nice to meet you" doesn't mean they want to see us again. "We'll talk" doesn't mean they're planning to call us again. "See ya later" doesn't mean they want to see us again. So what's a girl to do?

The movie was "cute" but there was something wrong about it, something unnerving that took me some time to figure out. For sure, we women need to take things at face value, live in the moment, and stop thinking ahead. It seemed like the women in the movie created futures with these guys in their heads and these became fantasies that the women strove to make happen. Like the story of the couple who met, fell in love, and married at the pushing of the woman, but then later they both realized how unhappy they were, how the relationship wasn't the one of their fantasy any more, or maybe it never was. The movie showed several unhappily married couples, mostly because of the wives who made something out of nothing, like the couple at their wedding arguing over whether the guy hesitated before "saying I do." The movie made women look pushy and unrealistic and the guys look weak and whiny and it made me uncomfortable.

I haven't dated for a while and have been pretty comfortable on my own. This movie certainly didn't make me want to grab the first guy I see, but it did make me even more sure of my own views. That I need to live in the moment, enjoy whatever is happening right now and stop "futurizing." That I need to continue to strive for good communications with men I might meet, checking out what it is they are really saying by asking them, not others. That life does not revolve around having a romantic partner. And that a night out with girlfriends is always fun.