HaBitza

Please note:  this post was triggered by the following comment – but is in no way addressed specifically to this person.  Critique of an entire gender is so commonplace now it’s become an accepted norm, a subject of discussion.  There are times when we all (married, single and anywhere in-between) need to examine ourselves, need to re-assess how we talk about others and how we relate.

Just a guy:

I am not just hurt. I am not just broken. I am ANGRY. I cannot have a meaningful relationship with a woman now. I have tried. Lord I have tried! I was SUCKED DRY. Every inch of my soul is simply burning with pain from the HORRORS I underwent BECAUSE OF YOUR GENDER!

So many people, men and women, single, married, divorced have been through bad experiences.  Some say it’s only the men, some say it’s only the women, and some say they deserve each other.

But get real – question is, do you, does anyone want to stay with such feelings?  To carry on treading the same rut?

And do you, just a guy, want to be considered as just a guy? a man?  (or amongst the macho, a real man?) or a person?  I address the same question to the women who malign men day in day out – do you want to be considered as a woman first – or as a person?

When Deena and I gave the original tag line to this site, we called it “Date like a Mensch” – not like a man, or like a woman.  “Menschlichkeit”, behaving like a mensch, comes before and way above sexuality in relationships.  Without it marriages can’t work, relationships can’t work, and let’s face it, even a single date can’t work.

To malign an entire gender is not menschlich – whether it comes from a man or a woman.  And beyond that, for anyone wanting to get married – it’s not useful, not helpful, and serves to distort the soul.

Move on, look for the individual, look for the good in that individual, and be aware of your power in relationships, because even the one who feels so much like a victim has power if he/she would only wake up to it.

But repeating complaints without purpose – unless, just-a-guy and others, you’re trying to convince yourself to enter a monastery or a single-sexrelationship – is just that, without purpose.

Date like a mensch.  That is the only way to go.

My new role models

OK, here’s the thing.  Yenta decided she wants to open a singles bar in Florida.  For over-90′s.  Well I can’t let her do this all on her own… she’ll guilt trip me into oblivion…

OK, for real now – I find I’m not able to continue co-authoring this blog (as you may have noticed in the last couple of months!)  due to time constraints, and am officially retiring to the peanut gallery.  My role models are the two old men in the heilige Muppet Show, and I hope to follow their example faithfully and well, developing my talents for offending the innocent (and amusing the guilty) to unprecedented levels.

Many thanks and kudos  to Deena for keeping this blog going and for telling it like it is!  From the many responses and comments we’ve had over the last year, it seems that we have been touching a nerve, somewhere, and I hope habitza.com continues to make a lot of people deservedly nervous for many years (you know who you are, you think such behaviour will be tolerated?  no, it will be blogged about!).

Photo by Ricardipus on flickr

Yenta:  Live dangerously, tell someone she’s beautiful

Yenta:  Live dangerously, ask her out

Yenta:  Lose the toupee… did you hear me?  Lose it before it falls into your soup!

Yenta:  Some people stay single when they’re married, and some people seem married when they’re single.  It’s a strange world.

Yenta:  remember, arrogance and total despair are built into the Jewish condition (with a heavy helping of guilt)

Yenta: never tell your date you can’t meet cos you’re washing your wig

Yenta:  never take a gun on a date

OK, homeopathy is based on the law of similars, on the idea that a careful dose of something that can cause symptoms in a healthy person can cure similar symptoms in the sick.  Sort of “hair of the dog” idea.  Homeopathy is what I do.  And if I were a true homeopath, which I am, I would say the following, which I will.

YOU’RE ALL NEBBICHS!  EVERY SINGLE PERSON IS A NEBBICH! (nice double entendre on that one, don’t you think?) NOT BEING MARRIED MEANS YOU’RE A NEBBICH!

Has that gotten you writing me horrible comments, announcing to the world “this woman is crazy, I’m never reading her posts again”?    Has a little voice in you woken up, a part of your personality flexed its muscles, an unspoken announcement declared internally saying “I’m not taking any more of this c-&*(#@p!  Has part of you, the part with internal integrity, recognized that this is not truth, never was and never will be?

There, now, doesn’t that feel better? And doesn’t that feel wonderful?

Or as in the famous Life of Brian scene (and anyone who doesn’t know it is too young, too ignorant or has yet to experience the delights of true humour), are you all going to repeat after me “we’re all nebbichs” – except for the lonely courageous soul in the corner who’s saying “I’m not!”

If you came across a group of people (no matter what their gender, species, marital or financial status) discussing earnestly whether they were losers or not – would you think they are?  Would you think they aren’t?  And most importantly – is this a conversation you even really want to have?  Does it make you happier? More fulfilled?

Everyone has problems and difficulties, challenges as we say in the era of new age and positive thinking – where exactly does pity come into it? Where does constant self-examination of  “loser-not loser”/”nebbich-not nebbich” come into it?  To my mind, the only thing that comes into it is practical action – are you going to stay home or go out?  Are you going to ask someone to set you up with the guy/girl you’re interested in or are you going to wait?  Are you going to take this job/that job/ unemployment benefit?  Are you going to set those people up or not?  But the self-definition discussion – this kind of self definition discussion – adds nothing, in my excessively outspoken opinion.

Basically, it’s like this:  If you’re a nebbich you’re a nebbich, if you’re not, you’re not, and I have news for you, it has absolutely nothing to do with being married or single.

Signed

THE NEBBICH, AND PROUD OF IT