Women And Their "Boyfriends"

I met three different women yesterday who told me they had boyfriends within the first five minutes of meeting them. One at a business meeting, one on a bus, and one in my building. I didn't ask a single one of them if they had boyfriends, nor was I trying to hit on any of them. They just felt it necessary to not so subtly work the existence of their boyfriends into the conversation.

The woman at the meeting complimented me on my shirt. I smiled and thanked her, and she told me her boyfriend has the same one. The woman on the bus asked me if I knew where the nearest Best Buy was, and when I told her, she said she wanted to buy an ipod for her boyfriend's birthday. The woman in my building had just moved in, and I introduced myself just to be friendly. She, of course, had just moved in with none other than her boyfriend, and she let me know as much about 5 seconds after I introduced myself.

I've gotten the "I have a boyfriend" line plenty in my day when asking a woman for her number. I know for a fact, at least half of them were lying. I'll just pretend for my ego's sake that the other half weren't. I even had a woman tell me she had a boyfriend when I asked her out for a second date. Apparently, she met someone, dated him, and was at a stage in the relationship where she felt comfortable enough to call the man her boyfriend, all within the two days it took me to call her after our first date. My beef is not with these women, though. "I have a boyfriend," is code for "screw off, I'm not interested." I get it. But why do women feel it necessary to tell you they have boyfriends when you're not even remotely making a move on them? Are they just so proud of having boyfriends that they want to shout it from the rafters and let the whole world know? Or do they feel like every guy, even if he's not overtly hitting on them, has ulterior motives, and the existence of a boyfriend, real or imagined, will keep these uncontrollable horn dogs at bay?

I wonder if these women's boyfriends are walking around telling every woman they meet that they have girlfriends. Somehow, I don't think so. In fact, somewhere right now there's a guy with a girlfriend hitting on a girl who will tell him she has a boyfriend. And even if he's not hitting on her, she'll find a way to work it into the conversation.