The other day, I was getting a drink with a friend of mine who I haven’t seen in a few years. She told me about her most recent boy who, she admitted, was kind of a scrub. How much of a scrub is he?

He is such a scrub, that not only does he live in a closet, but that closet also is inside of another closet.

Long unemployed, he pays the rent by selling off his record collection.

Finally, there’s this charming anecdote: one morning, my friend needed to get keys from his pants, and when she reached her hand into his pocket, she found it to be literally full of crumbs.

So here we have some sort of 19th century street-urchin — you can picture the greasy hair, the fingernails, and oh, the things that you wouldn’t want to see.  But wait a minute — just how old is this chap?

Well, my friends, it so happens that the young man who once inspired (maternal) affection in the tender heart of my 22-year-old friend is actually 36.

Though in some ways, this man-embryo seems to be from another dimension, he is only one closet and a bedroom removed from being the typical urban man-child. The frustrations of the man-child in his many forms have been recently documented in film (see Judd Apatow’s oeuvre), in trendpiece, and longer ago in this awesome and mysterious Neneh Cherry song.

However, despite the fact that this is a somewhat novel social and economic phenomenon, it turns out that men like this are not uncommon by far. Unlike many women who are very vocal about the tragedy of their singlehood, prideful bachelors in their mid-to-late thirties suffer in silence, with only the consolation of women under the age of 25 who will sleep with them, perhaps adore them for some time, and then ultimately outgrow them. Indeed, these dudes are a sad bunch. But what of us ladies?

When she was my age, my mother had just finished med school, and along with a job, she had her hands full with four-year-old me (granted, I filled a few hands). Twenty years later, she is making pleading phone calls to me because I can’t even take responsibility for my own student loans. And not even financial responsibility; I am too lazy and distracted (by making out with thirtysomethings?) to make a phone call to the bank.

Which is to say that for now, along with many of the girls I know, I am on the fast-track to being a manchild myself. But if something happens and I actually end up reaching adulthood before menopause, I say that rather than resentfully airing my (rather boring) anxiety over the lonely sex in this terrible city, if I am going to blame anything for not having its shit together enough to father my child, I intend to blame Science. In this day and age, it is Science’s job to keep up with the trendpieces and keep me fertile until John gets a real job; until Harry mans up and sees a shrink; and until Mark finally empties the crumbs out of his pockets.

Either that, or I’ll consider not acting like Financially Viable Romantic Love is my due just because I am a woman.

Photo by Flyinace2000