"..and by the way if you you hate to go to school, you may grow up to be a mule.." - Bing Crosby

I didn't particularly enjoy school, but I loved university. Yet, at 25, I am unemployed. I don't feel much like a mule, but I do feel somewhat like a fool.
Had I been working for the past 8 years, instead of earning myself a degree, I would have considerable savings by now and maybe even enough to not - gasp - worry where my next rent cheque is coming from. I cannot believe I am actually at that point. I cannot believe that people younger than me own property and are looking into "buying a second, purely for investment purposes."

I saw a poem today that read :

"The more I worry about my weight, the more I gain, the more I worry about my financial situation, the more I lose."

I wish I didn't worry about - well, I was going to say 'this' but actually both - issues so much or so frequently. My weight is something I can change, I know it. But I like myself. If I'm only doing it to 'meet people' (why must it sound so old-fashioned to say 'find a husband'? thats what i want to do!) then why should I do it at all?
The answer is clear to the world - because nobody wants a fat girlfriend. Oh my friends can roll their eyes, or tell me off, or proclaim in that dramatic way "SO not true!" but I know it. I know it because I've met some lovely, kind boys who have never looked at me in that way, but have considered other friends of mine as potential girlfriend material. My friends are each bright and talented, but I have enough self-value to realise that we are all equal in intelligence and wit, in personality and warmth. The bottom line is physical appearance. Of that I am certain. Men are created animalistic, it is in their nature to be first and foremost on the prowl, on the hunt, to act with natural desire and instinct. Walk into any club or bar and feel those 'prowling' vibes reverberating off the walls. Today, women claim to be capable of being equally predatory - which may be so, but I could argue it is not in their natural makeup. They have to work harder at it, for it to be believable.

This idea was perpetuated many moons ago by Jane Austen, in nearly all of her novels. Examine the attitudes and ideas on gender being flung about in 'Emma', played in the 1996 movie by Gwyneth. The attitude of Mr.Elton in the novel towards Harriet. most clearly manifests the feeling I often feel from men when I am around taller, skinnier friends - not sincerely of disgust, but of almost patronising amusement that I have even come to acknowledge, stepping out the way for the more beautiful girls. Why on earth would you pick Harriet, when Emma is still available? Emma imagines herself maligned by Frank Churchill when he 'chooses' Miss Martin over here. Yet he had been playing Emma for a fool, conducting an affair for many months with Miss Martin and simply leading Emma down the garden path. Even this may have been Emma's own imagination, longing as she is for romantic love.

I have no desire to be made a fool of, nor to be made to feel small and unworthy. I acknowledge that I am not a beautiful girl, and as I am nearing 26 it seems unlikely that one day I will magically blossom into a skinny, tiny, olive-skinned small-boned beauty. But, as I asked a friend the other day - yes, one of the beautiful ones - if what initially attracts a man to you is yours looks, how do I get them to even sit down with me? I have confidence in my personality, my intellect and my ability to make people laugh (providing they're not entirely boring) - but if I can't even get to the Coffee stage, where does a wedding come in?