“Thanks doll. Me wuv you,” the text message read.

I read it again. Then I scooted the phone across the table to my friend The Captain. He read it and spit sushi out of his mouth.

The man on the other end of the offending phone is not and never has been my boyfriend. We went on one date. One. His message confuses me. Why is he telling me this? Why is he saying it like that!?

It’s been a long time since anyone told me “I love you” in a romantic sense. But no one, ever, has said or written it in baby talk. “Me wuv you” is like a bad car accident — I couldn’t stop re-reading that text. Thinking about it. Telling everyone about it. Trying to figure out what it meant and why it was sent.

Scott Halzman is a professor at Brown University in the department of psychology and human behavior.

“I think the purpose of baby talk is to protect the sender from rejection or embarrassment,” he says.

I see his point, but after one date? I’m concerned that this guy thinks I find baby talk sexy, or is perhaps confusing me with his 6-year-old child, or, or, or? I tell Dr. Halzman about the sappy text message and how it perplexes me.

Halzman agrees, “People look forward to sex with adults, not infants, so baby talk can dampen the sex drive.”

Talk about an understatement.

I want to be loved, but not “wuved.”

— Leah M. Charney
Contact Charney at lcharney@womensmag.com and www.datingandotherbadhabits.com.

Photo by Amanda Tipton, Koroko Photography.

My eyes are big and brown and haven’t changed as I’ve aged. They are still inquisitive and rimmed with long lashes. I don’t happen to think they’re my best feature, but the man in the hat thinks they’re beautiful.

A few weeks later another man — a very married photographer friend — declares randomly, “You know what’s the prettiest part of you? Your bottom lip.”

My bottom lip? But the man in the hat said my eyes.

“Your eyes are pretty, too,” the photographer says, pausing as though studying me like one of his compositions, “But your bottom lip is gorgeous.”

Beauty is indeed a thing no one can absolutely agree upon. For a guy trying to pick me up in a dark bar it was the eyes. For a friend whose whole life is art it’s the bottom lip. I’m curious to know what men I’ve actually dated find beautiful about me.

Since most of my ex-boyfriends become my best girlfriends I ask them. It feels awkward, like I’m fishing for an unauthorized confidence boost. But I really don’t know how else to get answers.

What is beautiful about me?

“It was the way you talked,” says the clever musician. “It was silly, eccentric. That’s what I found attractive.”

The way I talk? I love to talk and am often concerned I’m saying too much and hijacking conversations. But upon first meeting, at a time when he knew very little of or about me, the way I gesticulate wildly and tell animated, detailed stories about nothing was not only interesting, but apparently beautiful.

I unleash the question upon the rugby player, a Greek statue of a man who doesn’t skip a beat.

“You happen to life, you don’t let it happen to you,” he claims before expounding. “You influence — impact, I think would be a better way to put it.”

And that’s beautiful?

“I think so,” he says seriously, almost daring me to accept the compliment.

Like many women I have a hard time taking a compliment. I think it’s written somewhere in the girl handbook. But it was pointed out to me that defining beauty isn’t about conceit. Instead it is the measure of confidence.

It was much easier to ask the question than to accept the answers, or worse yet (gasp!) answer the question for myself.

So, deep breath, here we go:

I love my breasts and my bottom and those pouty lips, too. I have hair that belongs in a shampoo commercial. Sometimes I snort when I laugh and when I smile I scrunch up my entire face. But those are not my most beautiful qualities. No. Not even close.

I am kind, generous. I am a fiercely loyal friend. I believe in the possibilities. I live for the journey. I am stubborn. Defiant. Silly. Serious. I am a walking contradiction, always and never the same.

And it took the men who know me most intimately to remind me of all this. The men who have seen me both all dolled up and completely dressed down. The men who have seen me fragile and scared. The men who after dating me still wanted to be my friends. They have answered the mysterious question.

My eyes and lips are nice enough. But my character is luminous.

— By Leah M. Charney
Contact Charney at LMCharney@gmail.com and www.datingandotherbadhabits.com.

I have no idea what she meant by that — unless she meant kisses should be small and nutty and taste awesome covered in chocolate. But since the woman spent her life writing about kisses, I’ll wager she knew a thing or two. I have not ever written about kisses until now, but I have done a fair amount of kissing in my time.

I am thankful for kisses. Kisses are small things, to be sure, but oh-so-important. I wouldn’t want to live my life without them. Life in single-girl-world means sometimes spending weeks or months without so much as a single peck.

There are different types of kisses and different types of kissers. A quick Google search of kissing will turn up hundreds of Web sites devoted to types and tips and how-to’s.

Think back to the best kisser you’ve ever known. Perhaps that person is your spouse, or a lost love of long ago; or maybe the best kisser was that stranger on New Year’s whom you spent a mere two minutes with. It doesn’t matter who your best kiss was with, but I’ll bet you are thankful for that moment.
The kiss is sometimes a thing we look most forward to. My best guy friend recently had a first date with a hot Boulder doctor. The date went great, until the kissing part came.

Photo by Flickr user e.esders.

“Maybe you’re a good kisser, and she’ll be a fast learner,” I said, trying to comfort him during our post-date pep talk.

“I dunno,” he responded. “It’s real bad. It’s like a horse eating an apple.”

Ouch.

I’ve also known bad kissers. I’ve shared moments with “washing machine” kissers who slobbered all over my face and chin. I dated a boy in high-school who was a “chicken” kisser — he’d lunge forward with quick, piercing pecks, like my lips were bits of corn feed. Then there are the “vacuum” kissers, who Hoover through the mouth with such force I’ve feared for the safety of my teeth. Still, I am just as thankful for those bad kisses because they taught me to appreciate the good ones.

I have learned how I felt about someone just in the way I kiss him, and have in turn learned his feelings for me. A few years ago, I was dating a Perry Farrell look-a-like who unexpectedly kissed me goodbye by planting a soft, sweet kiss. On my forehead. In one motion, he had clarified our relationship — it was going nowhere — and less than a week later he was gone from my life.
The kiss is something we often take for granted, until we miss it.

Take my friend, Ginger (not her real name). When we were in college at CU, there were young men to be found at parties every weekend. Recently she recounted the tale of one such party. It had gotten late and was time to go.

“But I haven’t kissed anyone yet!” she bemoaned.

“Will someone make out with Ginger so we can leave?” her male bodyguard and buddy pleaded to the party.
Cue the line of men. Six or seven of them.

“So who’d you pick?” I asked.

“Oh, I kissed all of them,” she said, “And the last one was the best kisser. I was annoyed I didn’t start there.”
She paused. “I miss college sometimes,” she said.

But it’s not the parties she misses. It’s the opportunity for kisses.

– Leah M. Charney
Charney is sassy yet classy and always up for a good kiss. Contact Charney at lcharney@womensmag.com and www.datingandotherbadhabits.com.

I’ve spent my entire automobile life counting on mechanics and boyfriends to change my oil and tell me where that blue smoke was coming from. I’ve dreaded buying a car any time I’ve had to because I knew I had the mark of a sucker on me. I am afraid of my car. As much as I count on it to get me to work and the store and other states, I had no idea what lurked beneath the white metal exterior.

I have, however, claimed that I wanted to learn more about my car.

I’d wanted to know how to change the oil and for what purpose. I fear the day I’m stranded by the roadside because I don’t even know where my jack is, much less how to use it. And I was paralyzed by my inability to do anything about one pesky burned out headlight. It was long past time to take charge and understand exactly what was going on inside of my heavy machine.

Enter Club Workshop.

I stumbled upon the ad on Craigslist for “Auto Maintenance 101.” It might as well have boasted, “Stop being silly, Leah. Take the mystery out of this once and for all!”

Club Workshop is the brainchild of Steve Garran, who together with his wife, Laura, opened the 16,000-square-foot Denver space in September of 2008. An active hobbyist, Steve Garran quit his stressful IT job to follow a dream. That dream involves an auto bay with a lift; a woodworking shop; a metal working shop; and more.

“I realized there wasn’t a place like this where you could do it yourself,” Steve explains.

Laura interrupts, laughing, “You needed a bigger garage.”

This is certainly a bigger garage.

Mike Kiehl is my teacher today. The former repair shop owner grew tired of running his own place and decided to come to Club Workshop. He now spends his days helping members of the club with their projects and teaching classes to folks like me. The auto classes are always small — three to five members max — and today there are three of us total, all women seeking to know more about the machines we depend upon.

Mike puts a Subaru on the lift. Carefully we inspect the undercarriage and all the parts and pieces located there. We discuss why and when to rotate tires. We remove the oil from the car. Once the Subaru is back on land, we finish the oil change and soak in all there is to know about what rests beneath the hood.

Later, when I open my own Toyota I could effectively point out every belt, hose and tank. I can even tell you what they all do.

“I think it is empowering for women to know the basics,” Laura Garran told me in our first e-mail.
I couldn’t agree more. Next time I come back to Club Workshop, I think I’ll learn how to weld.

Click here to view the embedded video.

—By Leah M. Charney

The American Cancer Society estimates that there will be 192,370 new cases of breast cancer in 2009.  About 10,000 of these women will be under the age of 40.

And according to the National Center for Health Statistics, approximately 78,000 women will get a mastectomy this year; a procedure in which all of the breast tissue from one or both breasts is completely removed. In 2008, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons performed 11,327 breast reconstruction surgeries on women under the age of 40.

Most of these surgeries were performed on women with cancer, but several thousand of them may have been performed on women with perfectly healthy breast tissue.

My breasts are not victims — not yet. They are a source of power. Ultimately this is why it is so hard to imagine a me without them.

Some women whose relatives have been so plagued by breast cancer, like mine, choose tests, surgeries — various preventative measures to try to army up against future cancer cells. They find strength in sort of scientifically foretelling their breasts’ future. But for other women — for me — it is not that simple.

This month I will be 26 years old. This month I will have a mammogram — again. I was 20 when my tender, terrified bosom was first placed between those cold plates. I’d like to say the mammograms get easier; they haven’t yet. In fact, each one becomes more of an event. Will this be the time they find cancer?

But my biggest fear isn’t actually getting the cancer that has plagued my mother so many times in her almost 53 years. My biggest fear is simple: Who will love me if I don’t have breasts? More importantly, will I love me if I don’t have breasts? For me, they are a key part of what makes me beautiful; what makes me a woman. Without them would I be less beautiful? Less of a woman?

I ask this question of my friends, my family, my boyfriends. One night, my mama and I are holding court, as we often do. I am outside on the porch in the sticky summer air. My cell phone is hot to my face and tears burn my cheeks. I call terrified or sad or angry, and she listens like all moms should.

“There is some beauty in cancer,” she says on this particular night.

This woman is an incredible, beautiful soul. She is bold, kind, gracious, feisty. In short she is the older, blonder version of me. And this I am deeply proud of. But she is a double amputee. Her breasts, once removed, were never reconstructed. Currently she is living with terminal cancer — a reoccurrence of the breast cancer that has taken hold in her lymph system since there is no more breast tissue to gobble up. I have promised her that if she lives to be 60 I will take her to Greece and buy her new breasts. I cannot look at her scars.

Two big anchor scars sit atop her chest where her 36-C cups once lived. They are surrounded by pockets of flesh and fluid. They are not pretty.

So what is this beauty in cancer? Apparently the things you discover in yourself. When her cancer returned in August of 1999, my mom packed up herself and her life and started over. She left my dad. She went back to church. She changed careers. She fought for her life. She created a new life worth fighting for. She made new friends. She created valued relationships with her children.

“I understand the fear of what-if, baby girl, but if you never open up and try, you miss out on all the good stuff,” Mama says sagely.

The first time I found a lump I convinced myself I was making it up. When you’re constantly waiting for cancer, looking for cancer, then everything could be cancer. So I decided I was imagining the lump until a week later when my doctor also felt it during my already scheduled yearly exam. But two ultrasounds later it was gone. It was nothing. This time.

I watched cancer tear my parents apart.

And while there were certainly other factors in the demise of their marriage, the cancer was a big contender. My dad couldn’t fix it and my mom didn’t want him to. From the perspective of a child it appeared as though each sickness pushed them further and further apart. And once her breasts were gone, he was even more different and distant — to all of us.

I can’t imagine what it must be like to watch your partner fight cancer, have chemo, lose body parts. But I know the possibility of this scenario affects my own romantic relationships. By date three, most people are thinking, “Do I want a date four?” Or maybe “Could I introduce this person to my friends?” Or “What does this person looks like naked?” But not me. Date three I’ve been known to think, “Could I be sick with you? Are you the kind of person who can handle it?” Which is the saddest thing I’ve ever had to admit.

Jenny Atchley, of Erie, is 29 years old. Two years ago she had a tumor the size of golf ball removed from her colon. Last year she had her breasts preemptively removed, and in January she finished her reconstruction. We meet in a bar and bond over a glass of wine. We have this secret in common: this fear of what our bodies will do without our permission.

“Even after being married six years I was still afraid if my husband would still find me attractive,” Atchley confides when I start poking around about her surgery.

So what makes a woman decide to chop off her breasts before they turn cancerous? Knowledge. After Atchley’s bout with colon cancer, she was tested for genetic mutations and that test made her decide to, in her words, “Flash the threat of breast cancer a defiant middle finger.”

I, too, could end some of the guesswork. Doctors have suggested more times than I can count that I have genetic counseling. Two genes — BRCA1 and BRCA2 — have been identified as genes that, when they mutate, increase risk for breast and ovarian cancers primarily, and also certain small bowel cancers and prostate cancers.

For $3,120 the people at Utah-based Myriad Genetic Laboratories will do a full sequence genetic test that searches for these mutated genes.

According to Myriad, “Women with a BRCA mutation have a 33 to 50 percent risk of developing breast cancer by age 50 and a 56 to 87 percent risk by age 70.” Not done scaring their captive cancer-afraid audience, the statistics continue: a 27 to 44 percent chance of developing ovarian cancer by age 70.
Perhaps that range seems awfully wide, and age 50 seems pretty far away. But my mom had ovarian cancer at age 30 and breast cancer number one at age 33.

I’ve avoided having the testing done for a few reasons. This test could determine whether I have positive genetic proof, this mutation, a so-called “cancer gene.” But I don’t really want to know. What does knowledge get me? Is it power in this case?

Atchley had the test done and tested positive for a mutation to BRCA1. To paraphrase one doctor, I will get a mammogram and an MRI each year, six months apart, due to family history. And if I get the BRCA1 and BRCA2 tests? I’ll still get the mammogram/MRI one-two punch. For the rest of my life.
Plus, testing positive for the genes delivers more decisions. Another Myriad pamphlet shows a graph with cancer prevention management options.

Go on a drug like Tamoxifin, which interrupts estrogen production, and breast cancer risk may decrease as much as 49 percent. But no estrogen equals early menopause for as long as the drug is used.

Have an oophorectomy (removal of the ovaries) and the risk could drop 53 percent for breast cancer and 96 percent for ovarian cancer. But no ovaries equals no biological babies.

And most importantly (to me and my breasts, anyway) have a prophylactic mastectomy (removal of the breasts) and breast cancer risk could drop by 90 percent. But no breasts brings me right back to square one.

I’m overwhelmed by the numbers and the options, and I tell Atchley that I’m terrified to have the test because I’m not ready to make the decisions that come with a positive result.

“It’s one of those things where there is no turning back,” she explains, understanding. “I have had moments over the last year where I wondered if I wanted to know all this.”

Kindly, Atchley and I retreat to a dark bathroom stall where, like a teenage boy, I fumble over her new breasts. They feel natural. They look right and hang the way a 29-year-old woman’s breasts should. I would never know they weren’t the ones she came with, except for one pink telltale scar that runs from the side of her nipple to her underarms.

She looks beautiful, womanly.

So do I want to know about BRCA1 or its evil twin BRCA 2?

Can I work through my fear with my therapist? Ride my bike? Eat a healthy diet? Not smoke? Get a mammogram? Six months later get an MRI. I’d rather keep my breasts. These are mine. I like the ones I came with.

I consult Timothy Rebbeck, a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania. Rebbeck is working on a study, funded by the National Cancer Institute, looking specifically at measuring the risk reduction BRAC-positive women receive by getting mastectomies.

“It’s pretty clear now that testing for BRCA1 or BRCA2 has value because you can do something to reduce cancer risk and mortality if you are found to be positive,” Rebbeck says.

He’s onto something there. I live in fear of what the test will tell me, but that is a bit like sticking my fingers in my ears and screaming “la-la-la-la-la.” So let’s say I do get the test. And then let’s say the test is positive.

Then what?

Rebbeck explains, “Prophylactic mastectomy is not necessarily recommended but is an option. Since there are other preventative options for breast cancer … the need for mastectomy for prevention is less, and the psychological issues are potentially more complex.”

Definitely more complex. I won’t get a simple test because if it’s positive then I’ll have to decide whether or not to have my breasts removed and reconstructed, and if I have them removed and reconstructed if I can have a successful romantic relationship. I’d say that’s pretty complex.

Oddly, I begin to feel at peace with the idea. This test is something I’ve avoided for years, blamed for my lack of commitment in relationships, hid behind. It is long past time to stop hiding, stop fearing the what-if.
Maybe it’s time to get the test now and worry about the results later.

Psychologist Elizabeth Lombardo says it’s OK to be scared, but not if that fear prevents you from making informed decisions. Lombardo, based in Pennsylvania, has been on CNN and quoted in Newsweek, Self and Glamour, among others.

“There is a difference between avoiding testing out of fear,” she says, “and consciously and rationally deciding not to get tested.”

So, consciously and rationally do I want this test?

The test could provide answers. Or more questions. And frankly, if I decide not to get the test will I be able to stop worrying? I may be afraid of a day that never comes. My mother’s legacy need not be mine. She was right to tell me that concentrating so furiously on a what-if makes me blind to the beauty around me. What if I spend all this time scared, preparing for a diagnosis that never comes?

I never used to be afraid. And so what if this is just a phase? I could grow out of it. Each clean mammogram, each clean MRI, reinforcing my health. My pert breasts reinforcing their beauty, their strength, reinforcing me.

Kate Crow is a master’s level genetic counselor in southern Colorado.

“Genetic tests are not the Holy Grail for medical management decision-making,” she says, getting to the root of my problem. “Surgery is always an option, not a requirement if you have an inherited risk for cancer.”
Right. Option. Not requirement. I forget that sometimes.

But here is my hope — and yes, there is a lot of hope in cancer, as my mom has shown me. I am not my mom and my future man will not be my dad. On her own journey, Mama found beauty in independence and solitude. I seek beauty in allowing myself companionship.

I want to fall in love with a man who loves me. A man who will look past the statistics and the percentages and possibilities. A man who will love my breasts and think them beautiful. A man who would also throw them a funeral if they are taken away. (Atchley’s husband did that for her.) A man who will throw them a parade if they are rebuilt. A man who is able to look past cancer and still see me. In short, he must be braver than I.

I still don’t know if I will have the test done. But what I do know is being afraid of a test is a waste of my time, my youth — and my beauty.

- By Leah M. Charney

Around town

Here are some local plastic surgeons who do prophylactic mastectomies, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons:

Claude Burrow, of Boulder — 303-449-5822, www.drburrow.com
Winfield Hartley and Hans Kuisle, of Boulder — 303-443-2277, www.boulderplasticsurgery.com
Glenn Herrmann, of Louisville — 303-664-9400, www.herrmannplasticsurgery.com
Scott Replogle, of Louisville — 303-666-4554, www.replogleplasticsurgery.com
Jeff Swail, of Longmont and Boulder — 303-449-6666, www.bvplasticsurgery.com

It’s not just the tub that is tiny. The stove is two-thirds the size of a normal one. The refrigerator is shorter than I am. I can touch the ceilings without much effort. I often joke that the walk-in closet is the biggest room in the house.

I’ve heard rumors from the neighbors that it was once upon a time housing for the priests or nuns of the Catholic church down the street. That was then. Now, it is my very own life-sized dollhouse.

Like other dollhouses, mine has no storage, apart from that one long skinny closet and five kitchen cabinets. I’ve gotten pretty creative and almost everything here serves some sly second purpose.

The coffee table is actually my two bedside tables pushed back to back—they wouldn’t fit in my bedroom. The couch has a mattress as a cushion and quickly becomes the “guest bedroom” for slumber parties or afternoon naps. There isn’t a linen closet, so a small dresser at the end of the bed hides all the sheets.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Living in a small space means living in a public space — there’s no laundry room to hide the dirty clothes. Piles of worn outfits stare at me from the corner of the living room/kitchen/office/guest bedroom. My toiletries are on display in the bathroom: bath soak, bath caviar, milk bath, all parked next to one another. I’m careful about what gets top priority in such packed real estate. When space is in high demand, one must carefully decide what is worth saving and what has to go.

Most of it goes.

Decorating choices must be more deliberate in a dollhouse. There are few places to hide secrets and not enough space to stash treasures. The brightly colored sewing box in the bathroom holds clandestine Tampons and toilet paper. My house will never look like the Pottery Barn catalog.

But it also will always have character, and lots of it. There is room for one overstuffed brushed metal bookshelf. There is room for one overstuffed red linen couch (or guest bed). There is room for one stepladder with homemade shelves that is overstuffed with glassware, pictures and Whiskey.
Most importantly, there is always room for me and my Rubber Duckie.

— By Leah M. Charney

Photo by Jessica Gronewold

When Bob Dylan tells you it’s time to let go of a relationship, it’s serious. Bob said! That means I have to do it.

I know I’m in trouble when pop songs start speaking to me. Which is to say I’m in trouble a lot.

But specifically, Bob Dylan’s “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right” might be the greatest song when trying to figure out how to get over a guy. When he opens with, “It ain’t no use to sit and wonder why, babe. It don’t matter, anyhow,” I know he means it.

It’s the kind of advice my best friends would give. Except by the time I get to Bob, I’ve usually stopped talking to my gals about whatever guy has taken over my brain. If I have nothing new to say, my friends aren’t going to be able to provide any new advice or insight.
Yes, I know it’s silly that I can’t get past it (whatever it is).

I know he wasn’t that great.

I’m aware I’ll meet someone better.

These things are true, and when our friends tell us these things over and over, they’re just trying to help. But when no amount of rational thought will allow me to move on, it’s time to put down the ice cream (or in my case, the bacon) and pull out the big guns. I go to my music collection. Sometimes it’s to be with my fellow brokenhearted and emote all over the place. Other times it’s the loudest, angriest, rockinest thing I can find.

I know music is an important part of the get-it-over process for a lot of folks, but I decide to consult the experts.

Ryan Stubbs is the guitarist/bassist/violinist for the Denver band Everything Absent Or Distorted. They’re a band full of boys who sing songs about girls. He and Bob aren’t good friends, but he’s got his own tunes to kick him out of break-up funk.

“‘Soon Enough’ by The Constantines has helped me,” this rocker explains. “The lyrics are great.”
I check into the song and find out quickly what Stubbs is referencing. When the Canadian band wails, “Soon enough, work and love will make a man out of you,” it reminds that heartbreak is key to growing and moving on.

I call Sam Hill while she’s on the air at radio station Alice 105.9 FM. I figure she’s an expert since she listens to pop songs all day for a living. When I tell her about my conversations with Bob she seems to understand. I ask if she and Bob have had conversations, too?

“Well, ‘Purple Rain’ makes me cry. So when I listen to ‘Purple Rain’ and I don’t cry anymore, then I know I’m OK,” she confides.

I try to have a conversation with Prince, but he’s just not as good a listener. So back to Bob I go.

And just when I think about calling what’s-his-name to seek out answers or further punishment, Bob chides,

“We never did too much talking anyway. So don’t think twice, it’s all right.”

Yeah, Bob. You know what? You’re right.

— By Leah M. Charney
Charney is a sassy yet classy music lover who still believes in mix-tapes. Contact her at lmcharney@gmail.com or www.datingandotherbadhabits.com.

There are men who only live in my phone and not in my real life.

Well, at some point they lived in my real life but in ever so brief ways. For example, there’s the financial planner whom I call J. Trouble. (I think his name is John but it could be Josh or James.) We went on exactly — count ‘em — two dates. And then, like any good “man magic act,” he disappeared.

Except he didn’t stay gone. In fact, he shows up every season. Every four months, like clockwork, there’s a text message from Mr. J. Trouble telling me he was thinking about me, or we should get together, or my favorite, the ever simple, “Hey gorgeous.”

But it’s not just him. I have a whole crop, eight or nine of them — men I’ve never slept with, never been on more than a few dates with, never expected much from, who disappear and reappear every few months.

I am at work when one such message arrives, so I run to my work-wife, Jessica, the woman who effectively handles all my drama when I’m in the office (and keeps me in a steady supply of Kit Kat bars and Advil). When I tell her about J. Trouble and the others like him, she tells me, “It reminds me of these ugly yellow flowers we used to have next to the driveway growing up. My mom hated those flowers so much. We’d mow them over and in the winter run our sleds over them, but they just kept coming back.”

I understand the metaphor all too well. So I decide it’s time to delete the perennial favorites from my life or else they’ll keep popping up like ugly yellow flowers.

Over brunch, my married gal-pal, Jen, thinks back to her dating years and remembers what she called her “boomerang men.” No matter how far she threw some, they just kept circling back. Erica Hollander, a trainer, educator and therapist who specializes in human communication, listens carefully when I tell her about these “boomerangs.”

“You need to ask yourself ‘What messages am I sending that make you think you can pop in and out of my life?’ Is there something you’re doing to invite this kind of behavior?” she asks.

Other than texting them back each time? I hedge. I’m a smart alpha-female. I want to end this annoying pattern. I want to communicate my intention directly. I want to be left alone if it’s not going to work out.

Hollander sees through my veiled excuses and pushes further: “All of us want to get on with life and get on with productive relationships. The relationships you’ve described have no potential.”

Ouch. But she’s right. And she makes me realize that I’m doing myself no service by perpetuating the “cool girl” myth. Like many women, I want to be thought of as an awesome creature who is oh-so go with the flow. And that I’m the exception, not like the “other” girls. So I keep texting back, keep perpetuating a cycle because I don’t want to be rude. Plus, I’m curious to know what’s brought whichever man it is back. But I never get the satisfaction of knowing. So it’s time to end this unhealthy cycle.

More disturbing is the fact that when I delete these men I feel nothing. No guilt, no excitement, nothing. J. Trouble and the others are plucked easily like the simple weeds they’ve become. So I keep deleting, until I get to one that I don’t want to delete. One that I sometimes wish would come back (due to whatever idiotic reasoning, thanks Dr. Hollander). I think about deleting him for several days. Until finally, I do.

And just like the others, I feel nothing. Unlike the others, I am relieved to feel nothing.

Charney is a sassy yet classy minx who may be unleashing her delete key on Facebook next. Contact her at www.datingandotherbadhabits.com.

Greg Behrendt may not be a household name, but you definitely know him.

He’s a stand-up comedian and was a consultant for “Sex and the City.” Oh, and there’s that little book called “He’s Just Not That Into You,” which recently became a movie starring the likes of Drew Barrymore and Jennifer Aniston.

Now, here’s your chance to get to know Behrendt better.

WM: Have you even been to Boulder?

Greg: Yep. I love it. It’s cute. I think went shopping for some vintage cowboy stuff at some point. It’s great. I like this state.

WM: Do you get the same relationship questions in every city? Or do you find that it’s different in the deep South versus the Midwest? Are women across America are asking the same questions?

Greg: They’re all the same.

WM: So we’re all the same idiots. OK.

Greg: I wouldn’t say idiots. I would say that it’s all the same problems. Everyone has the same problems. They’re in a relationship with someone they don’t understand and wonder if they should stay in it.

WM: And the good relationships really aren’t that much work?

Greg: My experience — and I always have to say my experience — is they shouldn’t be that much work. My relationship isn’t that much work, and it’s actually really fun. I actually look forward to seeing my wife.

WM: I love the way you talk about your wife.

Greg: You know I waited a really long time to — I mean I didn’t get married until I was 35. I met her when I was 33. I waited a long time to find the awesome . And it’s awesome.

WM: It’s got to be hard to go from being a comedian to writing this book and now it’s a movie. Have you seen the movie?

Greg: Yeah. I think anything’s great “source material” for relationships, and there was certainly a lot of good source material there. The way I look at it was they painted a picture of my book but with Scarlet Johansson and Jennifer Aniston. So I’ll take it.

– By Leah M. Charney

Leah Chearney

My driver’s side headlight has been out for almost a month now. I’ve been meaning to fix it, really I have. In the meantime, I’ve been helping high school students everywhere win at padiddle. But it’s gone on for too long now and I really should get around to fixing it. It’s just, well, isn’t that a job for a boy?

There, I said it. Out loud even. And I meant every word of it. I know it might be considered anti-feminist of me, and I don’t mean to betray the sisterhood, but there are some things I just can’t bring myself to do.

As a strong, stubborn, independent female, my job is to terrorize men everywhere into believing that I don’t need them and can eat them alive. And I might not really need one. But sometimes I really want one (though not always for breakfast).

Specifically, I’m taking applications for a boyfriend-of-the-week that will take care of all the maintenance pertaining to my car. I’ve never been particularly good at washing it or detailing it. The mechanic who changes the oil checks the tire pressure so that I don’t explode on the highway. And yes, ashamedly, I ran out of gas once.

To my credit, when I noticed the headlight was out I popped the hood and took a peek. It looked complicated. I enlisted men I work with just to double check; they agreed. Complicated.

These same male coworkers suggested I strategically plan a dress with the proper amount of cleavage and march myself down to an auto parts store. Apparently this is what other girls in this situation do. So I plotted the outfit and practiced batting my brown eyes. When I walked in, the angry looking girl behind the counter didn’t find my dress cute or practical, and I’ll wager a guess she was less than impressed with my breasts. She sold me the headlight, and $10.38 later I asked, “Is there someone here who can show me how to install it?”

She glared at me from beneath her Aquanetted bangs and said, “Make your boyfriend do it.”

Ah yes. Back to square one. Since the solution seemed to be lack of a man, I set out to solve the problem by finding one.

I thought about calling a man I’d recently been on a date with. He did, after all, take me to Wal-Mart to buy a gun rack, and he had an unfortunate mustache. Surely a man of this caliber would know how to change a headlight. When I told my friend Doug of my plan, he took the wine glass out of my hand, volunteered to be my fake-boyfriend, and quickly searched Google for proper headlight technique since I have no owner’s manual. But then, after several beers, he too decided it was best I seek professional help.

So I continued driving with one headlight, bemoaning the fact that I was going to have to take out an ad on Craigslist to find a temporary boyfriend suitable for the job.

Until something marvelous happened. I was standing in the kitchen cutting beets and asked my friend E.J. where her husband was.

“Roberto’s gone to get my headlight fixed,” she said, without looking up from mashing the potatoes.

Problem solved.

Who needs a boyfriend when you can borrow someone else’s husband?

I came down with a mild case of Tourette’s as Roberto easily reached into the hood and removed the cord with the troublesome headlight and slid the new one it its place. It was that easy.

Jack Dionigi, owner of 28th Street Garage in Boulder, laughs when I tell him the long, silly process for that one headlight.

“Some of them are that easy,” he says, “but you can have many headlight scenarios depending on the car.”

I ask Jack if he teaches a class on simple car care for dummies like me.

“We’ve never done that before but it would be good to take the fears out and show what can happen and how it affects your car in the long run,” he says.

Then Jack offers to have me come to the garage so he can show me a thing or two.

Who needs someone else’s husband when I’ve got Jack?

Charney may be sassy yet classy, but she really should learn something about auto maintenance. Contact her at www.datingandotherbadhabits.com.