I will/I won't

I felt the urge earlier to write a poem. That was a blast from the past. Haven't written anything in probably 4 years at least. Am I regressing? Am I wishing for a time long gone?

Probably, yes. I think I'm longing for a time when I was still bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, when I was still the 'ice queen', could keep myself protected in my little fortress of solitude and all was right with the world.

Now I find myself longing to tell people,

'No, I don't want to hang out with you because you will make me want things that I don't want, you will make me long for things that I don't want to long for, you will make me step outside my fortress and make me long for a life that will destroy me.

'I will schmooze when I need to, I will be the social butterfly when it is required of me, I will conform to that fit that people-shaped hole in your mind that you think I belong in when it is called for.

'I will be the cool aunt, the crazy cat lady, the girl with standards that were too high so she didn't get married, the woman who's too independent and couldn't find a man. I will do this for as long as it takes until I can carve my own little cave out of life and fill it with the love that I need. 

You have what you want of me. Let me be.

What would a woman have said?

I saw the following caption on Reuters' Weird News, Odd News, Funny News Stories page:

Man tried to hire prostitute for his son, 14
LONDON (Reuters) - A man who tried to hire a prostitute to take his 14-year-old son's virginity as a present was spared jail by a court on Friday.

And I thought, the judge has to be a man. And guess what? It was! From Reuters: Man tried to hire prostitute for his son, 14:

LONDON (Reuters) - A man who tried to hire a prostitute to take his 14-year-old son's virginity as a present was spared jail by a court on Friday.

The Polish national took the boy out in his car and allowed him to pick out the prostitute, who was standing at the side of the road in the red-light district of Nottingham.

But the 42-year-old father was arrested because the teenager had chosen an undercover police officer, Nottingham Crown Court heard.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was handed a 10-month prison sentence, suspended for a year, after he admitted a charge of trying to solicit a woman to have sex with a child, the Press Association reported.

The court heard that the father, who came to Britain eight years ago, was arrested last July during an undercover operation by the city's vice squad.

Prosecutor Adrian Harris said the man and his son had approached the undercover officer whose code name was Sarah and beckoned her over .

He asked "Sarah" how much it would cost for her to have sex with his son and they agreed on a 20 pound fee. However, when the car pulled over, the man was arrested by plainclothes police officers.

"The boy said that they had driven past the girl and his dad pointed to her and said 'will she do?'" Harris said.

"He said 'yes' and they had turned round. He said his dad did this because he was still a virgin and he was taking care of that for him."

Judge Jonathan Teare said he would spare the father jail because of his excellent character and that he believed he did not mean any harm to his son.

"You have a duty of care to your son and that is to look after his moral welfare, not as you might think to break him in to the ways of sex through a prostitute," he said.

The court was told the boy would continue to live with his father.

I'm guessing that a female judge would have ruled in a completely different manner. The ruling would probably have included such words as 'depraved', 'sexual maniac', 'irrepairable psychological damage', 'unfit parent' and 'propagating sexual deviance and human trafficking'. But no, the guy lucked out and got a male judge and a slap on the wrist. Hmm.