You’re Telling Me the Perfect Man Does Not Exist?

This is not me, but it might as well be.

People tell me I am too picky. I really just refuse to settle for an off-brand partner. I decided I never would after I developed my first crush 19 years ago to realize not all cute boys are funny. Since then, I have chosen to live an independent lifestyle until I discover a version of someone who is worth wasting my time. What I want is simple, so I really don’t understand why it has been so difficult.

I just want a guy who will love me. But not to the point where he loves me more than I love him, or I love him more than he loves me. If the levels are off-balance by even one degree, I will either be turned off by how much he likes me because that means something must be wrong with him, or I will feel unwanted and not care to put effort into making someone like me as much as I like them.

I guess I also want a man who is intelligent. But not too intelligent to the point he gets off on mansplaining societal issues and basic functions of modern-day humanity, like how he is the first person to have discovered that keeping the last used layer of adhesive paper on his lint roller until the next time he rolls it onto his black linen pants stops it from sticking to the surrounding items in his desk drawer. But he must be more intelligent than me to challenge my perspectives while I remain smarter than him in the areas of my intellectual strength so I can teach him something in return to feel fulfilled.

And I want a man who is attractive. But not too attractive to the point I will constantly be worried he will leave me for someone who is out of our league. And I don’t want him to be as clean-cut as the men in the Calvin Klein ads because he must be the type of hot who reads Virginia Woolf on the train in his nerdy black and boxy Tom Ford glasses, and look like he crawled out of a dumpster all at the same time. This type of attractive works on men who have a really good personality, and even though growing attracted to him requires getting to know him, I must already know he is more attractive than he seems at first glance so I don’t lose interest.

I also want a man who is artsy. But not too artsy to the point he only wants to verbally dissect art and nothing else, and when he does, it must be about the types of movies that I consider art, like Lady Bird and Frances Ha. And art has to be such a consuming part of his life that it influences his hopes and dreams and life choices that cause him to live spontaneously like he has nothing to lose but his positivity, but he cannot depend on that mindset financially. Therefore, he must have a realistic back-up plan at all times.

I want a man who is successful. But not to the point where he works from the dark hours of the morning until 3 a.m. the next day and uses our only moments together to drill the achievements he made at his finance job that week into my ears. And even though his work ethic is what attracted me to him in the first place and the reason he can afford our adventurous tropical vacations where we order as many margaritas and Baja fish tacos as we want from room service, it is not allowed to lead to a long-term life of unhappiness and divorce fees he will hopefully cover.

I want a man who is stylish. But not to the point he is trying too hard because he must look effortless enough to stand out while avoiding any unique piece of clothing that I might dislike because that could turn me off forever, which would cause me to break up with him over the image of him wearing a neon orange baseball cap backwards, even though he pretended to enjoy the sight of my thrifted cowboy boots.

I want a man who is feminine. But not to the point where his femininity overshadows his masculinity because he must be the perfect amount of emotionally understanding to attend the Women’s March with me and still be able to put up a fight with other men who piss me off if necessary, even though I don’t believe in violence and would never want a man to act that way in public — I would just want to know if he could.

I want a man who is caring. But not to the point where everyone else can tell he is caring because I want him to come off as an asshole to them and just care about how he treats me, as our love should be so strong it is the only thing I care about. But he must disguise himself as a gentleman to impress my closest friends and family.

I have not been able to find anyone who checks off all of these boxes, even though I avoid eye contact with any man I think I might like and avoid dating apps and texting people back. I mean, is that so hard to find?