Petri: As a man, I obviously cannot be alone with a woman

By Alexandra Petri

The Washington Post

No! No! I cannot be alone with a woman! Please! I beg of you!

Nothing will happen, of course. I hope. I pray. But please, let us not test it! My truck, my rules. I took a vow.

You do not know what I will become! You have not seen the horror that I struggle at all times to contain.

If you were in a situation where you had to move a cabbage, a fox, a woman and myself across a river, I would beg you: Take them, take them and go! Leave me alone on the shore, where I can do no harm. Build a tower around me. Let thorny vines grow up all around it, until it is obscured from view. Forget the location of the tower. Burn all maps containing it. Then, only then, can women be truly safe.

Oh, this curse, this curse! I cannot bear it.

What I would give to look at a woman and see a person. I am told that is what others see. If only; if only … .

You understand, I have this horrible condition. I have had it for years. I am incapable of seeing women as people. It used to be possible to get by in political life in this country with this condition. You would just move around a smoky room, speaking only to men, and you could have a nice career. But now, oh, these things, these things are everywhere. Holding elected office, performing jobs, playing soccer! You must understand my agony when I behold this. So much good meat, delicious meat, wonderful meat.

It is with difficulty that I shamble into the company of people every day. It is with difficulty that I convince people that I am, after all, a human being, not a wild animal, the mad, helpless victim of an uncontrollable lust. I cannot, I dare not; oh, it is with difficulty that I write these words now, knowing a woman may read them. The mere thought of my words moving before her unprotected eyes sends me into a frenzy. Ffffffft rrrrrrrrr graaarrrfll rrrrrr.

No women in the truck!

My truck is my sanctum sanctorum, my place of rest and quietness. But it is a struggle. Once a leaf landed on the window that looked like a woman’s profile, and I had to brake abruptly. Someone left a file folder with suggestive curves on the passenger seat, and I nearly drove off the road. I saw a picture of Hillary Clinton on a roadside billboard and I had to pull over immediately. Such is my struggle. I am scarcely fit for human company.

If you know of anyone who can break this curse, oh, what a relief it would be. My wife, too, could be alone with people! We would both be free from this agony. But as it is, I am a wolf bundled in an ill-fitting button-down shirt. I am a wild beast. I am a pestilence. Perhaps, in fact, I should not go out in public at all.

Do not let me out of the house! Or if I am so honored to be elected by you the people, the governor’s mansion!

Follow Alexandra Petri on Twitter @petridishes.