Introduction
Get On
Your
Broom
and Go
T his handy guide and phrase book was created to unite and amuse all women by pointing out our common vocabulary—all the slang terms, euphemisms, common wisdom, and girl speak we've picked up along the way. As such, this book is essentially an homage to friendship and should serve as a reminder that good girlfriends and laughter can get you through
anything.
Part One of this book is a dictionary of common language that all single women share, which is born of the heartache and laughter that later we call “wisdom.” It is presented here as simple terms that you and your friends might use when philosophizing about the ups and downs of the dating roller coaster that we all ride for an unspecified time. These are the homespun terms and shorthand references that you begin collecting in high school, further cultivate in college, reinvent with your first apartment roommates, and finally perfect somewhere between twentyfive and forty. Laugh with your fellow females over this vernacular we share, but don't tell the boys…if you give them too much information, they may use it against you later.
The Girl Code
is also a long-overdue public airing of how women behave in packs—whether it be in dorm rooms or boardrooms, coffee shops or bathrooms, and a few boundaries that we need to draw between us about men.
Part Two is the implied code of behavior, ethics, and essential do's and don'ts that all you cool girls live by. As every girl knows, together we are a powerful force that abides by our own rules. If you are reading this book you've been living under these unspoken laws for at least eighteen years, but if you somehow missed out on why you keep losing girlfriends and botching up relationships, this should explain it. Welcome to the bible of being a girl's girl. These codes can and should be held against you in a court of public opinion by the sorority of sisters you hang out with.
Let's put it this way, ladies: If
Lord of the Flies
was about a group of girls stranded on a desert island, Piggy would have been lynched within three days, and this book will clearly explain why.
Most important, this book is not about how to “catch” a man.
We have a deodorant made for women but we can refuse to ever wear parity hose if we so choose. If we work hard, never marry, and renounce the right to bear children, no one will even look twice. We certainly don't need another book telling us how “tricking a man” into our lives is good for us.
This book is intended to be a sigh of relief, a reminder to all single girls that they are certainly not alone. And most of us are so by choice, whether we know it or not. This solo time in your life, dedicated just to you, should include space to make mistakes and have many more laughs with your girlfriends.
Married women will also enjoy these pages, as you recall the days before finding your soul mate, life partner, husband, or dirty old man. It's a dose of the reality of dating life and a healthy antidote to your overromanticized memories of it. You will also find that most codes of behavior between you and your girlfriends remain the same, even though your single friends tell you it's different now, just because you're off the market.
There are many definitions in this book, but let's begin with two important ones:
SINGLE: Being a single girl doesn't mean that you are loveless; it simply means that you are unmarried and that you still think of yourself first and foremost (which you have every right to do). You may be in a relationship and expect to one day marry your current date, but for the time being you don't share the same domicile or the same name with him.
GIRL: Any female who still has hopes for her future and the life force of a blooming flower is still a girl in my book (literally). As a matter of fact, my grandmother is one of the youngest girls I know.
And finally, who the hell am I? I am a single girl just like you (or the friend
Fuyumi Ono
Tailley (MC 6)
Robert Graysmith
Rich Restucci
Chris Fox
James Sallis
John Harris
Robin Jones Gunn
Linda Lael Miller
Nancy Springer