Not so long ago, I wrote about New Year’s as a holiday that provokes relationship angst and triggers nasty inebriated break-ups. If you and your significant other actually managed to blissfully unite under a disco ball and welcome in 2008 with joy, you’re about to be put through an even more arduous test – the Hallmark invented bull crazy that is Valentine’s Day.

If you and your partner are open, stable, honest, in love and not looking for ‘the next best thing’ you’ll probably get through the holiday just fine. I know very few New York relationships that could be categorized under all these terms. In many ways, Manhattan’s an island of relationship losers. We know what we want (it’s just different Monday through Friday), we know how we feel (for the few hours after expensive weekly psychotherapy), and we believe in romance (when we’re not being spit on by people in the subway). Many New Yorkers prefer to indulge in what I like to call ‘grey relationships.’ Love stories that are exciting, non-committal, endlessly confusing, and allow us to be closet workaholics. Everything’s going along swimmingly until a calendar imposed nut-fest like Valentine’s Day forces you to snap out of the dysfunctional grayness you’ve been passively enjoying and dares you to define your relationship.

Definition very often equals death.

Let’s embark on a memory road trip to Valentine’s Day three years ago, a holiday that assassinated my extremely pleasurable grey relationship at the time. I’d been for the most part exclusively dating the object of my affection for eight or nine months. I’d been subtly pushing for weeks for us to take things to the next level (meeting parents, going on trips, engaging in activities together other than just eating, drinking, watching HBO, and sex) and decided to use Valentine’s Day as a test for him to prove he cared about me on a level beyond buying me beer and letting me keep stuff at his place.

My not-so-subtle hinting that he better do something nice for me for Valentine’s Day (or else) actually worked. He put down the cable remote control, did laundry, pulled himself together and made reservations at the nicest restaurant we’d ever been to. We actually connected over the meal. The night from start to finish went great. You’d think some sort of victory dance and ‘happily ever after’ scrawled across us in cursive would have ensued, but no. Us connecting and spending the holiday together sacred this guy shitless. It was too much, too fast. He disappeared, I stalked him, we exchanged stuff, and never spoke again.

Thanks, V Day.

Granted, we wanted different things from one another. Granted, I was being an immature crazy manipulator. Granted, he sucked. But our enjoyable, stress-free arrangement could have continued for many more months undisturbed had Valentine’s Day not forced us into defining exactly what we meant to each other – a stage, come to find out, neither of us was ready for.

Maybe I should look at V Day as my friend. Something that helps you define, dump, and move out of the dysfunctional realm onto something bigger and better, but the commercialism, pinkness, teddy bears and Duane Reade mega assortment of Sweet Tarts and cheap candy makes it impossible for me to do that.

My advice to any men in the grey area who aren’t sure what to do is to send flowers. I don’t think flowers force anyone to define anything, and flowers have NEVER made a romantic situation worse. They’re the one gift that can’t hurt, they can only help. Hell, if I had this powerful a placation tool I could send to the guys I’m dating, I’d have it in my calendar on autopilot.

Thursday’s D Day. So who has plans?

What a pleasant surprise when I attended a typical ‘pre clubbing’ promotional dinner last night and found myself surrounded by six foot tall, glamorous, successful women. And no, this wasn’t a cut scene from Lipstick Jungle (which my TiVo’s stored and I plan to watch and mock, tomorrow [series review here]). I had actually landed at an all girls dinner party. No men allowed.

What happened to the idea of ‘girls only?’

In my life, it died somewhere after single sex summer camp. And as a hormonal teenager, ‘only girls’ is deemed brutal, bitchy and boring. In NYC, it seems women are constantly pitted against one another. We’re competing for jobs, men, attention and that last pair of size seven shoes. I’ve had fellow women in a huff try to take me out with their handbag or casually toss my jacket on the floor. When was the last time a girl was friendly to a fellow New York female at a bar? Or even engaged one another in conversation?

One of the more perverted aspects of the Manhattan clubbing circuit (and yes, there are many) is how women inevitably end up looking like accessories to men power-tripping on bottles of Grey Goose. And this isn’t just about who’s forking over the cash. Even if women were buying the liquor, if a man’s present, we automatically see it in the paradigm of ‘his table’ and ‘his harem.’

This women as ‘going-out ornaments’ mentality isn’t only degrading (yes, most of have jobs, pay our rent, and have to wake up in the morning) but fuels competition among women to be the shiniest piece of tinsel in the bunch.

Hence my overwhelming joy and approval when the woman who organized our dinner informed me that she was scheming to get successful New York women playing on the same team. Not only is she entrepreneurially launching her own nightclub in Nolita, she’s creating a social networking site for girls only. In her words:

Femme Fatale is New York’s premiere networking club exclusively for women. A femme fatal exemplifies the New York sophisticate. Our members are hand chosen because they’re the most striking, intelligent, adventurous, fun-loving spirits the city has to offer. Our goal is to indulge the ultimate lifestyle and expose cultured and accomplished women to a network of equally savvy women, while spoiling them with the extravagances provided by our luxury brand sponsors. Our mission is to inspire women to continually seek success, be independent, and provide each other with support and opportunities. There are many exclusive men’s clubs out there, and it’s about time women enjoyed the same distinct opportunity to expand their professional and social horizons.

The day women start organizing their own social activities paid for by brand spronsors will be a tragic one for the sleazy New York club promoter who feeds off women and clueless baby models to pay his rent. Watch out! Cause it looks like the system’s going to change.

The launch party takes place at Lollipop this Saturday. And make sure to bookmark the website which is coming soon, femmefatalny.com Men, don’t bother