Letters to the Editor

• 23 and Manless? Perish the Thought

  [Read the article: I'm 23 but I don't have everything I want yet]
  [Read more letters about this article: Here]

  So the LW seems to have her act together professionally. She has a steady job and is self sufficient. On the dating front she says she loses them on the 7th date while also indicating it is not from "throwing the cat around."

  Well... what could be the issue here? At 47, I need to hop into the way back machine, but perhaps here are a couple of scenarios.

  1) Throw the cat around.

  I don't know what dating protocols are today, but I have to imagine there's something more going on than a few chaste hugs if not down and dirty horizontal rumbas by the seventh date.

  2) The scent of desperation to a 20-something male has the same effect as a light does to a cockroach: they flee.

  Few guys are looking for a partner, per se, at that age unless you are hanging out at church socials in the Ozarks, and Salon doesn't appeal to that clientele too often, methinks. The head on their shoulders may be able to think that way in a few months, but unfortunately that won't be the head controlling the thought process that early in the game. Attach the strings to soon to the aforementioned head, and the man will pull a turtle, crawl into his shell, and get the hell out of there.

  3) Don't worry about it.

  After serially dating a few women in a small college that were about as successful as lighting up exploding cigars and shoving them in my face, I was "Box Office Poison" as it were. Morose and lonely as a second semester senior in the September semester after my classmates had left, I vowed to dive into the theatre and get the hell out of school and get on with my life.

  Early in the semester three women who bonded based on discussing what a jerk I was were surprised to see me lurking around the campus. They invited me to a party assuming I would not have the cajones to show up. Given free beer was involved, I did.

  They decided to introduce me to the head of the women's association just to watch the fur fly given I was quite the young republican at the time. (My semester off had been to work on a presidential campaign.)

  So there we stood, behind a barrel back chair getting into it rather hot and heavy on all matters political. In my cups, I asked the young lovely is she knew how to drive a standard. When she said yes, I replied, "Good, then you can drive me back to campus." I handed her my car keys which she accepted with some trepidation.

  I left that night with minimal "petting," vowing to call her for dinner the next night, which I did. If that dinner was our first date, then we have been on it for the past 25 years and will be married 23 years on the 11th. Our oldest graduates from high school today.

  I can still see that barrel back chair and remember exactly what she had on when I first laid eyes on her. She, too, remembers what I was wearing. I because she was gorgeous in a crunchy granola sort of way and who still takes my breath away at the oddest moments, and she because I was dressed like a stooge which she took to denote someone who didn't give a shit what people thought about him which she found perversely appealing ... at the time. She now tries to upgrade my wardrobe on a regular basis.

  At her 20th reunion we went back to the house where we met and knocked on the door, explaining the story. With our 4 children there, I pointed to the corner where the chair had been and recited a story the kids know to the point now where my telling it is akin to chalk on a blackboard to them. The repetition should assure it gets told to our great grandkids after we have left the earth and are bickering away in the after life.

  So what is the point of this "aw, how sweet" story? Luck is when preparedness meets opportunity. If you are prepared to not worry about being single, then you just might have the opportunity to get lucky.

  I sure as hell did.

  Permalink Friday, June 2, 2006 10:11 AM