Observations On Women - I've

Observations On Women - I've been single again for going on four years, now. I've been on at least one date with several dozen women in that time. And while you might cry "Jaundice", you do so only at the risk of looking wierd to your neighbors. "Jaundice" is kind of a strange thing to yell for no reason.

So don't yell "Jaundice". Think whatever you want, though.

In the eighties, there was some research that claimed that women who were single by the time they were 35 had better odds of being struck by lightning while carrying an assault rifle in a lottery line than of getting married. I used to think that was a crock. The more women I meet, the more I realize that there's probably a reason for this - although not the one anyone's thinking.

If someone is single by the time they're in their early thirties, it's a fair guess that they've decided they really don't want to "sell themselves short", or to "settle" for "less" than their absolute ideal. I think most people have a checklist with the main points they're looking for in a potential boyfriend, girlfriend, whatever.

But if that checklist hasn't had to run into life's little realities - marriage is a good place for that - then the list of "ideal" bullet points becomes more and more set in stone over time. This is a hunch, but I'll stake a few bucks on it; by the time someone gets to her late thirties, she has invested nearly two decades of her adult life in finding the person who matches every single point of that checklist. Why give up now?

Which'd explain the number of women I've met who are 37, 38, 39 years old, and who've never been married - but have endless series of "relationships" with deadbeat morons. I mean, as long as you're disregarding the checklist, why not jump on a Harley with a "bad boy"?

Our society today glorifies adolescence - and does its damnedest to preserve it. It's completely possible for someone to remain an adolescent well into his or her forties - I have friends my age who've evolved, emotionally, not a jot since their late teens. Their common thread? They've remained single the whole time. Nothing yanks you out of extended adolescence like having to deal with another person, every single day, forever. Especially when it's more than one other person. Kids are another angle to the whole thing.

Beyond adolescence, our media - especially media aimed at women, the whole "The View"/Oprah/Lifetime/Cosmo Axis of Fantasy - reminds me of the staff at a Special Olympics event, constantly reminding their audience how very, very special they are; women who succeed in business are celebrities because they are Women Who Succeed in Business (or whatever supposedly-male-dominated field)! The Gopher Women's Basketball team achieved a lot getting to the Final Four - and, unlike some of the rest of the Northern Alliance Radio Network, I enjoyed watching them play. But do you think they'd have gotten a fraction of the coverage they got if they'd been men? Check it out for yourself; in the eighties and nineties, when the Gopher's men's Baseball team dominated the Big Ten, year in, year out - check out the headlines.

And endless praise and constant attention will go to a person's head - which, with a Special Olympian, isn't a bad thing.

But unlike Special Olympians, women have no handicaps to speak of, not as a gender. Yet praise, exhortation and the Oprah-spawned sense of entitlement, combined in the mind of a person who's never had to expose her fantasies to the crushing pressure of a real, long-term, inescapable relationship, eventually adds up to a set of goals and expectations that can be met only by the kind of guy that only exists in womens' imaginations.

You see this on a date. You meet, you have a few drinks, have a couple hours of conversation ranging from passable to fascinating - and then see that "you're cool, but I want all of this in a package that includes Pierce Brosnan looks and no kids. Thanks for trying" expression by the end of the evening.

So I'm coming around. I think there might have been something to that research - women who haven't gotten married by their mid-to-late thirties probably won't - mostly by their own choice.

Because Mr. Perfect has got to be coming up. Any date now.

Are men any better when they get into their thirties? I don't know. I don't go out with them. You're on your own, ladies.