While I continue to eat bonbons and obsess over whether or not online sex can in fact get me pregnant, I’ve again farmed out site duties in the interest of furthering my understanding of men. Of life. Of exactly why every time I buy tampons I’m in line behind Hot Dad. The following was written by a male friend–a big strapping one with great shoulders–with whom I may or may not have had sex in the JMU library stacks in the summer of 1994. The Fountainhead, indeed. Enjoy.
Dear Kris –
I’m writing to you as a friend, a reader, and a citizen of the kingdom of men (which is something like the Planet of the Apes, only there’s more deodorant and less riding around in leather armor).
I’d like to address a phenomenon that I’ve noticed floating about in the culture at large which has found voice, albeit in passing, in your blog. [Massive disclaimer: I heart your blog and none of this is in anyway a criticism of you or your writing; you know I think you’re the crème de la.] What I’m talking about is a form of Despair that has become pervasive among a certain set of otherwise self-confident, intelligent urban women.
You’ve already guessed what I’m talking about, I’m sure – let’s call it the Theory of Diminishing Romantic Returns. It goes something like this – you’ve loved, you’ve lost, you’ve loved again. Your expectations are correctly high, for you are, in fact and indisputably, a gem. But whither the man you seek? Dating, never your favorite sport, has become a chore. The men your friends attempt to set you up with – how could they think you were a match for that guy? The men you meet through work – you can see why they’re still single. You can construct a dozen more of these on your own (I just deleted a bunch in a vain attempt to avoid sounding pedantic). So after months or years of hopefulness and bucking-self-up, you arrive at the following conclusion here composed as a syllogism for reasons soon to be clear:
All dates are bad/boring/not worth my time.
All dates are with (presumably available) men.
All (presumably available) men are bad/boring/not worth my time.
This syllogism ends up being told and recycled in a variety of ways: “This is all that’s left”; “It’s hell out there”; “Dating sucks”; and the inimitable “What’s wrong with me?” Like many cultural conventions, finding people to commiserate and agree with this assessment is ridiculously easy. (Well, hopefully not many of your friends would nod and say “Yep, there is something wrong with you,” but you get the point.) There’s a whole industry of films, books, TV series, and Web sites devoted to the Truth that dating pretty much sucks.
The trouble with this massive cultural agreement (there’s a whole mess of trouble with it actually but this is one) is that it slaps blinders on you – you can’t see anything else. The pickpocket who meets the saint only sees the saint’s pockets, right? If the Truth is that the men who are available are uniformly unworthy of attention, if facing the prospect of meeting new people is an effort of will, of mind over despair, you’ve created the kind of hurdle barely anyone can clear. Perversely, your expectations rise dramatically as you invest more and more hope in an ideal, as every moment of time together with a potential mate becomes an investigation – after all, something must be wrong, right? What man worth the time is 35 and single? It’s true, isn’t it?
The trouble is that it’s not. For a syllogism to prove out, it has to move from the general to the specific, and this one does not. The first premise – that all dates are bad/boring/unworthy – is not only immeasurable, it’s unqualifiable. You have, of course, not gone on “all dates.” And while some dates can surely be chalked up as purely bad (restraining order), you have to agree there’s a spectrum; nothing is purely black and white, is it?
But this is all a lot of gobbledygook in the end. What gets under my skin about this is the pervasive despair that it allows to leak into your life. Despair, more than anything, will color everything around you, and the world is as full of beautiful, amazing men as it is full of women like you. What I love the most about you, my dear Wino, is your capacity for joy, excitement, wonder, and delight. Allowing yourself – choosing – to buy into this culture of despair, it’s deadly. It’s the grinning monkey portrait of home decorating; it’s the pale, bald neighbor’s potbelly on an otherwise flawless weekend morning. Look away! Look. Away.
All my love and lascivious glances,
Jack “The Monkey King” London
18 Comments
Why aren’t you two married?
Thanks guest writer for the swift kick in the ass. You’re right, need to stop losing faith in dating and get a new attitude!
I think I might be in love. Don’t tell my husband. :)
Look. Away.
Well said, well said. (I agree with John, why aren’t you two already married?)
Hooray! I love the way that “Jack” dismantled that syllogism. Maybe I should take this advice. I mean, I probably won’t, but I’ll consider it… :)
This is AWESOME.
The man definitely has a point — being older+single does not necessarily mean that there are no interesting people left.
THAT BEING SAID, I do agree with the principle that the older you get, the more prevalent “crazies” are to the single pool — singles of odd proportions and strange habits that make them unfit for consumption. The problem is sorting these chaff from the wheat.
Unfortunately, single life is not geared to the 30+ crowd, even though it’s probably just as applicable. Hanging out at bars and nightclubs becomes purile at best (and the crazies are thick as flies) and there aren’t any mass-single arenas such as college available to people of that age. Work, even if it is populated with singles, either aren’t the type you want or are off limits because banging a coworker one day and opposing them on the budget the next was never fashionable.
So…good points, Jack. Amen to getting rid of the despair and darkness of the older single crowd. But the task is definitely harder than it was.
add kids to the equation and it gets that much harder to find someone – but that doesn’t mean we have to give up hope!
happy new year!! =)
Holy cats, Mr. Monkey King London. I think I’m in love. If you have your own blog, and I pray you do, please let that address be known to us lesser mortals.
And yeah, why aren’t you two married? Did Atlas Shrug after The Fountainhead?
This is pretty badass. Thanks, Jack London. Now, bring back the Wino!
90% of the general populace is undateable. It’s been proven in a study from the Obvious Institute.
And I like that Monkey used a logically structured syllogism in an email to you. Oh, my sides still ache.
I’ve heard women say this, but not a man. Love it. :)
Hmm…I tried to post my comment before, but maybe it didn’t go through?
In any case, I love this letter and need the daily reminder.
(Also, very nicely done with the stacks. My then-manfriend didn’t have quite the same sense of adventure.)
Is he single???
So, where does one find all these beautiful, amazing men?
thanks monkey king… i think we allll needed that…
xoxo
Thanks for posting this! I needed that! :-)
I’m a little late to this party, but anyway…
Firstly, well written, Jack. I can relate to much of what you have written. For example, last June I went out with a man that I thought was just okay. I would have been willing to go out with him a second time, but I wasn’t overly excited. So, we didn’t have our second date until last Friday because (I’m sure) he felt the “not so interested” vibe and didn’t bother asking again. But the second date was a complete 180. I always knew he was cute but I had no idea how intelligent and funny he is. We’ll have a third date this weekend.
When I think about why I didn’t understand how great he is on the first date, I have to blame myself. I think that I was assuming he wouldn’t be worth the time because I’d recently (then) had a string of bad dates. That, of course, makes me wonder how many of those bad dates were bad because I anticipated that they would be.
But to defend Krisser (not that she asked), I haven’t really gotten the feeling that she doesn’t think there are worthy men left. After all, she is 35 (right?) and single and she knows that there is nothing wrong with her that would have resulted in that status.
I think that she may just be frustrated, as many of us are, at thinking we might have found “him” and then having to try to find “him” again after the first (or second or third) “him” didn’t work out, with the knowledge that we might get hurt…again.
But she also knows that the romantic kind of pain isn’t permanent and can be eased with a glass of wine and a trip to Target.