Memo to Gentlemen Over 39

Pretty Lady is delighted to confirm that the vast majority of her gentlemen friends appear to hold no quarrel with her definition of feminism, at least in theory. But as she was discussing just this weekend, over a pitcher of pseudo-margaritas with some dear colleagues from Pittsburgh (none of them could figure out what was in those 'margaritas'--half a liter of Triple Sec was anyone's best guess) understanding that Ladies are People, Too is merely the beginning. And that this fact, all unwitting, plays a major role in the Nice Guy Dilemma.

But perhaps she had better clarify.

You see, despite her reputation for dating Losers, Pretty Lady's romantic history is by no means confined to them. She has consorted with a fair number of Nice Guys as well. When she looks back on it, now, from the safe and starry-eyed comfort of present circumstances, a certain clarity emerges; a certain Pattern, if you will. And so she will share with you now, all you Nice Gentlemen, the real reason she rejected all those decent fellows.

Once upon a time, many Nice Guys of Pretty Lady's acquaintance were drawn to her. What drew these fellows (besides the obvious) were her qualities--of expressiveness, intelligence, creativity, and a simultaneously gregarious and introverted amiability. Specifically, they liked her because she was a talented, outspoken artist with a cadre of close and well-chosen friends.

The trouble arose when, after a time, it became apparent that these qualities were not only genuine, they were permanant. After a certain time-frame of halcyon acquaintanceship had passed (perhaps three months, perhaps six), Pretty Lady did not change a whit. She continued working assiduously in her studio, speaking out in public, and socializing with her friends.

It never seemed to Pretty Lady, feminist that she is, that her essential stability of character ought to create a problem, particularly when consorting with gentlemen whose Niceness veritably radiated from their stolid core. She was never deceptive about her goals, habits, or intentions; neither was she selfish or neglectful in her dealings with these splendid friends. She merely continued being exactly the same person she was before she met them.

Gradually, she came to suspect that the gentlemen suspected that her personality was All An Act. Certain comments they let drop, as well as certain assumptions they acted upon, led her to believe that they didn't believe she meant it. For example: While attending art school, at a party in San Francisco, she once met an editor from Berkeley--presentable, humorous, and Catholic. This editor took her number and asked her out. Over drinks, he inquired as to her preferred painting medium. Acrylic?

"Oil," Pretty Lady replied.

"Oh, you're serious," he responded.

Pretty Lady nearly got up and walked out. That any gentleman should assume that she would throw up any semblance of financial stability, move halfway across a continent and take up residence on Haight street, merely to dabble in an amateur endeavor, struck her as clueless in the extreme. If a man is living in California, and he asks a lady out who makes no secret of the fact that she has moved there from Texas to attend art school, he ought reasonably to expect that he is dating an artist. QED.

But it was gradually borne in upon Pretty Lady that, whatever this fine fellow thought of artists, he didn't actually expect her to be one. He assumed, that once relations between the two of them had come to a solid understanding, all her creative attentions would naturally redirect themselves toward his affairs. "I need to go to the studio" was consistently treated as a coy, trivial evasion, when it came down to a choice between this and playing hostess to his cadre of editorial friends; "artist" was all very well when it came to cocktail conversation, but the practical discipline of such struck him as superfluous.

Pretty Lady dumped him immediately after the Christmas party.

This was by no means an isolated circumstance. Verily, it seemed to Pretty Lady that every time she attempted to consort with Nice Guys her own age or older, something similar would happen. Initially attracted to her style, they ended by ferociously attempting to change it, either by main force (breaking in on best friend tete-a-tetes and demanding that she renounce the Ramones, right now) or by blithe dismissal (planning a long-term Future Together that included world travel, darling babies, and glamorous residences devoid of studio space.)

In sum, it was as if these earnest, faithful, committed swains had been taught from the cradle that charming ladies acquire their charm solely for the purposes of attracting a mate, and thence for brightening the path of that mate, forever and ever amen. They believed this so implicitly that they were honestly deaf to other interpretations, such as that lady artists make art. So when Pretty Lady revealed her inner self to be none other than Pretty Lady, as advertised, they were horribly betrayed.

Interestingly, Pretty Lady has never had this problem when consorting with gentlemen born after 1970. These darling boys accept her at face value, and love her for it. She hopes it is not an indiscretion to allow that her current G.F., born in 1971, not only accepts and applauds her for who she is, but would be seriously disconcerted if she suddenly became someone else--i.e. an agreeable Wifey who hung around his theatre, straightening his tie.

So, as advertised: Gentlemen over 39, this is a memo from the Future. The Future would like you to know, chiefly, not to be afraid. Not only is it perfectly possible to have an intimate relationship with a lady who is a fully realized peer, it is actually comfortable and functional to do so. You will find, after you adjust, that your sense of personal worth can withstand close, daily contact with a lady whose sole purpose is not to bolster it. You may find, that without the pressure to Dominate and Steer, an unwonted sense of Freedom may take hold of your soul. You may discover that your intellect becomes keener, your spirit becomes brighter, and your future more adventurous, with a lady by your side who offers you more than the dead weight of a passive Adorer.

Because the opposite of survival is not failure; it is to thrive.

The Bar, Revisited

Darlings, Pretty Lady has seen the light; she has finally understood the reason for those silly little label things at the bottom of Desert Cat's posts. It was borne in upon her that, even if a person is cursed with near-total recall of every conversation she has had in this lifetime, ultimately she forgets in what month this conversation occurred. And the archiving function on her new template, not to put too fine a point on it, is dreadful.

So Pretty Lady was up till the wee hours on Saturday, doing that thing ex-librarians do best.

While engaged in this desultory Cataloguing of History, Pretty Lady's mind, naturally, wandered. It occurred to her that at times in every lady's life, she has got to do what she has got to do, whether it is wise or not. Specifically, there comes a time when a lady has simply got to wander alone into a bar, order a double bourbon or ten, and challenge a stranger to a game of pool.

Why has she got to do this? One may ask. One may not receive an answer. The mysteries of the wayward heart are singular and confidential. Pretty Lady does not concern herself with Motive; she merely concerns herself with Tactics.

For it is widely understood that for a single lady, a bar with a pool table in the middle of Brooklyn is the rough equivalent of a jungle in Deepest Darkest Africa, as regards the potential for loss of life and limb. Much bemoaning of this fact has been done, in progressive circles; however, the fact remains. And it seems to Pretty Lady that the focus of this bemoaning is All Wrong, from a tactical point of view.

The most outspoken of the Progressives, you see, have a tendency to preach to the persons least likely to listen; to wit, they preach to the Creeps. Moreover, they behave as though there were more Creeps out there than not--even that the vast majority of a single gender were possessed of Creeplike characteristics. It seems to Pretty Lady that the point of bifurcation, in these people's minds, boils down to Creeps, and Women.

Whereas Pretty Lady notes that a much more practical division is between Creeps, and Decent People.

A Creep, you see, is an individual who gloms on to a diminutive, intoxicated, pool-playing lady late at night and attempts to back her into a corner, or an alleyway, or his apartment. A Decent Person is the one who stands nearby, casually making sure the Creep's agenda is frustrated.

Do you see? This Decent Person is not a predator; he is not a chauvinist; he merely perceives that the pool-playing lady needs to let off a little steam, more than she needs to keep her guard up. He does not judge her for this. He does not question her ability to take care of herself. He merely hangs around, assuring himself that everything is okay.

It is a very great pity that some potential Decent People are cowed, by idealistic notions of Progressiveness, into the idea that looking out for one's fellow citizens is an offensive thing.

For as Pretty Lady has stated in the past, it is not that ladies in bars are incapable of handing a Creep's nether regions to him on a silver platter; it is that if the lady has friends around, she shouldn't have to. It is Pretty Lady's firm opinion that peace and safety are best maintained by invoking the minimum of fuss; plus, allowing a Creep to save face in a small way may prevent that selfsame Creep from coming back with a switchblade. It is always best to look at the bigger picture, before indulging in petty victories.

Masculinism

Men should be economically and socially independent. They shouldn't rely on women to take care of them.

Yes indeed. This spectacle of gentlemen who are unable to adequately feed or clothe themselves without constant supervision must cease. Young men must be taught the basics of cooking, cleaning, laundry, and the maintenance of necessary social contacts or the world shall Fall Apart.

There is no such thing as a "woman's job." It is wrong for women to be given preference for any job position, even if men traditionally aren't in that field.

Males who wish to apply for jobs as day care workers, choir directors, kindergarten teachers and Catholic priests must be given a thorough psychiatric evaluation before being allowed to interact with children, unsupervised.

Women and men should be held to the same sexual standards. If women can sleep around without judgment, men should be able to as well.

Pretty Lady must take this opportunity to register the information that nobody is fooling anyone by encouraging her to go home with El Chico Guapo if she feels like it. Somebody is simply trying to assuage his Inner Guilt and Shame, and it Will Not Work.

Men should take an equal role in dating. Men should ask out people they are interested in and take their turn in paying.

Pretty Lady has been telling this to anyone who will listen for years.

Men should accept their bodies as they are. Men should not have to conform to wacky beauty ideals.

If Pretty Lady's boyfriend would like to take his shirt off while lounging atop the cliff at the summit of the trail, who is she to stop him? This self-consciousness about one's pectorals is utterly misplaced. And she also thinks that shortish men are cute.

A man should be able to marry and have kids with anyone he wants - including another man.

Good luck, fellas!

Men should have the right to choose any path in life - from being a stay at home dad to a Fortune 500 CEO.

If a gentleman chooses to be a Fortune 500 CEO, he'd better have the chops to follow up, and not go down in Public Disgrace; the same goes for Decent Parenting.

Men should be encouraged to pursue education as much as women are.

Absolutely not. Any fellow who requires encouragement is already a Lost Cause; the only kind of man Pretty Lady likes is the sort who gets sucked into libraries, used book stores and compulsive Googling so easily that he frequently forgets to eat.

Men should have legal, easy access to all types of birth control - including the morning after pill.

Why should Pretty Lady always be the one to run to the pharmacy?

You would support a man for president (if you agreed with his politics).

Perhaps. But he would have to be exceptionally well-behaved.

On Integrity

Pretty Lady is delighted to discover that her Daddy has a fan club! A fan club, moreover, not dominated by aficionados of state-of-the-art fighter planes!

So, to wash a little more Angry Atheist venom out from between her molars, Pretty Lady would like to indulge in a bit of instructive Daddy-worship, if it's all the same to you.

The legend in Pretty Lady's family goes back to her Great-Granddaddy, Pops. Pops owned a hardware store, out in the middle of nowhere. Folks would come into this hardware store, stating their interest in purchasing a new stove.

"What's wrong with the old one?" Pops would inquire.

"Dunno, it just stopped working."

"Have you tried changing the whosamajiggy?" Pops replied.

"Nope, can't say that I have," said the customer.

"Look, I'll make a deal with you. Take this little whosamajiggy, put it in the old stove, and see if that takes care of the problem. If it doesn't, then I'll sell you a new stove."

Well, dad gum if that didn't take care of it.

Perhaps you dears may wonder how Pops stayed in business at all, what with his extreme unwillingness to part with high-ticket items upon explicit request. Well, his attitude bred such unaccountable loyalty in his customers, that along about Great Depression time, Pops stayed in business when nobody else did.

This habit of looking out for the rock-bottom interests of all parties to transactions, and not merely those of self, then, is a multi-generational tradition in Pretty Lady's family. It is part of the air we breathe, and at this point is scarcely subject to conscious consideration. Pretty Lady practices this habit in her own business, unlike her former employer the Wall Street chiropractor, whose business plan entailed corraling a few paralegals and UPS couriers with generous health-insurance plans, and threatening them with crippling disabilities if they didn't come to see him three times a week. Pretty Lady got pretty sick of rubbing down the same hairy-backed UPS guy all the time, she can tell you that.

When Pretty Lady's clients ask her how often they should come in, she invariably replies, "Listen to your body, dear. You're responsible for your own health, and I wouldn't want to bankrupt you. Although if you wait longer than six weeks, we'll be starting again from scratch."

Pretty Lady is thus not rich, but her clients trust her.

Back to Daddy, though--one of the things about Daddy is that Pretty Lady has never, never, never heard him adhering to a legalistic argument in order to weasel out of an implied responsibility. Perish the thought. Once a commitment is made, it is total and unquestioned, no matter if unforeseen and inconvenient circumstances arise. Daddy is the Rock of the extended family; he has shepherded his parents, siblings, cousins, wife's siblings, stray friends and offspring through more sticky and embarrassing and, sometimes, financially draining crises than anyone has bothered to count. Nobody has ever heard Pretty Lady's Daddy utter the words, "Well, I never said I would...". He simply does, and does not hold a grudge afterward.

At the same time, Daddy never pretends to be someone he is not. Early in her parents' marriage, they moved to a new town where some distant cousins were members of High Society. Like good cousins, they invited Pretty Lady's parents to High Society dinner parties. Daddy, a young engineer, was seated next to many expansive oil millionaires who casually discussed the charter jet they'd taken to the party in Baja last weekend, with their twelve best friends. Daddy was rather bored, but polite.

Then the complimentary tickets to the High Society Ball arrived. Daddy returned them, with thanks, and the comment, "Thank you very much, but I am afraid we cannot afford to sustain this kind of lifestyle." Mommy kept a stiff upper lip.

Many times in latter years, particularly in adolescence, Pretty Lady suffered from snide comments and party-invitation-exclusions from Noveau Riche social climbers, who were aspiring to membership in the High Society clan that Pretty Lady's family had voluntarily exited. The knowledge that this sort of thing is gauche, tacky and low-class in the extreme did not entirely make up for her empty social calendar--but really. As Daddy says, and Pretty Lady concurs, those people are boring anyway! Why bother?

(Now, of course, when Pretty Lady goes home, the society ladies who volunteer at the Modern Art Museum are all agog to hear about her latest New York exhibition, but that is all by the way.)

And it goes without saying that cheating on his taxes, or on Mommy, is something so inconceivably beyond the pale in Daddy's universe that it does not bear discussion.

Whenever Pretty Lady has an ethical decision to make, the first question that springs to her mind is "What would Daddy do?" When she once borrowed a friend's five-year-old, factory-second camping tent, and the tent was subsequently stolen out of her trunk, she paid the friend the original cost of the tent without question. Then she received another call. "For another two hundred dollars I can replace it at REI, with a money-back guarantee. The old one had a money-back guarantee. Please give me two hundred dollars more."

At the time, Pretty Lady had not only suffered a robbery, but an assault, and was surfing friends' couches while searching for a home in a safer neighborhood. She was barely making financial ends meet in the ghetto, and needed to come up with the down payment on a new and more expensive place. She was also in a state of shell-shock. Her first inclination was to hang up on this so-called 'friend' and never call back.

But, after much consideration, and discussion with other friends, she sent the girl a two-hundred dollar check. Then she cut the connection.

"I didn't want to worry that I wasn't fair to her," she told Daddy afterward.

"You did the right thing," said Daddy. Which made it all worthwhile.

The Real Man

My lands. Pretty Lady cannot believe the number of times she has answered the question, 'What do women want?' and been greeted by a chorus of head-nodding, only to have the question repeated. To be fair, it is rarely Pretty Lady's friends who are asking this question; it is the unenlightened Others who do so. However, it is so reliably guaranteed to pop up in the community on a regular basis, that Pretty Lady feels she can go on answering it ad nauseam, without any fear of boring her readers.

In brief: Women want a Real Man.

Definition of a Real Man:

One who 1) knows who he is; 2) knows what he wants; 3) engages with her; 4) consistently.

All of these elements, darlings, are crucial.

The vast majority of whining, carping, frustration, rage, and lack of empathy with women comes from wannabe Real Men who wish to cut corners on one or another of the above criteria. The Pathetic faction is heavy on the end of Allowing the Woman to Define him; he is the sort who will go off and drink a gallon of aloe vera juice because the lady demonstrates an interest in holistic health care, and come running back, expecting a pat on the head. The Boorish faction, on the other hand, hold no truck with this sort of thing, at all, at all; he goes after what he wants, attains it, and parks it. He is the sort who invented the immortal line, 'Of course I love you. I married you, didn't I? What else do you want?'

Gentlemen. Please.

A lady does not wish to be the prime motivating factor for all of your actions. This is too much pressure, and it makes her feel decidedly unsafe. It gives her the uncomfortable sensation that if she were to become engrossed in her own activities for half an hour or so, you might go off and commit hari-kari for lack of sufficient attention; she does not want your blood on her hands. When she tells you to 'get a life,' she is being literal and sincere about it.

However, it gives a lady a warm, fuzzy, proud feeling to know that on some level, she is a prevailing influence in her man's life. There is nothing sweeter than the sound of the words, 'I was thinking about what you said, and I've decided...'. These words make a lady feel as though she is more than a decorative possession, to be flaunted or stowed at will. They make her feel that she is an ongoing force to be addressed; a challenge, if you will. Certainly she is more than a combination brood mare and chambermaid.

Pretty Lady would like to point out, as a side note, that a man who pursues several different women simultaneously is NOT a man who knows what he wants. He may claim that what he wants is several simultaneous girlfriends, and a concomitant freedom from responsibility; he may, in fact, want precisely that. However, such a man is incapable of engaging on an intimate level with anyone, and is thus unable to fully know himself. He is constantly shuffling communication modes, is frequently trying to remember which story he told which lady, and is never fully present. How is it possible that this man is honestly cognizant of the contents of his own mind? Let alone that he could have space in there to understand anyone else's?

Pretty Lady notes that all the men she has known who were like that were initially fascinating, having perfected the art of the initial fascination through assiduous practice, but got exponentially more boring every time the tape repeated itself. In pursuing breadth of experience, depth is inevitably sacrificed.

By the same token, a man who does not consistently engage with the woman in his life becomes, inevitably, a tedious lump who ultimately is not worth the space he takes up on the sofa. His routine may be straight, narrow and reliable; he may thus be shocked when the woman who has loyally washed his sheets for thirty years precipitately files for divorce.

But the fact is, circularity serves no ultimate purpose. Whether it be the same circular argument, the same scurrilous betrayal, or the identical carping comment of a political nature repeated every evening for three decades, circularity is a characteristic of Hell. Life, to be ridiculously cliche'd about it, is a journey. What women want is a trusted and intimate companion in a landscape which is always, and intriguingly, new.

Enlightenment! -or- August Explains the Male Mind to a Benighted Pretty Lady

August elaborates upon the Missing Logical Link:

You mentioned a proposition.
You mentioned saying something extraordinary.

Now there has to be an assumption somewhere between the two, and I figure that assumption is in a male brain.

That particular male has likely perceived the extraordinary as the competitive, and is hoping such competitiveness will translate into some friendly competition in the bedroom.
...

As for myself, my assumptions in similar situations are simple: loyalty and competition work in opposition to each other. I simply disengage. I have learned enough lessons the hard way.

Ah. So that's it.

Let us set aside all the sardonic commentary--indeed the floods of rhetorical self-indulgence, illustrated with many florid anecdotes, that sprang to Pretty Lady's fevered brain after she was finally able to wrap her hopelessly feminine mind around the above logical sequence. Let us consider this as read. Let us, merely, ask this theoretical male a theoretical question.

Are you familiar with the concept of a team? As in those sports thingies? Group of persons working together toward a Common Goal, such as to win the Super Bowl, or something else equally random and trivial?

Pretty Lady pauses, for the man to bring this undoubtedly familiar concept to mind, and hold it there.

Now. Think hard. Suppose you were a coach, auditioning players for a team. Would you require these potential players to prove their competence, by handling the ball or puck or stick or whatever, with finesse, logic and aplomb? Or would you require them to prove their loyalty, by fumbling around and dropping it all over the place, so as not to infringe upon the other players' inherent superiority?

Hmm?

Now, I ask you, theoretical man, to stretch a paradigm. Imagine, that in the mind of Woman, relationships are roughly equivalent to teams. This putative Woman regards a relationship as an entity in which two individuals work together to achieve a set of Common Goals, such as building a home, raising children, establishing a system of mutual nurturance, companionship and spiritual, emotional and intellectual growth.

Now, imagine that this hapless Woman, with this goal in mind, proceeds to audition for a place on this Relationship Team by proving her competence. Her method includes displaying perspicacity, humor, kindness, flexibility, wit, resourcefulness, and a basic ability to hold up her end of the stick, in both practical and aesthetic contexts.

And the Man promptly responds by thinking, "Who does this Woman think she is, being all clever and competent like that? I'll take that bitch down a peg. She's begging for it." So he treats this potential team member as a Woman--that is, as an exotic sort of prostitute--grinds her into the dirt, abandons her, and goes off in search of a ball-dropper to put under contract.

Are you, theoretical Man, perhaps getting a hint of the sort of frustrations and miscommunications that can arise, due to this mutual conflict of assumed paradigms, yet?

While you are chewing on this idea, Pretty Lady will pose some alternatives to the notion that an intelligent woman, making a humorous, perceptive, or witty remark, is attempting to emasculate a man by Competing with him. The possibility exists that her motive in making such a remark might be:

1) To express what's on her mind, in the hopes of kindling an answering spark of resonance in his.

2) To defuse a tense situation with humor.

3) To introduce an alternate perspective for mutual consideration.

4) To pre-empt being patronized, which can be mildly annoying, when a gentleman assumes that no sweet little blue-eyed blonde lady could possibly be able to process ideas or information beyond the first-grade level.

(Incidentally, a lady who engages in such patronage pre-emption may also be endeavoring to spare the man the humiliation that inevitably occurs, when she is finally forced to confess to having a Ph.D. in engineering.)

5) To engage his attention in a flirtatious way, for the purposes of mutual enjoyment.

6) To let her Freak Flag fly high, in the hopes of attracting someone who likes that sort of thing.

7) Just to express the sheer joy of being alive.

Now, it is certainly possible that the lady is a ball-busting bitch who wishes to see all men castrated and ground down under her dominating and vindictive heel. Such bitches are occasionally born. However, it is Pretty Lady's private suspicion that such bitches are also made, after a well-meaning lady has been given the competitive-whore treatment a couple of dozen times.

In closing, Pretty Lady would like to re-iterate the statement that loyalty has nothing, nothing, nothing whatsoever to do with competence. Loyalty is an aspect of character, which in all humans is divorced from other characteristics such as wit, intelligence, creativity and the like. You may not assess a woman's character in the course of a brief conversation, however witty or bovine this conversation may be. You can only assess it by interacting with her over a period of time, and observing her actions.

Of course, if you drive her away by vulgarly insulting her with a lewd proposition, the first time she dares to say something clever, your storehouse of Erroneous Assumptions will remain wholly intact. And you will, incidentally, end up with a very dull wife.

Feline stoicism

Let it be known that in the last two weeks, the Alpha Cat has passed at least four large kidney stones, by Pretty Lady's reckoning.

We have it down to a routine. The Alpha Cat makes his distress known, through both vocalization and gesture; Pretty Lady provides succour and discipline in equal measure. With much regretful sympathy, the Alpha Cat is quarantined in the bathroom, along with the Cat Hospital Basket and a towel.

The Alpha Cat retires dutifully to the basket until he passes a blood clot into the towel. Then he is released from quarantine, has lunch, and sleeps off the agony on the couch, while Pretty Lady mops the bathroom.

Let it be known that throughout these deeply distressing experiences, the Alpha Cat's manners, dignity and sweetness of character proceed unwavering. Once his plight has been acknowledged, he does not whine; he expresses appreciation and affection for services rendered, even in the extremis of bleeding through the urethra.

More than one of Pretty Lady's hypochondriacal ex-boyfriends could learn a thing or two, from such a shining example of stoicism and grace.

The Angry Atheist

Of course you darlings were too polite to ask. But she can hear you wondering.

"Of all the colorful characters in Pretty Lady's shadowy past," you think, "why is it that the one we have not heard about is the Angry Atheist? Surely this one is the most colorful of all. Surely she could mine this character to the fullest extent, in her cautionary tales of Tolerance Gone Mad. Surely there is infinite fodder here for wry, picaresque and illustrative self-mockery, for Adventures on the Edge, for voyages into the absurd that one can only dream of. Why is Pretty Lady so uncharacteristically reticent on the subject?"

The truth is, friends, that the Angry Atheist was the one who sobered her up. It was no laughing matter, this relationship. The Angry Atheist is the reason that Pretty Lady leads the all but monastic life she leads today. And for that, she supposes she must thank him.

You see, darlings, Atheism, despite its pretense to strict rationalism, is anything but. It is a philosophy rife with superstition, fanaticism, evangelism and irrationality. In the hands of a person with formidable intellect (as indeed, intellect has always been one of Pretty Lady's primary requirements in a consort, however these gentlemen may be lacking in other respects), it can become a dangerous weapon. The shell-shock incurred by experiencing the side-effects of this destructive philosophy, up close and personal, for a period of years, veritably smelted Pretty Lady. It rent her to her foundations, and she has spent the subsequent years painstakingly constructing her soul anew.

Superstition? you say. How so?

One of the hallmarks of Atheism, as Pretty Lady experienced it, is a wholly irrational trust in the efficacy of Transference. That is, the belief that one can solve a perceived problem by focussing one's energies on something that is not the problem at all. This human intellectual failing can be summed up in that hoary old joke, "What are you doing?" "Looking for my car keys." "Are you sure this is where you dropped them?" "No, I lost them in the other block. But there's more light over here."

The doings of the Angry Atheist were almost wholly dictated by this unexamined philosophy. It manifested in the manner in which he dealt with his chronic, simmering, unappeasable rage; in order to avoid showering his nearest and dearest with such (this included Pretty Lady, up until the bitter end), he would habitually pick fights with persons he believed to be both peripheral and deserving targets. Such as cops.

Of course, the laws of Karma being what they are, not to mention the nature of cops, this habit had some not inconsiderable side effects. The Angry Atheist would frequently complain, "I'm always getting guns pointed at me. Even when I'm not doing anything. Especially when I'm not doing anything. Cops have it out for me."

"That is because you look like Bernhard Goetz, darling," Pretty Lady would reply. The A.A. did not find this amusing, but it was true. Cops, both good ones and bad ones, have a certain intuitive sense for sensing dangerous auras in random persons; the combination of high intellect and smouldering rage creates a particularly palpable field. Ergo the stories.

"All I was doing was riding my bicycle in the rain alongside the Billyburg Bridge," he stormed. "This cop car came up behind me and forced me onto the sidewalk. Then he gave me a ticket for reckless endangerment, because I was riding on the sidewalk. I gave that asshole a piece of my mind, all right; I went as far as humanly possible without getting arrested."

This story occurred very late in the relationship, so Pretty Lady was not quite as sympathetic as she might have been hitherto.

"I'm sensing two distinct elements in this story," Pretty Lady replied, tersely. "One is gross injustice, certainly; but the other one is YOU." The A.A. cut short the conversation.

Now, the Real Reason for the Atheist's chronic rage was, of course, a set of absolutely vile progenitors. There is no doubt in Pretty Lady's mind that this man was raised by abusive creepazolas. His anger was, then, completely understandable. It was also completely pointless, because 1) the abusive creepazolas were thoroughly, physically dead by the time she met the Atheist, and 2) he was committedly perpetuating the effects of their abuse upon himself, by choosing to remain in his state of impotent, humorless ire against them.

Of course, the Atheist's philosophy of choice made any other methodology of rage-management impossible, because the notion of healing and forgiveness was a ridiculous fairy tale, in his opinion. He subscribed entirely to a mechanistic vision of psychology, as well as every other science; if one generates Rage, the only thing to do is to Vent it. Like ammonia, or fluorocarbons, or ozone.

Pretty Lady, at the time she met the Atheist, was firmly entrenched in a state of undiagnosed co-dependency. Her idealistic notion was, that if she just loved the Atheist enough, if she understood that the root of his outbursts was his own deep woundedness, if she accepted him for himself, that this would Heal him. So she proceeded to do so. She tolerated all manner of egregious, offensive outbursts, in the name of Divine Love. She was a total idiot.

For tolerating the Atheist's chronic venting of spiritual poison did HIM no good at all, and very nearly killed Pretty Lady. Since the violent demise of this relationship, Pretty Lady has had no tolerance left over, whatsoever. She is a wee bit Hypersensitive, in fact. That is why, when any person at all vents his Spleen in her direction, she has developed a habit of intolerantly calling him on his toxicity, and in the event of failure to apologize, she cuts the connection. Any other practice is wantonly self-destructive.

Dominance and Submission -or- How to Acquire a Good Submissive Little Lady as your Friend and Helpmeet

La-la-la. Pretty Lady is Communing with the Higher Vibrations today. Her Arvo Pärt CD arrived, along with the Buddhist chanting and Japanese flute music, and she has ingested nothing for three days but the most spiritual of substances--cranberry/apple salad, steamed greens, marinated vegetables, and Yogi Tea. She highly recommends the Yogi Tea, either Classic India Spice or Egyptian Licorice. Additionally, she has attended daily vinyasa class, and stood for extended periods of time on her head. She is Fortified with Light.

So, in her state of purity and heightened consciousness, Pretty Lady has bravely decided to tackle the problem of Rebelliousness in Woman. Yes, she has transcended gender-ego considerations enough so that she is willing, nay, eager, to give you poor trampled gentlemen some clues as to how to get your woman to toe the line, come to heel, yes! stop her troublesome habits of whining, bitching, nagging, spending the hunting-trip budget on pointless things like slipcovers, and running off with libertines, leaving no note--and Submit. Submit to your superior male wisdom, your grace, your masterful direction, your Father Knows Best.

(Whee! This tea is wondrous. Ginger, cardamom, and clove. Pretty Lady swears that's all.)

Without further ado, then, Pretty Lady submits her Rules for Achieving Total Domination Over the Female.

Rule # 1: Do not be a complete and total jackass.

When Pretty Lady was an idealistic young girl, she made an idealistic little rule for her very own self. This private rule was: give everyone a chance. Do not be hasty in judging a young man for apparent nerdiness, foolishness, pimpliness, odiferousness, boorishness, albinism, or any other superficial, cosmetic characteristic. One may be easily deceived by such things; one may, as the Bishop's wife warned her, pass up a Diamond in the Rough.

So Pretty Lady earnestly set about going upon at least one date, or half a date, with anyone who asked. No matter how much he made her skin crawl, and set off subterranean alarm bells which screamed 'Fire! Fire! Run away!'

(Note: it was not the Bad Boys which set off these alarms. It was the computer science majors with chiselled profiles and Icelandic coloring. But more of this anon.)

Yes, Pretty Lady was true to her ideals for, well, nearly a couple of months. The date that influenced her to re-consider her philosophy was one with an older Young Republican, encountered in figure-drawing class, who took her to see 'Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.' On the way to the film this strapping young man forthrightly announced, 'I don't care about other people. I just want to make a lot of money, and everybody else can go to hell.'

During the film he precipitately attempted to fondle her armpit, while she shifted progressively farther toward the edge of her seat, clenched up tighter than a nun's--well, let's just say her body language was not forthcoming. This did not prevent the man from parking in a deserted Sonic Happy Eating Drive-thru and regarding her expectantly. She asked to be taken back to her dorm, now. He complied; she ran into some comfortably bohemian friends outside the elevator, and went with them immediately to see another movie, the perfidious little bitch.

Ah well.

In the course of her brief stint with the Young Republicans, and the Young Conservatives, who were far to the right of the Young Republicans, Pretty Lady noticed one thing. Whenever a Young Conservative got the hots for her, he immediately started ordering her around. 'Go and get me a coffee, cream and four sugars, McDonald's only.' 'Wouldja' go and get me a Coke, love? Fanks very much.'

Her bohemian friend from the Village suggested that the proper reply to this should be, "Get your own effing Coke, and I'm not your love." Pretty Lady did not say this. She meekly fetched Cokes and coffee, and ignored the gentlemen forthwith.

Because, gentlemen, your potential lady friend is not a secretary. She is a potential Queen. If you would like to be considered for the position of King, you are going to have to impress her with your kingly qualities. Ordering coffee does not cut it.

Rule #2: Do not be a complete and total fool.

There were others. Oh, yes there were. Others who slid under her guard with the notion that they were 'just showing her around Chicago,' others who wooed her with months of romantic correspondence before blowing into town to sweep her off her feet. Others who fall under the blanket category of 'clueless, callow puppies.'

They meant well. Really, they did. They were simply incapable of 1) listening, comprehending, and acting upon pertinent information, and 2) backing up their own unrealistic expectations of self.

For example: say you wish to show a lady around Chicago. Say that this lady has confessed to an interest in art, and thus the great museums of Chicago. Do you:

1) take her to the Art Institute of Chicago posthaste; or

2) take her to the Museum of Science and Industry, an institution geared mainly to hordes of screaming children, because it is free and you are employed as a desk clerk at a youth hostel, where you met the lady, and are really not supposed to be hitting on her at all, let alone the fact that you are operating on a shoestring budget?

Say that you picked, unaccountably, option #2. Say that, after several hours of your company, the lady confesses to wanting lunch. Do you:

1) take her to the nearest decent sandwich shop posthaste; or

2) say, "but we were going to have stuffed pizza for dinner, in four hours or so. We can split some nachos now, I guess."

Let us leave alone the advisability of following this lady back to her room at the youth hostel, angling for an invitation to spend the night, after she has contemptuously picked up the check at the stuffed pizza joint, in order to spare herself any guilt feelings over having cleaned you out and waltzed off into the sunset. Let us furthermore close the curtain upon your hopeful statement, "So, I'll see you at 9 tomorrow morning?" which only forewarns the lady that she needs to be up, dressed, down the street and on the train by 8 AM.

You see, boys, there is more to leadership than merely consulting one's own convenience. One must also consult, not only the convenience, but the requirements, temperament, and preferences of others, before coming to a firm decision. Otherwise, one finds oneself leading an army of one.

Rule #3: Know your own limits.

It is a fine gesture, indeed, to walk into the toniest antique jewelry store in San Francisco and confidently discuss the relative merits and suitabilities of the 3-carat diamond engagement rings on sale. The gesture is slightly marred, however, when your desired fianceé is not only forced to buy you dinner on her birthday, because you are beyond broke and got fired from your job at the pizza joint for being an idiot, but when you also have to ask her for a dollar to give to the homeless person who is breaking your heart by his existence. Possibly because you may be him, in another few years.

The Cardinal Rule, Above All Others: Pay attention, pay attention, pay attention.

Did I mention that you should learn to pay attention? The word 'listen' is so overused, that Pretty Lady feels she should be a bit more explicit. 'Paying attention' means, not only attending to the sense of another person's words, and integrating this sense with your plan of action; it means attending to circumstantial and non-verbal cues as well. If the lady has repeatedly mentioned that she is currently adhering to a no-meat, no-dairy diet (whatever you may think of this madness) it is inadvisable to walk into a restaurant and order meatballs and cheese toast to share. If the lady is sitting on the edge of her chair, arms wrapped around herself and knees pulled up to chin, this is probably not the time to attempt a passionate necking. Just a wee suggestion.

The Ultimate Madness: Treating a lady as you would treat a downtrodden little wifey-poo, ON THE FIRST DATE.

Pretty Lady did ultimately overcome her nameless sense of aversion and dread, enough to agree to throw a little community dinner party with the Icelandic computer science major. She invited a friend of hers; he invited fifteen of his. She suggested going grocery shopping together; he said, "we've just been shopping," so Pretty Lady stopped by the store and picked up the ingredients for stir-fry, herself. When she arrived, Pretty Lady made stir-fry, while the Icelandic computer science major talked geek talk with his fifteen friends, and bragged about what a good cook Pretty Lady was. And smart and gifted, of course, but that stir-fry, mmmm-mmm.

Halfway through the dinner party, Pretty Lady and her friend sneaked off to an audition for "Noises Off," and didn't come back.

A shining example of True Dominance:

This one comes to Pretty Lady via her Canadian friend, who has always been more of a hard-ass with men than Pretty Lady. Her Canadian friend is tall and domineering herself, and thus requires someone yet more statuesque, commanding and decisive to squire her around the planet. And this friend does get around the planet.

"My dream man," said this friend. "We were driving through Midtown and the car got a flat in front of the Astor Hotel. He leapt out of the car, and ushered me into the hotel bar for drinks, conferring with the doorman on the way in. 'What about the car?' I asked. 'It's taken care of,' he replied. After a couple of martinis, the doorman let us know that the car was good as new; we had dinner, and danced till 2."

Of course, a few years later he came out of the closet.


There is a certain cosmic irony in the fact that the gender which is most empathic, considerate, and tuned-in to the needs of others, by and large, is also the submissive one. We ladies, most of us, do not wish to be dominating, nagging, controlling bitches. We only grab the wheel when we can see that it is definitely headed toward a cliff. It is a very great pity that so many gentlemen are incapable of seeing the gaping abysses that lie just past the ends of their own noses.

What is sexy, part the second

Bob is in a fit of literalistic pique over Pretty Lady's cavalier dismissal of his query re: the indefinable appeal of Johnny M.:

So....if I literally read what you wrote...

"Understanding" only comes if your female and lesbian?

Could your response be considered as sexist and sexless at the same time?

?

Hmph. If you must.

Only straight women and gay men, dear Bob, can truly appreciate the poignant, winsome tension that is John Mayer the man, the artist, and the earnest little boy. Straight men are likely to be left coldly unaffected by the ropy, casual masculinity of John Mayer's forearms and hands as he tweedles his instrument; they will entirely miss the sudden gust of psychic pheromones as he casually tosses a glossy dark lock from his forehead. Perhaps an unusually sensitive specimen of straight man might note the odd, unpremeditated way he rolls his eyes back behind lowered lashes as he sings, as though he is channelling the voices of angels; but this same straight man is likely to be repulsed, rather than otherwise, at the manner in which his sensual lips purr against the microphone, as against the skin of a lover.

No, Bob, your average straight man will not even perceive the wryly humorous way he looks askance while performing the wordless, falsetto bridge, communicating his own innocent surprise at the goofiness of the song which has lighted upon him. He will consider that, even if the candid way he meets his audience's eyes upon occasion indicates a sincerity of spirit and an engaging friendliness of character, that this is nothing remarkable. The subtleties of power restrained, power allowing gentleness to shine through, power with the confidence to be vulnerable, lighthearted, playful and whimsical, will mean nothing to this straight man.

The straight man, in other words, thinks that all the girls and gay men are going bonkers over an inconsequential puppy. This is why we besotted straight women generally keep quiet about it. Unless, of course, we are in the privacy of home or car, where we turn up the volume, blithely twirl in circles, and sing along to 'Clarity' until sated and exhausted.

The Progressive Male

Good afternoon, dear Mr. Nelson! I do hope you are well.

Mr. Nelson asked a tongue-in-cheek question about the Progressive Male. This question was answered in typical tongue-in-cheek manner by various non-progressives around him; Pretty Lady will now endeavor to address the matter seriously. Pot-shots from the balcony are, however, welcome.

progressive adj 1 a: of, relating to, or characterized by progress b: making use of or interested in new ideas, findings or opportunities c: of, relating to, or constituting an educational theory marked by emphasis on the individual child, informality of classroom procedure, and encouragement of self-expression.

The scourge of Pretty Lady's existence has been, truthfully, Boring Men. Pretty Lady admits that the fact that most men bore her is not their fault. Cursed with an abnormally high IQ, an addictive reading habit, and a voracious yearning after wisdom, Pretty Lady has found, to her sadness and dismay, that when the average fellow bares the deeps of his soul to her, her response, more often than not, is to reflect, "Yes, I thought of that. When I was about twelve."

(She doesn't say this, of course. What she says is generally along the lines of, "Ah! M-hmmm. Interesting." It doesn't do to give the dear boys a complex.)

And truthfully, the Boringness Quotient has, in the long run, little to do with native intellect. It has much more to do with laziness. The average human male, in the absence of severe threats to his personal survival, reaches an age between twenty-five and thirty and simply stops thinking. By the time he is twenty-five, he has generally decided 1) what his political beliefs are; 2) what his ethical/religious beliefs are; 3) what his career goals are; 4) what kind of women he likes to sleep with; and 5) where he likes to go on vacation. All intellectual and social pursuits thereafter are dedicated toward reinforcing and defending these points of view.

By the time he is fifty, such a man has intellectually ossified to such an extent that his habits of thinking are irreversibly stamped upon his physiognomy. He has a pronounced, entrenched gut. He has two severe lines extending from nose to jowl, and a wattle beneath. His upper lip is perfectly straight, with perhaps a slight downturn at the corners. His shoulders are stooped and knotted, his lower back is in constant pain, and his limbs are thick and inflexible.

It is at this point that the gentleman calls upon Pretty Lady, complaining of chronic pain, and she employs her afternoon in beating him up, trying to reverse in one hour the effects of two decades of circular thinking. Pretty Lady is grossly underpaid.

So much for the non-progressive male.

The Progressive Male, on the other hand, has an attitude toward life resembling that of the Dalai Lama. Pretty Lady has never met the Dalai Lama in person, but from the books and interviews she's read by and about him, she must say that the man is a sweetheart. Whenever presented with an idea which is unfamiliar to him, or even one which is familiar, the Dalai Lama is likely to reply, "Hmmm. Let me consider that." In order to further explore this idea, the Dalai Lama will ask thoughtful, probing questions of its propounder. He will not make a blanket judgment; he takes it, and you, seriously.

If the propounder of the idea is, in fact, a jackass, said jackass is left to come to this conclusion on his own. The Dalai Lama loves him anyway.

In Pretty Lady's view, the Progressive Male is not a male who subscribes to any particular social or political beliefs. He is not necessarily a liberal, a feminist, a socialist, a Buddhist, or a queer. In fact, a man who identifies himself by any particular '-ism' for a prolonged length of time is, ipso facto, not progressive. The Progressive Male makes Progress. He explores, he questions, he challenges, he learns a new trade. In the course of these explorations, he sometimes comes to some startling conclusions; he may even discover that our forefathers were right about some things. But he never takes anything for granted.

You see, darlings, we live in a world which is chock full to the brim with Different People. Pretty Lady has empirically discovered, in her profession, that not only are people Different, but they are all Valid. Each one hangs together in his or her own personal, complex, inimitable way. They may be ossified, they may be foolish, they may be entrenched and isolated and despairing, but each of them has a point of view, and if one takes the trouble to explore this point of view, one can generally learn something.

The non-progressive male (or female; let us cease this arbitrary sexism) makes the blanket assumption that those who do not share his or her point of view are stupid and not worth considering. Such non-progressives, in their extreme form, make the assumption that those Other People out there are actually evil, and must be destroyed. Such assumptions manifest themselve in increasingly belligerent behavior, as well as pronounced guts and facial wattles. Thus, even if a non-progressive is correct in some of his assumptions, he becomes increasingly difficult to be around.

Progressives, of course, can be even more difficult to be around. They can sometimes make you downright uncomfortable, particularly when they insist on selling their stock options and their apartment and taking off around the world, or starting a subsistence farm, or quitting their jobs and putting every cent of home equity into a real-estate startup. They have been known to depart abruptly for Buddhist monasteries. Engaging one's life with a Progressive is not for the faint of heart or will. It frequently requires patience, resourcefulness, and the willingness to part ways when the Progressive goes too far.

But Pretty Lady has always preferred this to the sort of fellow who sits behind his Wall Street Journal and makes a variation of the same snarky comment, every single day. Life, as they say, is too short.

What a Good Date Looks Like

Pretty Lady is pleased to report that the gentleman she met on New Years' Eve has returned from Ecuador, and dropped her a line.

It has been a slightly odd and hectic week. The situation with the landlord is still hanging fire; Pretty Lady is forthrightly ignoring the situation. She figures that if the landlord wants his rent, he can call and ask nicely, after he's fixed the front door. If he wants to throw her out, he can call and ask nicely, and she will call a tenants' rights lawyer. Until either of these two eventualities come to pass, there's not much she can do.

Additionally, Pretty Lady was surprised and delighted by a flying visit from her beloved sister and cuñado, who were unexpectedly stranded at LaGuardia Airport overnight. Oh, the fetchings in the rain! Oh, the crackings-open of French wine, the throwings-together of exotic salads, the extracting of futons from the decrepit sleeper-couch, the cat-fights in the corridor! (Pretty Lady must pause to praise her Alpha Cat. He was the most polite host, despite the fact that her cuñado's cat was suffering from a fit of extreme spleen, and insulted him most grievously.) Pretty Lady adores her family. She more or less shares a common brain with them, and the occasional intense download of laughter, conversation and insight is one of her primary reasons for continuing to exist.

Because of this surprise visit, Pretty Lady was forced to put off the gentleman from Ecuador. One notes that he did not pitch a fit of the sulks about this; he was cheerfully understanding, and called the next day to confirm that they were still on for the evening.

So, description of a Good Date: We met at the little French bar on Ninth, decided it was too noisy, strolled to the Cocoa Bar, had three pots of tisane and a chat, and strolled home again. Simple.

What is more extraordinary is what did not happen. We did not talk about the Same Thing for three hours; the gentleman neither monopolized the conversation, nor sat in adoring silence while Pretty Lady entertained both of them. Pretty Lady did not have to fend off unwelcome advances on her doorstep; neither did she have to walk home alone at midnight. The gentleman did gracefully pick up the check, but did not get himself in over his head, either intellectually or financially. He did listen to what Pretty Lady had to say; he did not always agree, but did adjust his attitude according to additional information received.

In short, we had a nice time because nobody had an agenda. Good dates, my dears, are just good company. Perhaps they do not make good stories, because nobody is getting skewered; but then, good stories are the Consolation Prize anyway.

The Alpha Cat

It has been Pretty Lady's long-held view that pet stories, not to mention pet photos, are best confined within the nuclear family. She feels that outsiders are rarely likely to appreciate or understand the nuances of pet personality, and there is nothing she fears more than Being a Bore.

But, in light of recent popular demand, she will break the ironclad rule of a lifetime, and present The Alpha Cat.

Please to ignore the cheap, ugly flower pots in the background; they contain as-yet un-sprouted poppy seeds. Fire escape photo sessions are, of necessity, less than ideal.

Pretty Lady was adopted by the Alpha Cat in Austin, Texas in the summer of 1989. A Mexican vet once asked her what kind of cat he was, and how much she'd had to pay for such a superb feline specimen; she replied, "Simplemente llegó, un día." ("He simply arrived, one day.") The vet declared, "Que suerte." ("What luck.") Yes, indeed.

Astute calculators will remark upon the fact that the Alpha Cat will be at least seventeen, roughly, this summer. Other people's cats generally are showing some signs of wear and tear at such an advanced age, such as big unsightly tumors, urinary tract blockages, gray hair, thyroid conditions, kidney conditions, emaciation, death, and lack of interest in tearing around the house, chasing Brats. (The Brat is another story. We will save him for another, distant, day.) One must note that the Alpha Cat, so far, appears relatively un-ravaged by time.

Pretty Lady has no explanation for this, except that at times she suspects the Alpha Cat of being a Buddha, his consciousness occasionally appearing to transcend the normal limits of space and time. Either that, or he escaped from a genetic research lab at the University, which is not impossible either.



Ordinarily the splendidity of the Alpha Cat's fur and demeanor are difficult to photograph. Magnificent as he is in person, in photos he usually comes out looking like a random, undifferentiated bundle of fluff. Pretty Lady thinks these photos are rather better than usual, despite the ugly flower pots.

The Alpha Cat has accompanied Pretty Lady upon innumerable journeys, both of the mind and the body; he has flown in planes, he has ridden cross-country in trucks, buses, and a Buick (sprawled at his leisure over the seat back, interestedly observing the landscape.) He has acquired numerous dramatic and disgusting abscesses, brawling with oversized raccoons in the ghetto. Once in Mexico, Pretty Lady had to leave him with friends for a few months, and in her absence he went Over the Wall, and hung out in dark corners with the Mexican alley cats. Pretty Lady's friends were forced to perform an Intervention.

In all these myriad adventures, he has always maintained a high standard of politesse, if not always dignity. (One of his favorite postures, particularly in his younger days, was to lie on his back, half-propped against a wall, so that his oceanic stomach displayed itself like Humpty Dumpty's.) When introduced to another cat, he is invariably courteous; he sits upright and peaceful, eyes wide, and psychically indicates the intention, "How do you do. I am the Alpha."

If the other animal is equally courteous, the two of them get along like a house afire. If not--if the wretched creature is psychotic, and yowls indecencies at him, or has the indecent chutzpah to challenge his Alpha-hood, he demonstrates a world-weary contempt for the creature, and takes him out. "Look, I GAVE you a chance," you can hear him thinking. "Shut up already. You bore me."

In terms of human kindness, let us just say that the Alpha is largely unsurpassed by most humans of Pretty Lady's acquaintance. He has always had the sense of when Pretty Lady has had a particularly horrible day, and on these occasions he takes care to sleep by her head, purring like a factory of sewing machines. During one or two severe break-ups, he performed the role of Feline Dishrag with infinite patience and aplomb.

Pretty Lady is sure she has not come close to plumbing the depths of the Alpha Cat's psyche; she humbly realizes that he is most likely being patient with her. After seventeen years, she hardly knows him.

Haberdashery

Pretty Lady has been inspired by the stylistic perfection of one of her colleagues to advance an unsupported, purely subjective personal opinion: Polo Shirts are a Blot. Either a Blot, or a Blight, take your pick.

I realize this may fill the hearts of many gentlemen with dismay. This is not a personal attack. It is simply that Pretty Lady felt she finally must speak out upon an issue that has been oppressing her psyche since junior high school. The Polo Shirt is the single least sexy item of clothing it is possible for a human being to own. To don a Polo Shirt is to instantaneously acquire the sex appeal of a paper doll, in Pretty Lady's warped perceptions. Particularly if said Shirt is knit of that crusty sort of acrylic-polyester knit that resembles industrial-grade carpets. The soft cotton Ralph Lauren kind is marginally superior, but it still makes Pretty Lady shudder.

Rugby shirts are okay. Pretty Lady can't exactly say what it is about stupid, thick little collars on would-be sports shirts that gives her hives; tightish elastic piping on short sleeve cuffs makes her equally queasy. No doubt this is a holdover from buried associations having to do with private school, buttressed by one or two unfortunate freshman-year dates with computer-science majors. However, she doesn't think extensive psychotherapy is likely to make any difference at this point; the fact is, Pretty Lady loathes Polo Shirts. So there.

So, then, what should a gentleman wear? His options are so limited!

Well, Pretty Lady herself has always been partial to the Mid-80's Demi-Punk look, due to associations equally arcane, and which got her teased in the mid-90's by a boyfriend who, unfortunately, had known her since the mid-80's. "You like guys to dress like Torvald," he accused her, acutely. Pretty Lady had to confess that he'd nailed it. We never really get over our first love.

Not that Torvald's aesthetic was anything spectacular. His look was basic and easy to achieve. Jeans: well-fitting, without any labels, flares, drainpipes, stone-washing, patterning, embroidery or other rot; weathered and torn by excessive use and honest washing, never purchased that way in the store. T-shirt: black, white, or the occasional thrift-store find bearing a cryptic legend such as 'Deer Camp Minnesota, 1979.' Flannel shirt, unbuttoned, in your choice of red or blue plaid. Converse All-Star Hi-Top sneakers, in any color you choose.

(In latter years, Pretty Lady has come to prefer a set of well-worn, good-quality, heavy work boots to the Converse. The Converse just became Too Trendy For Words, and their level of quality has consistently declined. In fact, she's not even sure if real Converse are made anymore. Does anybody know?)

(Never mind, she Googled them. They're still there, without the star, and boy do they look silly.)

The more creative types can get away with such things as cut-off army fatigues, secondhand high-top Doc Martens with blue shoelaces, odd and colorful vests, striped button-down shirts with the sleeves torn off, odd and colorful ties (as long as they are never worn with anything resembling a suit), hats with the brim bent back and stuck full of pins, strings of wooden beads, and patchouli. If you are one of these types, you already know it. If you don't know, don't try it.

Never wear a baseball cap unless it has never borne the legend of a baseball team, and the brim has never been worn facing forward.

Now, mind you, Pretty Lady has never said that gentlemen should not clean up. On the contrary, "he'd clean up nice" is high praise in her home town, and in Pretty Lady's opinion, modern gentlemen don't clean up nearly often enough. As long as they don't don the dreaded Polo, there are many options of clean, from Architecture Casual to Frack. She will now enumerate a few of them.

Aforementioned Architecture Casual: Black or white T-shirt, of higher quality than the T-shirt mentioned above; scoop neck, heavy-weight cotton. Pleated pants. Interesting belt. Footwear that does not too closely resemble that of an Italian gigolo.

Professorial: Chinos, slightly tattered blue button-down shirt (never white. Shudder), frayed tweed jacket with patched elbows, scuffed wingtips. This costume is best worn with a sense of knowing irony, and is not precisely sexy, but it's better than a polo.

Rugby shirt and bermuda shorts: only to be worn if one has the legs of a soccer player.

Needs-Must Business: Never wear an American suit. Americans cannot make suits; few Americans can wear suits. Those stiff, square serge things give Pretty Lady the screaming horrors. If you must wear a suit, for goodness' sake go to Savile Row and get a real one, or else go to Italy and get some Clothes.

There is nothing more horrifying than the sight of a gentleman who has been forced by economic desperation into dressing 'corporate' for the sake of low-level temporary employment. Pretty Lady has little advice for these hapless souls, except to pack a T-shirt in your backpack and change into it in the office bathroom at 5 PM. Try to get away with Architecture Casual, at the very least.

Frack: Dinner jacket and tails, black pants with black satin side stripe, pleated white button-down shirt, white tie, cummerbund. Black dress shoes shined to mirror-hue. Cufflinks. Viola case. Oops, betraying another personal preference, there.

Under no circumstances may a gentleman ever wear a pair of pants which expose any portion of his gluteal cleavage, by accident or on purpose, at any time. I do not know how to make myself clearer.

In conclusion: for those of you out there who are still confused as to matters of masculine attire, Pretty Lady directs you to the Dandy's trenchant and informative discussion of drag, complete with illustrations. She has only to add that despite whatever her abovementioned mid-90's boyfriend may have wanted to think, when she attends a party dressed as Humphrey Bogart, she is most definitely in drag.

San Francisco Nights

Even at the time, Pretty Lady knew those days were numbered. So fortunate she was, to be dating a French Software Engineer, in San Francisco, in the middle of the tech boom! Though Pretty Lady's days were harried, her nights were sybaritic. Once she made it up the hill to the Penthouse in North Beach, such meals! Such a view! Such carryings on!

(Pretty Lady recommends that every girl date a Frenchman, at least once in her life. Then she will understand the way women ought to be treated. The trouble is, it makes you finicky ever afterward.)

And Pretty Lady, fool that she is, almost passed him by. "Not my type," she sniffed, at first. "Too Nice. Too Normal. Too mechanical and bland." But her hand knew better. Every time the phone rang, her hand fetched the phone of its own accord, without Pretty Lady's conscious permission. Thus when the Frenchman called, inviting her skiing in Tahoe, she accepted in spite of herself.

Thus it began.

At this time in her life, Pretty Lady was a busy girl. What with two part-time jobs, two free-lance careers, and full-time vocational training, she was juggling so many tasks and appointments that she had to schedule 'teatime' in her day planner. She never slacked on her gardening, workouts, or farmers' market cookery, either. With all of this going on, she always arrived at the Frenchman's penthouse looking as though she'd stepped out of Godey's (being in a rather romantic stylistic stage at that point) and the Frenchman never suspected a thing. At least, he seemed to assume she'd been lounging around all day, filing her nails.

The Frenchman rarely left his Penthouse. During his first few years in the Bay Area, he informed her, he actually drove out to his cube in the Valley every day, but once DSL was invented, why bother? The Frenchman woke up when he damn well felt like it, usually around noon, and sat and programmed until he felt like stopping, anywhere between 9 PM and 5 AM. Pretty Lady had no problem with this; having an aerospace engineer for a father, and a mechanical engineer for a brother, this seemed to her to be a masculine thing, right and proper. Boys do their fabulous, unfathomable things off in their rooms, and every now and then they emerge, proudly bearing something miraculous, like an assault rifle, a web browser or an A12. We pat them on the heads and continue making dinner. Such is life.

You see, girls, the masculine mind is rather like a mining drill. It takes the bit of linear logic between its teeth, and pulverizes everything in its trajectory. Nothing along its path can be deflected or overlooked; no crucial semicolon within fourteen thousand lines of code, no millimeter of deviation on the drill press, no hairsbreadth of torque on the delta wing. The woman who gets between a man and his gadgets, or his pet theories on the nature of political systems, is headed for disaster. One does not butt logic head-on with a man--within the ten degrees or so of his line of sight.

This same man, of course, is utterly incapable of figuring out when to start the potatoes, the chicken and the asparagus respectively, so that dinner is on the table at 6:30--uniformly hot, neither overcooked nor raw. Women are naturally responsible for the other three hundred and fifty degrees of perspective on the world. That is how our minds are made.

It has always been this way. As a child, Pretty Lady loved the "Little House" books; actually, she still loves them, and in times of extreme stress she can be found behind a shelf in the children's department, rereading them. Recently she came upon this passage:

Pa drove the wagon out onto the ice, following those wagon tracks. The horses' hoofs clop-clopped with a dull sound, the wagon wheels went crunching...All around the wagon there was nothing but empty and silent space. Laura didn't like it. But Pa was on the wagon seat and Jack was under the wagon; she knew that nothing could hurt her while Pa and Jack were there...

In the night a strange noise wakened Laura. It sounded like a shot, but it was sharper and longer than a shot. "Go to sleep, Laura," Ma said. "It's only the ice cracking."

Next morning Pa said, "It's lucky we crossed yesterday, Caroline. Wouldn't wonder if the ice broke up today. We made a late crossing, and we're lucky it didn't start breaking up while we were out in the middle of it."

"I thought about that yesterday, Charles," Ma replied, gently.

Dating this lovely Frenchman gave Pretty Lady the opportunity to practice being just like Ma Ingalls, with the added benefit that the Frenchman appreciated it. His friends did, too. Upon one occasion, the Frenchman proudly repeated Pretty Lady's comment on his motorcycle skills; "I don't get frightened when you pass on two-lane highways at 115 mph, because I know you're such a good driver," she told him.

"How elegantly tactful," said the friend. Of course he kept the two-lane passing to a minimum, after that. Frenchmen are such intelligent darlings.

In fact, this Frenchman was such a wonderful fellow, that Pretty Lady was actually able to negotiate with him on important issues, such as the scheduling of weekend ski trips to Tahoe.

"Would you like to go skiing this weekend?" she would ask, of a Wednesday.

"I don't know. Let's be spontaneous," the Frenchman would reply.

Pretty Lady would take a deep breath. "Let us make a decision now, dear," she would say. "Because I would love to go skiing with you more than anything, this weekend, dear heart," she would explain. "But if we do not have plans, my telephone will ring. It will ring many times. This ringing will be my clients, asking to book appointments. It will be my best friend, wanting to have lunch. It will be my classmates, wanting to schedule a study session. And if I do not have concrete plans with you, my love, I will say 'yes' to all these people. By the time Saturday rolls around, it will not be possible for us to go skiing any longer, at all, at all. We will no longer have the option."

"Ah," said the Frenchman. "I see. Let us decide to go skiing this weekend. I will book the hotel."

See how easy this is? I told you Frenchmen were bright. You really should try them.

Pretty Lady has a lot of female friends. She is not trying to prove anything by telling you this; she is not subtly letting you know that she is not one of those loathesome females that see every other woman as a source of potential competition. She is just saying that she knows, intimately, a lot of very intelligent women. Just about all of these women have had trouble choosing a 'career.' This is not for lack of talent or interest; on the contrary, all of these women have so many talents and interests that deciding among them is an impossible task. Should she be a fashion designer, an event planner, a stockbroker or a nurse practitioner? Should she be a mother, a farm wife, a personal chef or a writer of fiction? Every option seems too scrumptious for words.

The men, on the other hand, rarely seem to have these concerns. Pretty Lady's cuñado, for example, is an Architect. He spends 90+ hours per week utterly absorbed in Architecture. Her brother, as she has mentioned, is the most committed and automatically self-disciplined mechanical engineer, possibly, on the planet. Her good friend Jake is a photographer-archivist-videographer, but then Jake accuses himself of being female.

Pretty Lady is going to get wildly stereotypical, here; she anticipates that many people will get their knickers in a twist about it. She is going to essay the daring notion that women's and men's brains work differently. Women are good at juggling twenty feats an hour; we multi-task, we interdisciplinate, we integrate, poeticize and maunder. We keep the complex world in balance. This talent is absolutely crucial when one is birthing, feeding, educating, and housing a family and a farm; we have minds which leap naturally and easily from crying infant to cassoulet to poem in progress. We are elegant. We Handle It All.

Men, on the other hand, Forge On Ahead. They pack the wagon and trundle it across the lake into the Dakota Territory. They build bombs and racing automobiles. They are, really, quite splendid.

But the dear boys need us desperately, or else they would all be like that fellow who won the Darwin Award; the one who attached a solid-fuel rocket to his automobile and went tearing across the desert, forgetting to consult a map. When they found the remains, plastered up against a sudden cliff, the former brakes were melted to goo.

If this man had had a woman with him, this tragedy would never have occurred--at least, if this man had been French. "Darling," you can picture her saying, "the solid-fuel rocket is a splendid idea, and the notion of trying it out in the desert is exciting beyond words. But dear, I worry. Have you tested the brakes? Did you get a map? What is the terrain like, outside the state line? I know I'm being fussy."

Too many American men, sadly, get testy about things like this.

Gamma boys

Such an engrossing discussion over on VD's blog, all about Alpha and Gamma and Domination and thrilling things like that. I would have written it myself except that I was sleeping. I do sleep too much. It's one of my few flaws. However, my dear VD was kind enough to make a suggestion:

It would be interesting if you would attempt to explain the appeal of the Alpha male and the lack of appeal of the Gamma male from the female perspective.

The workings are a mystery to me, having been taught from day one that women just want men to be kind, gentle listeners, but observing completely the opposite. Thus, I know the What, but I don't understand the How or the Why.

Kind, gentle listeners! Why, certainly! We want you to be kind, gentle listeners on the morning after you have lifted us off our feet, tossed us into the loft, given us four orgasms and fallen asleep in a blissful pool of mingled sweat and pheromones. Silly boys. They always get their sequence wrong.

(They're not always very good at the orgasm part, either. But that is Mr. Savage's column, not mine.)

Sigh. Fascinating as this discussion is, with all its sweeping socio-political-cultural-biological generalizations, so much of it boils down to chemistry. Chemistry is a wonky and unfathomable thing, and beyond the scope of my analysis. Thank goodness. There must be some room for mystery.

However, I am moved to focus my discussion on those gray situations when there might be chemistry, or there might not, and Something Goes Wrong. While doing so I may touch upon Alpha behavior, or faux-Alpha, or Gamma, or Alphas who mimic Gammas and thus shoot themselves in the foot. I am not entirely sure. All of these scientific categorizations get beyond me sometimes.

I will tell you, then, about my buddy Gerry. For lack of a better definition, I will label Gerry an Alpha-Gam. He was certainly not Beta, at any rate; noted for his his charm, his Grateful Dead bandanas, and his degree in engineering, he had, to my certain knowledge, a harem of politically correct women scratching each other's eyeballs out over him. Gerry was a notorious serial monogamist. He would have the next lucky girl lined up even as he was tactfully and sorrowfully engineering the demise of his current relationship. One of the girls in the lineup was my dear friend Beth; she philosophically accepted her fate, even as she pined, when Gerry strategically moved to Dallas to get away from her.

Gerry and I were generally on the best of terms, though never close. Imagine my surprise when, upon his return from Dallas, I was informed by the rumor mill that Gerry had staked me out for his next girlfriend. Beth told me so herself. Gerry backed up the rumors with a series of knowing looks, and suggestions that I show up at his cooperative for dinner some evening.

Of course Gerry had my phone number; of course I would never consider inviting myself for dinner uninvited. That would not be polite. When my phone did not ring I naturally assumed dear Gerry had changed his mind.

Later that summer I found myself entangled with the incandescent, psychotic Williams graduate, who happened to be boarding at Gerry's cooperative. We went to dinner together; I greeted Gerry with warmth and friendship. Later my sister, who dwelled in the cooperative next door, told me that Gerry had dropped by, in a powerful sulk. "Your sister's over there," he declared. "She wouldn't come when I asked her, but she's over there now."

And, sadly, it seemed that Gerry never did get over it. He was vaguely snarky in my company right up to the day I moved to San Francisco, and in fact I ran into him at a Grateful Dead concert and he was snarky then. "I didn't think you were into the Dead," he said. He was right, I wasn't. Ugh. How I suffered.

When telling a girlfriend this story, years later, I phrased it like this: "he crooked his finger, and I didn't come running." She replied, "Good for you." But there wasn't anything good about it. It truthfully did not occur to me to come running. I expect that a truly confident gentleman has the courage to make himself vulnerable--to pick up the phone and say, 'you are a fascinating woman. Will you do me the honor of having dinner with me?' Anything else is ego.

But perhaps the story is no story at all; perhaps there was never any chemistry, as I said. I don't know. Certainly Gerry's sulks did not make him more endearing, although I continue to bear him no grudge.

I would say that this incident is perhaps an isolated case of an Alpha's failing to get his girl, but that such things have continued to happen to me on a fairly regular basis in years since. The pattern is generally the same; I am on friendly terms with an acknowledged Alpha, he crooks his finger, I look at the finger and raise my eyebrow, he storms off in a lasting huff. When I boil it down it really does look like pure egotism. I certainly would not call these men my friends. Friendship does not appear to be possible with a man like that.

I would, however, term such finger-crooking as 'passive-aggressive.' Interest has certainly been communicated, but not directly acknowledged. I frown upon such rot. As I said, a genuine Alpha takes his rejection on the chin or not at all.

So I am not sure what we are dealing with. Perhaps I will take refuge in Jane Austen. "By you I was properly humbled. I came to you without a doubt of my reception. You showed me how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased."

But then, Mr. Darcy is a fictional character.

All the money in the world

Come dance with me, my darling
To the edge of the world
Be sure to bring with you your hunger
And all your pretty spells

Today I was listening to a track from my special pre-official-release copy of Chad Parks' 'Pax Americana', and it occurred to me to wonder if Chad had got himself a decent website yet. I am thrilled to report that he has. Please run right over and start downloading.

We'll dance until the music ends
Turn and turn and turn a hell
Into heaven

I discovered Chad by accident, when Jake and I dropped into Arlene's Grocery one quiet Sunday evening about three years ago. The first band was acceptable. Chad's band, which at that time was called something outlandish like the Neo-Filipino Picnic Orchestra, had me doing that Thing I do, where I lose any vestige of self-consciousness I might once have had, and start whirling around the room like an avant-garde dervish, whether anyone else is dancing or not. The music hit me in my solar plexus, lifted me six inches off the ground and held me there. It was better than heroin. Jake forbore to comment.

Tell me your secrets
Quietly in my ear
All that you desire and all that you fear
I'll shout it from the rooftops for everyone to hear
You finally will feel free and your mind will be clear

After the show I approached the stage, grabbed Chad firmly by the ear and requested him to put me on his mailing list. He seemed surprised; I doubt he HAD a mailing list. He didn't have any CDs yet, either, which meant that I was dependent upon live performances for my fix. I started appearing at every one of his gigs, which surprised both of us.

You know that I love you
You know that much is true
Is there anything I can buy you
To make sure you really love me too?

In other places I've lived, bands are accustomed to groupies; you can usually count on seeing the same twelve or twenty faces at every venue. But in Manhattan, it seems that people are too busy and disengaged to become sincere fans. I wondered if my passion for Chad's music appeared immoderate.

I'll give you all the money in the world
All the money in the world
All the money in the world
To burn...

Chad called this his "sugar daddy song." Upon first listening to the words, I thought, with sophisticated cynicism, "how pathetic. Of course he's being ironic."

Then on one occasion I found myself sitting in the front row at the Sidewalk with tears unexpectedly streaming down my face. I was mortified. Not only is the fan obsessive, she is becoming emotional over a bit of sardonic irony.

The truth is, I was thinking of one of my ex-lovers, over whom I made somewhat a fool of myself. The gentleman in question was a musician, a classical violist. He arrived at this position of relative distinction through sheer force of determination, after an orphaned childhood on the streets of Mexico City. He had no musical talent, only passion, discipline, and the sense not to saddle himself with the economic responsibilities of parenthood. He was charming, wounded and pathologically unfaithful. I loved and respected him inordinately.

But the sad truth of the situation was that we were not socioeconomic equals. I had the resources and the freedom to move about the planet at will; he was tethered to his country, his job and his fears of irremediable destitution. Part of his compulsive philandering, I was sure, was due to a need to assert the balance of power in an impossible situation. He could not afford to become attached.

Of course I am romanticizing--of course the gentleman was merely another rat-fink womanizer, and I was a co-dependent fool. But in the moment of listening to Chad's song I had an inkling of what it must be like--do not laugh--what it must be like to be a man. Never to be entirely sure if a woman loves you for yourself, or whether her attachment stems partly from her instinct for survival.

I could sense, in myself, the willingness to throw away any amount of economic security in order to redress the balance of power.

You know that I love you
You know that much is true
Is there anything I can buy you
To make sure you really love me true
I'll give you all the money in the world...

When Chad finally got around to cutting an album, he came by my gallery with an advance copy. My then-boyfriend said that my face lit up like a Christmas tree. "You'd like to have that guy over a car hood," he declared, inelegantly. He was much mistaken; I had the jones merely for his music. Chad himself, although a most attractive man, would have been redundant. Talented musicians rarely have much conversation. My violist's charm, I fear, was in inverse proportion to his musical gifts. I suppose that life balances out in the long run.