We found ourselves at the mall, Sara, Mia and me, on Black Friday after all, despite my protestations. Actually, just one store in the mall, the Apple Store, because Mia needed a new power cord for her laptop.

The place was packed (Why? I have no idea; it’s not like Apple offers any Black Friday deals at 4 a.m.), but better yet, it was packed with men. 

“Wow,” Mia exclaimed, ogling the eye candy who were checking out the iPads and iPhones. “Where did all these guys come from?”

“Not around here, that’s for sure,” Sara said, “otherwise I’m sure I would have seen most of them naked at some point.”

Mia and I rolled our eyes.

“This place is better than any speed dating event I went to,” she continued.

“Or bar,” Mia said.

“Or online dating site,” I chimed in.

Could Apple stores be the “new bar” when it comes to meeting people?

I don’t know; it would be a bit creepy to walk up to someone and ask about their ram needs. Personally, I have many, but thankfully Sean is quite generous when it comes to that. Plus, at a bar someone from the other end can buy you a drink (or vice versa); you’re not likely to get a new iPhone from someone a table or two away in an Apple store although, hey, that could be cool.

But, it’s as good a place as any to meet someone, right? It’s where Robin Williams met his latest bride (No. 3), so it can’t be all that bad, right?

Lots of people hate the bar scene: “You can’t meet anyone good there.” I’m not so sure of that. I did — OK, twice, but still. Online dating sites? Same complaint: “I’ve seen him on this site for years. Playah!” OK, but maybe he was in a long-term relationship and broke up … just at the same time your relationship ended and you’re back online (and he’s thinking, “I’ve seen her on this site for years. Playah!”)

Honestly, I don’t where to “go” to meet someone. I think you just have to live your life and not hole up in your pad with a Snuggie , a pint of Ben & Jerry’s, Netflix and the remote. It doesn’t make a difference where or how you meet someone as long as you meet someone.

Generally, it starts with a smile and a hello.

The bigger issue, of course, is how to make things work after the smile, hello and first date. Hey — do they have an app for that yet?

• Where’s the most unusual place you met someone?
• Where do you “go” to meet potential romantic partners?
• What’s harder/more enjoyable — meeting people or the first date?

The phone rang ridiculously early on a Saturday morning. It was Sara. I looked over at Sean — snoring happily and oblivious to the drama that was most likely about to unfold — so I answered.

“Did you see that article in the Times?”

“What article?”

“The ‘Modern Love‘ article. She sounds like us.”

“I’ll get back to you,” I said as I hung up the phone and curled back up against Sean, who let out a muffled “Humph.”   

True to my word, I did read the article later that day. And although the author, Sara Eckel, is younger than Sara and me by a few, cough, decades, I totally get what she’s saying:

Being an unattached woman who would rather not be somehow meant you were a nitwit, a bubblehead who had few concerns beyond shopping, pedicures and “Will he call?” My friends and I had no interest in shopping or pedicures, but that didn’t stop us from feeling wildly embarrassed that we longed for love. … Like single women everywhere, I had bought into the idea that the problem must be me, that there was some essential flaw — arrogance, low self-esteem, fear of commitment — that needed to be fixed. I needed to be fixed.

Somehow, if you are a woman admitting that you’d rather not be single — whether you’ve never married or whether you are divorced and looking for love again — people assume there must be something wrong with you if you either make that a priority or if you can’t find someone.

As midlife divorcees, the stereotypes about Sara and me are a little different than those about Eckel and her generation (30-somethings), but they are no less maddening.

Divorcees (of any age) are bitter women who battle their exes and use their children as pawns and their child support payments to become plastic Barbies to keep their fading beauty from fading too quickly, and who got divorced because they knew they’d walk away with the house, the kids and a big, fat alimony check.  Or something like that. It isn’t true for many of us — certainly not Sara and me — but that doesn’t make things better. Perception is reality for too many people.

I hate the perceptions about divorced people — we’re failures, flawed, selfish, and self-absorbed people who don’t understand what commitment and “for better or worse” means, and put our own needs (aka happiness) before our children’s need, blah, blah, blah.

Those perceptions sting.

Like Eckel, we are wrestling with the belief that there’s something inherently wrong with us — we couldn’t make a marriage work, after all. How hard is that?!?! OK, granted — there are some divorced people who are bitter, who are oblivious to what commitment means, who have selfishly put their needs before their kids’. But, please don’t paint all of us with that broad paintbrush.

As for wanting love again at midlife, well, there’s the rub: Most of us assume we won’t find someone because of our wrinkles, sags and “issues.” And, yes — it is a little harder to find people at age 40 and beyond because the pool of eligible men is somewhat smaller and there’s a certain percentage of guys who want to skew younger. Fine — we’re not interested in those types! As Eckel says:

Did we find love because we grew up, got real and worked through our issues? No. We just found the right guys. We found men who love us even though we’re still cranky and neurotic, haven’t got our careers together, and sometimes talk too loudly, drink too much and swear at the television news. We have gray hairs and unfashionable clothes and bad attitudes. They love us, anyway.

Finding the “right guys” (or, in broader terms, the right person) is the take-home message.

Of course, nothing’s wrong with naming and addressing our issues head-on, and working through them as best we can. You can’t be available to fully embrace and love someone else if you can’t fully embrace and love yourself.

But, really, someone who loves us despite the crankiness, neuroses, gray hairs, bad clothes and other “endearing qualities” — isn’t that what we all want?

We just have to be prepared to do the same for someone else.

• Ever feel that there was something wrong with you because you were seeking love?
• Ever feel that something was wrong with you because you couldn’t find love?
• Ever feel that something was wrong with you because you couldn’t hold on to love?
• What stereotypes as a single or divorced person bother you the most?

Photo © Refocus Photography – Fotolia.com

“Do you think Sara Leal’s attractive?” I asked Sean as we snuggled on a lazy Sunday morning.

“Who’s that?”

Sean’s a smart guy, but he’s not too hip when it comes to the latest celebrity or celeb scandal — thankfully!

“The young blond party girl who had sex with Ashton.”

“Why do you pay attention to that stuff?”

Good question. I really don’t because I just can’t stand our celeb-obsessed culture. But as someone who likes to observe people — and as a mom —a Sara Leal is someone to pay attention to.    

Why? She’s pretty, young, has a great bod and can party with best of them — the kind of girl a lot of guys like to sleep with.

Now, I never would have heard about Sara and I’ll bet neither would have any one else if she hadn’t had unprotected sex — twice — with Ashton Kutcher, Demi Moore’s husband.

So why do I know about the 22-year-old? Because after first asking for $250,000 to shut up about it, which obviously didn’t happen, she then blabbed about it to anyone who would listen (which, sadly, is a huge portion of the population) — presumably for cash — saying that sleeping with him has messed up her life.

No, Sara, the truth is, you messed up your life. Sleeping with a married man (OK, he allegedly told her he was separated, but still) is bad enough but I won’t judge other people’s actions. But sleeping with him and then selling your story and all the details (“He had great endurance. We were up for a while. It was about two hours.”) to magazines isn’t going to help you move past your part-time modeling gig.

Except, of course, it probably will. I imagine Sara’s already entertaining offers to pose naked in Playboy, and I wouldn’t doubt that we’ll soon see her on reality TV. To get your 15 minutes of fame nowadays all you have to do is sleep with a high-profile guy once or twice, sell your story or pictures of it, or both, and you’ll pocket a few thousand to ease your heartbreak.

If I were a mom of a daughter, we’d probably be having a long discussion about how not to get famous by going the Sara Leal route. Being naive and stupid (unprotected sex?) and then opportunistic is a very ugly combination, no matter how pretty you are.

Then there are all the topless picture of her circulating on the Internet and descriptions by friends that she “parties a lot” and would “go out with her best friends, and she’d get drunk and be the fun girl.” This is not something to be known for. Being a party girl ages you pretty quickly.

And her 15 minutes of fame from all of this will blow away quickly, and she’ll spend many more years trying to get people to forget about it than being able to capitalize on it. Need proof? Look at Monica Lewinsky, who didn’t seek fame but who got it anyway.

Reading some of the comments on the online stories about the Sara-Ashton “event,” guys are calling her skanky but in the same breath saying, “but I’d still f@*k her.” Because that’s how people will see her now. I have to wonder — was it worth it?

Knowing that about some guys, and I’m mom to a guy, I’ll be talking about Sara Leal to The Kid, too. While Ashton may have been a relatively safe bet for having unprotected sex with since he’s been married for the past six years, Sara is a party girl. If she’s having sex on the first hookup with no protection, you can pretty much bet she doesn’t use protection, period, and the consequences of that could be disastrous — STDs, AIDs, a baby. I really want my kid to think about that.

Beyond the sex part, I’d want to explore with him why guys find someone like Sara Leal — with her heavy makeup and boozy partying — attractive? OK, that was a stupid question — I know why guys find someone like Sara Leal attractive. Which makes me think we have a very skewed idea of what’s attractive.

When I explained to Sean why, as a mom, I feel a need to talk about Sara Leal, I asked him again if he thought she was attractive. “No,” he said, “but I’d still f@*k her.”

• Is there a message for kids in the Sara Leal saga?
• Is there a message for all of us in the Sara Leal saga?

I couldn’t wait to get together with Mia; she’d met a guy who sounded pretty darn as close to perfect as you can get and I wanted to know more. So we met at the arts fest, not even feeling the raindrops because our conversation was so animated.

“OK, what are the stats?”

“He’s 52, tall, fit, nice salt-and-pepper hair …”

“Uh-huh. And?”

“Loves to hike, super-smart and super-sweet. Coached his kids’ soccer teams …”

“Sounds good. And?”

“And he’s a real gentleman. He paid for our dates, even though I insisted I’ll pay. He didn’t come on real strong; I practically had to throw myself at him to get him to kiss me.”

“Ah, he likes a bit of the chase? Nice!”

“And I’m starting to get crazy about him.”

“Mia, it’s way too soon for that! But I know — it’s hard not to feel excited about someone who’s so great. How long has he been divorced?”

“Hmm, well …”

“Well, what?”

“He’s just separated.”

“As in ‘just’ how long ago?”

“Two months.”

I think my mouth must have dropped far enough to smudge my cute new black cotton wedgies — that’s how shocked I was.

“Mia, what are you doing with a newly separated guy?”

“Enjoying our time together, why?” she sniffed.

“Because, because … because, it’s all wrong!”

“Says who?”

Says probably about every dating expert out there, although you don’t want to necessarily follow everything they say. But, who needs a dating expert to tell us that getting involved with someone fresh out of a marriage — and I wouldn’t call separated “out” of anything — is a bad idea?

Separated means a lot of things to different people. When Rob and I separated, it was to spend time alone to figure out whether we were going to salvage the marriage or not — that hardly made me dating material. For all Mia knows, this guy and his not-quite-ex could be still working on their relationship, giving each other “space,” dipping their toes into the dating scene to see if they can attract someone new or all of the above. Or maybe they’re actually somewhat happily married and he’s just scouting around for a mistress. Who knows?

As Singlemommyhood notes: “Separated always means in limbo. There is unfinished business — whether it’s emotional, legal, or financial.”

Which is what I told Mia (thanks Dr. Leah).

And Mia would hear nothing of it. Now you know why dating experts and shrinks stay in business — even if we know we’re in a situation that has way too many complications, we still delve right in, hoping this time it will be different.

Maybe it will be.

Probably not.

To me, even a newly divorced guy is a big dating no-no; no one’s ready to be available in a new relationship when he just got out of one. And, if he says he is, it’s because he’s lonely and/or he wants sex.

Getting involved with someone like that is taking a big gamble, one you’re likely going to lose.

• Would you date a separated man or woman?
• How about a newly divorced person?

Photo © Angelika Bentin – Fotolia.com

I was at a Labor Day barbecue, so of course it made sense to talk about work. But a lot of the conversation was about not working.

Two more friends have lost their jobs — Dan and Michael. I feel really bad for both of them, but I feel a lot worse for Dan. Michael is married, and his wife, Natalie, works; he’s OK for now (although this puts their marriage at a greater risk of divorce). Dan is single and although he’s smart, talented and an all-around great guy who can probably survive for a while on his savings, who wants to date an unemployed man?

No one. At least, that’s what he told me. 

“Dan, you don’t actually tell people you’re unemployed, do you?”

“Yeah, because I am — along with I don’t know how many millions of other people.”

“But, that’s shocking for people to hear, especially women you want to date; you need
to spin it.”

“Like what? That I’m on a sabbatical or I’m an independent consultant? Oh, please!”

“Can’t hurt.”

“It’s not exactly honest, either. Not the best way to start a relationship.”

He has a point.

I’m all for honesty, and if you’re jobless and don’t share that with a new love right from the start, it will be a big ugly mess explaining it later when it eventually gets discovered — and you just know it will! As it must.

That’s a much bigger problem for guys than women, not surprisingly. Unemployed women are still datable and guys are not —  if that isn’t proof about how far we haven’t come as a society, I don’t know what is.

I suppose Dan can give up dating for a while — all that extra time and energy (and cash!) can be spent looking for a new job, volunteering or learning new skills. But, if one part of your life is out of whack — like your health or your job or your love life — it really helps to have the other parts a little more stable. Knowing someone has your back and still finds you lovable makes losing a job somewhat less traumatic — for a while, anyway.

Of course, Dan can continue his dating routine, which is pretty much a lot of hookups and friends with benefits arrangements, like most people date nowadays anyway. As weird as it sounds, it actually seems to be the perfect way to have fun and connect with people given what’s going on; you don’t need to wine and dine anyone! Could it be that our casual sex dating rituals are a byproduct of the recession?

I don’t think our economy is getting back to normal any time soon — if you’re unemployed or underemployed and looking for love, what do you do?

Like this? You might like:

He’s jobless — do you date him?

Photo © Christopher Hall – Fotolia.com

When I saw that my friend Dan had changed his Facebook status to “in a relationship,” I just had to give him a call. But first, I clicked on the profile of the gal he was in a relationship with. Much to my surprise, she looked nothing like I would expect him to be with, based on his former girlfriends. She’s pretty, but in a sweet girl-next-door way.

What had happened to the Dan who always fell for babes who looked like they made their living swinging naked on a pole at the local strip club?

So I called him, and yesterday we meet over some beers.

“Should I be worried about you?” I asked.

“Why? Do I look sick?”

“No. Actually, you look happy.”

“I am happy. I’m in love.”

“But she’d not your type!”     

“Who? Kat, did you …”

So of course I fessed up on my snooping.

“Katy is absolutely my type! She’s sweet and smart and a total babe. You had me pegged all wrong.”

“I had you pegged by what you usually dated — they may have been smart and maybe even sweet but they were way beyond ‘total babes’ — they were, you know, skanky.”

“Well, just like women are drawn to bad boys, we guys are drawn to sluts. We can’t help it. But, no guy wants to to be boyfriend to that. We just want to …”

“Have sex with them.”

“Bingo.”

“So a girl who gives it up on the first date?”

“Uh, probably not the bring-home-to-the parents type. But you know that.”

“But, women don’t trash a guy because he wants to have sex on the first date. We expect a guy’s going to at least try!”

“Guys aren’t woman and women aren’t guys. Thankfully.”

“So, then why do women give it up so easily and dress so trashy?”

“Kat, I think you would know that better than I.”

And he was right, I guess.

Women like to dress provocatively; I know I do. It gets attention from guys, and I like to play up my femininity. But as I age I know there’s a line between looking sexy and looking trashy; older women who try too hard to look young cross that line in a tragic way. You can get away with some trashiness when you’re 20-something, but you actually don’t have to do too much to look sexy at that age; I wish more young women understood that!

But when it comes to sex, I know why some women give it up easily — they just want to have some fun, just like guys do. I’m not going to say it’s empowering — God, I’m really beginning to hate that word! It’s just that some women don’t have any hangups about casual sex. But a whole lot more women do, and they have sex freely and easily because they’re hoping it will lead to a something, probably a relationship. Sometimes it does but not necessarily with someone we want to be with for the long haul. Even if we don’t put out on the first date, Date 3 comes along and …

But, if guys don’t particularly want to have relationships with women who dress like they’re working the street corner and who give it up too soon (and I’m not 100 percent convinced I know when “too soon” is), then why do so many women go the skanky route? If guys like the chase then shouldn’t more women who are interested in having a relationship hold out from having sex with a guy for as long as they can — or at least until they recognize the guy’s not in it just to score?

Of course, if a guy dumps a woman after sleeping with her on the first date, he probably wasn’t too serious about wanting a relationship in the first place. It shouldn’t be a deal-breaker, or should it?

• Guys, what do you think of women who have sex on the first date?
• Do you always try to score on Date No. 1?
• Are skanky women lookers and not keepers?
• Gals, do you have sex on the first date? Why or why not?
• Do you dump a guy who tries? Do you have more respect for a guy who doesn’t try?

 Photo © dimis – Fotolia.com

“I have the perfect vacation for us!” Sara said as she burst into my front door before we took a (cold!) ride over Mount Tam.

“Oh really? The last ‘perfect’ vacation you had for us I was left alone for pretty much the whole weekend while you had crazy sex all over Austin with that hottie you met the night we arrived. Remember?”

“Oh, Kat — he was so cute, and you know I was desperate for sex back then. It had been, like, months!”

“Whatever.”

“OK, OK. This won’t be like that, I promise.”

“So, what do you have in mind?”

“Hedonism II.”

“The erotic resort? You’re kidding me!”

“No, it will be awesome. People interested in sensual things. All sorts of sexy activities. Decadence and debauchery. Naked people — think!”

I was thinking. And my thought was, no way! I’m hardly a prude but it’s just that erotic destination getaways seem so, I don’t know — calculated. Showing up at a music club in Austin, spontaneously meeting someone cute and having fantastic sex for the weekend seems so much better. If you can swing it, that is.

But maybe you can’t. Maybe Sara was just lucky that time. Maybe it isn’t all that easy to meet someone for fun (unless you’re going to go on Craiglist’s “casual encounters” once you get to town). Maybe it’s better to vacation at a place that’s custom-made to find you a lover — or at least the potential for one — for a few days if that’s where your head is at. (Although I have to imagine that there have to be some less-than-satisfied customers at exotic hot spots; since you’re still you wherever you go, if you have a hard time attracting people in your everyday life, you may not have much luck at an adults-only resort, either!)

Back in the ’80s, Club Med was the “it” place if you were a swinging single. Since the late ’90s, it’s become into a family destination. Makes sense; if you were a swinging single back in the ’80s, you most likely have been towing a few kids by now. Of course, that’s exactly when you may need an erotic vacation!

I can’t say adults-only resorts are good or bad because I’ve never been. And, I’m never going to go; I can’t see Sean and me packing up for four-days-three-nights at some place where the pressure is on to be romantic. What if we just want to sleep?

A former boyfriend once booked us a room at a hotel with a round bed and mirrors on the ceiling — I burst out laughing when we walked in the room. (You’ll notice I said “former” boyfriend …)

But, if you’re single and looking to score — or at least have some sensual fun — is an adults-only resort a good idea?

• Would you ever go to an adults-only resort?
• Why or why not?
• Have you ever been to an adults-only resort?
• As a single or a couple?
• And … ????

Photo © Nathalie P – Fotolia.com

Sara looked annoyed when we met early for a hike yesterday morning.

“What’s with you Ms. Sour Pus? I believe I’m the one who got out of bed that had a lovely naked man in it so we can hike.”

“The month’s almost over …”

“I know! Where does the time go? It’s, like, almost summer.”

“… and I barely hit my quota.”

“Quota? At work? What are you talking about, girlfriend?”

“May is masturbation month.”

“I know that, but I didn’t realize we had to jack off a certain amount before the month ends.”

“You don’t; I do.”

“You’re not making sense.”

“I made a promise to myself that I’d masturbate at least four times a week this month because, well, because I just haven’t been feeling it lately.”

“Uh, what exactly aren’t you feeling?”

“Sexual. I’m just not that interested in sex anymore, and it’s freaking me out.”

Yeah, I’d be freaked out, too! No interest in sex, especially if you’re not married — not that being married should make you less horny but familiarity after 10, 15, 20 years does tend to put a damper on things. But for a single woman — an actively dating single woman — to lose her sex drive? What’s that about?

I’m sure men lose their sex drive, too, from time to time, although there appears to be a rash of men who are masturbating too much (which in a way could be good because it takes the pressure off of all those women like Sara who might need some sexual readjustment time). Still, a lot of women lose interest in sex for good around menopause, in part because our hormones change and it’s like fighting biology.

Of course feeling sexual isn’t just about wanting to have sex — it’s fantasizing and thinking sexually even if you don’t intend to act on it. And, for women, desire is so intertwined with intimacy — something single people don’t always have.

But to totally lose interest in sex — the best free entertainment/stress-reliever/intimacy-builder around — is scary!

• Have you ever lost your sex drive?
• How’d you get your sexual mojo back?
• Or, have you given up on sex?

Photo © painless – Fotolia.com

Sara, her new beau, and Sean and I had gone out to Rancho Nicasio to hear some music, eat and dance.

At one point I caught Sara watching Sean and me in a slow dance out of the corner of my eye.

“You guys are so cute together,” she whispered to me later at the table, when Sean went to the restroom. “When are you going to move in together?”

Good question, because I’m not sure we’re ever going to move in together. But certainly not now.

“I don’t know, Sara; not before The Kid’s out of the house. Plus, his kid’s at home, too, remember.”

“Oh, kids, schmids —That’s so old-fashioned. They know you two are sleeping together, right? So, what’s the difference?”

It seems like a pretty big difference to me. Living together when you’ve got kids is sending the wrong message — that marriage doesn’t matter.    

I know, I know — I’m divorced. If marriage really mattered to me …

No one goes into marriage expecting to divorce. But, marriage does matter, if you’re planning to have kids.

Marriage is under attack lately, perhaps rightly so given the insane expectations people place on it. Fewer people than ever before think it’s necessary. Let’s face it, marriage certainly isn’t for everyone. And people often get married for all the wrong reasons, and sometimes couples marry because they’ve been living together for a while and it seems like the next logical thing to do.

Often, it isn’t.

Couples who live together before marrying tend to argue more and communicate less. If they eventually marry, they divorce more often than those who don’t. Plus, they get fat, and that alone is reason to make me say, no way!

But it you’re going to have kids, it makes no sense to live together without getting married first. Shacking up is marriage lite, with all the daily annoyances and relatively predictable roles of marriage without the commitment. And if you think it’s any easier to split if things aren’t going great, well, just look at Halle Berry and Gabriel Aubry.

Scary.

And once you have kids — who’ve gone through the trauma of a divorce — it’s all the more reason to tread very carefully on mixing families. Yes, it sure would be nice to go to sleep and wake up next to Sean more often, and to feel more like a family (although we sure do like our “space”). But I’m aware of the message we’d be sending our kids, and it isn’t the message I want to send.

There are like 5 million or so couples shacking up nowadays, and a lot of them are probably like Sean and me — single moms and dads. So I’m pretty sure we’re the minority. But, I’m OK with that. Plus, there’s none of the real or pseudo “step” or “half” things going on — stepmom, stepdad, half-brother, etc. Or worse — “mom’s live-in lover.”

I’ll bet that’s why we’re still so cute together after all these years.

• Is it OK to live together if you and/or your boy/girlfriend have kids?
• Do you think it’s any easier to split if you’re living together with kids than if you were married?
• Did you live with a parent’s boy/girlfriend? How’d that work out?

Photo © Gorilla – Fotolia.com

“Do you believe in unconditional love?” Sara asked me as we sat in her hot tub the other night, a welcome respite in between the storms.

“Sure, for my kid.”

“But, what about for Sean, or Rob? Can you have unconditional love for your partner?”

“You should have it, right?”

“Should isn’t can.”

I could tell Sara had an agenda. “OK, what brought this up?”

“Remember I was telling you about that gal Candy I know?”

“Yeah, the waitress.”

“Well, yeah. sort of. Candy works as a waitress but she makes her living stripping. She heads to Vegas about every six weeks, does a weekend of pole and lap dancing and heads home with a wad of cash.”

“No way!”

“Yes, way. And your reaction is exactly the problems — it’s creating all sorts of issues in her love life.”

Well, gee, I wonder why?

She has no trouble meeting men and having sex with them, but it pretty much stops there.

Many men love looking at strippers, escorts and porn stars, and many might want to screw them like crazy. But how many guys (and to be fair, women) want to bring them home to meet the folks and live happily-ever-after with them — especially if they continue to strip? (let’s forget about Jesse James for now).

Wasn’t it Charlie Sheen who said, “I don’t pay hookers for sex; I pay them to leave”?

I’m sure there are many happily partnered people in the sex business. I have a feeling they don’t ask, “How was work today, honey?” But like in “Pretty Woman” (which I hated, BTW), the fantasy is that the hooker becomes a respectable lady when her “prince” rescues her. It isn’t that she continues to turn tricks at the Motel NoTell.

I know it’s usually women who marry hoping men will change, but in this case, I’d imagine most guys would want the little lady to stop parading around naked or having sex with other men for money.

But maybe not. Maybe that’s where unconditional love comes in — can you accept someone for who and what he/she is and does?

Including bumping uglies with other people for pay?

• Would you date/marry a stripper, hooker or porn star?
• Would you ask him/her to stop?
• Why wouldn’t you date/marry a stripper, hooker or porn star?

Photo © Tomasz Wojnarowicz – Fotolia.com