Are you dating down?
Sara’s cousin, Claire, was visiting from Austin so the three of us got cozy at the bar at the Buckeye last week.
“So, how’s the midlife dating thing in Austin?” I asked. “Isn’t Austin always on the best place for single women lists?”
Claire laughed. “Well, we supposedly have about 11 guys for every 10 of us, but just having a few more guys around doesn’t mean it’s easier.” 
“Has to be easy for you,” I said. Claire’s not only tall and pretty with a knockout figure, but she’s smart — a gynecologist with her own thriving practice. But at 43, she’s still single.
“Not quite.”
“You’re kidding! Are the men in Austin blind or stupid or both?” I said, but as the words slipped out of mouth, I was reminded of a cruel reality:
Being 40-something is a tough age for a single woman; they’re just too old to be cranking out babies and that eliminates many eligible would-be daddies.
“Yeah, but you’re always meeting guys,” Sara said, sipping her syrah. “You just need to stop dating down.”
“Like every other place, they’re intimidated by successful women. I’d probably have more luck if I were the receptionist at my office.”
And that’s probably true.
The drive that makes a woman successful in her career is often a turn off to guys. As my friend Dan says, a woman’s degrees and ambition are not aphrodisiacs.
Being feminine generally is.
Claire — successful and feminine — often finds herself attracting men who want to be taken care of in every way, including financially. She doesn’t mind sharing the monetary love, but it does create an imbalance in a relationship that most of us still seem to more comfortable with when it’s the man who’s more successful.
And all those uber-successful men don’t mind dating down because they don’t necessarily want that kind of equality a relationship; it can create power struggles.
It’s a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation for successful women.
Fortunately, I don’t have that problem — I’m not a successful woman! Although perhaps I just have a different definition of what “success” is.
- Do you date down?
- And, if you do, what are you really saying about yourself?
Photo © Angelika Bentin – Fotolia.com
He’s got game — video games, that is
I was a little lost looking up and down the aisles of Best Buy, trying to find the new PSP3 video game title The Kid asked me to pick up for him.
But as it turned out, my aging eyesight wasn’t being put to the test as much my ears. Nearby, I could hear a few guys discussing the pros and cons of various video games. I thought they were middle-aged dads talking about their teens’ gaming skills, until I gave them a good look — they were late-20- to early-30-somethings, max, too young to have kids indulging in the joys of the latest Grand Theft Auto.
I returned to my search, but I couldn’t help but think, “Dudes, aren’t you a little too old to be playing video games?” 
And then I thought of The Kid, who kills more than his share of hours in front of FIFA
Soccer 11 or the latest MLB or Madden title, and all of a sudden I had a freak-out moment — is he going to be a gamer past his teens? He wouldn’t be the only one. And, if I were dating someone like him — or the late-20- to early-30-somethings at Best Buy — how would I feel about it?
Would I want to be dating a gamer?
No. Well, I don’t think so, but I realize it’s not fair to say that; I’m not a late-20- to early-30-something woman who’s grown up with video games and all the other techno stuff we can’t seem to live without. Maybe it’s no big deal. Honestly — how different is it than blobbing out in front of the TV, which I did grow up with (although barely watch anymore). We Trekkies turned out OK, right? And, my boomer friends and I still play board games — Scrabble, anyone?
And yet, there’s something about guys sitting around for hours on end killing people or even just kicking soccer balls around that makes me pause; it seems childish, like guys are suspended in adolescence (not quite a child, not quite a man but a child-man).
Now, I love it when a guy is in touch with his boyish side, but I mean the playful, imaginative, dreamer side — not the boyish side usually portrayed in the clueless T&A-obsessed beer-soused frat boy flicks, the kind that thinks hours of Final Fantasy with a Halo- keg and pizza chaser is a good use of time. But I wouldn’t be dating those kinds of guys, anyway.
I don’t think video game playing is a threat to society — if I did, I wouldn’t let The Kid play them (although at this point, it would be one helluva battle to get him to stop!) I think checking your cellphone or Facebook constantly may be more threatening — certainly to relationships, and that happens a lot more with both genders and among all ages.
I would have no problem learning how to play FIFA Soccer 11 or whatever if it brought my kid and me together although I haven’t volunteered to learn nor has he asked; might be weird to bitch-slap Mortal Kombat‘s Bo Rai Cho with your Mom by your side.
Would I want to do that to be closer to my partner? Uh …
- How do you feel about guys playing video games?
- Is there an age when guys should stop?
- Is it any better/worse than TV watching?
- Do you kids play them, and do you place limits on time/violent titles?
You look good … for your age
Mia had a goofy little smile on her face when we met for coffee before work the other morning.
“What’s with you?”
“Nothing, why?”
“Did Rex rock your sexy little world last night? You look pretty damn pleased with yourself.”
“Oh, ha! No, this guy in my yoga class was shocked when he found out how old I am. He told me I look 10 years younger.”
“Well, you do. Yeah, when I told a gal how old
I was the other day, she said I looked great for
my age.” 
“Ugh, I hate that ‘for your age’ thing. It’s like such
a backhanded compliment.”
“Me, too. What exactly does my age look like?”
Do you know?
“For your age” is not something you hear when you’re in your 20s and 30s, the decades of youth and assumed beauty, although, honestly, I’ve seen a lot of not so-attractive 20- and 30-somethings.
Then, at some point around your 40s, you enter
that particular subset of beauty — the “for your
age” subset.
I suppose it’s a compliment, but again — what is
a middle-aged woman “supposed” to look like? Damned if I know, but I’m certainly not going to
turn to the world at large to help me figure it out.
Some women my age are wearing Lane Bryant
size 18s. They’re overweight and under-exercised, and they’ve let themselves go. Compared with them, you bet I look great! Is that what my age is “supposed” to look like? No thank you!
And then there are the women my age who’ve
turned themselves into living Barbie dolls, adding or subtracting body parts like Mrs. Potato Head, injecting chemicals and fillers to smooth, boost and erase, re-creating themselves into what they want to look like and not who they really are. Is that what my age is “supposed” to look like? God, I hope not!
OK, sure — there are many people who think those women look a lot better than I do. Maybe they do. But beyond my minor beauty sleights-of-hand — highlighting my hair (which is not permanent, BTW), a little lipstick, eyeshadow and mascara and keeping the aging wolves at bay by moisturizing like hell — I’m just not interested in putting my body through that.
And, I don’t think it even think it looks good. It looks fake.
I don’t have some secret-to-youth beauty routine. I don’t do anything extraordinary, certainly not anything expensive. In fact, I’m pretty shocked — and very, very thankful — that all those years of my “youthful indiscretions” and of blowing off my mom’s warnings about sunscreen and moisturizer before I got with the program didn’t damage me for good.
Perhaps my “looking great” is genetic. Maybe, I should thank my mom and dad although I didn’t think like that when I was younger.
I was part of the “hope I die before I get old” generation, so I used to look at my parents and think, “You’re just so old!” There was nothing about them that looked or acted youthful.
Yet when I looked through an album of family photos recently, I was blown away by one of my mom taken when she was around my age, maybe a few years younger. Her lips were lush and red, her tight shirt displayed her ample bosom and tiny waist, her face was vibrant and sexy. My mom was a babe! A middle-aged hottie. How could I not have seen that when I was younger?
I guess our vision of what middle age looks like is still being guided by our impressions from when we were young and flawless. We saw wrinkles, saggy arms, veiny legs. And, you know, most of us do start looking like that when we’re “old” old — although who knows if people in their 70s and 80s see it that way. I’ll let you know when I get there.
So, I’m neither flattered nor upset when people tell me that I look great “for my age,” whether they mean it sincerely or whether it’s a backhanded way to point out that I’m old … or at least older than they are. Instead, I just thank them.
Inside, though, I may snicker.
All that really matters is that when I look in the mirror, I honestly can say that, yeah, I’m looking pretty good. I care enough about myself to care for myself; how can I expect anyone else to care about me if I don’t do it myself? And, really, that attitude looks good at any age.
- How do you decide if someone looks good, or do you judge it by his/her age?
- Is it a compliment if someone tells you that, or …?
- What’s your beauty “secret”?
Photo © Angelika Bentin – Fotolia.com
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