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Imagine, losing the perfect wife. Sometimes it's not until you've lost something that you truly appreciate its value, for as the old Jamaican saying goes: "Cow don't know de use of him tail until it chop off". That's why many people look on past relationships as being near perfect, and often make the mistake of trying to rekindle the old flames.
Well, nothing is really perfect, but try telling that to some people who spend forever searching, seeking, wistfully wishing for the perfect match-up to shed some light on their dark, dour, damned, dismal, desolate existence.
"So, how come yu don't have a man?" "Because I'm waiting for the perfect match-up, I know that it's in my future, that the perfect man is out there waiting for me." Well, they say that every hoe has its stick waiting in the bush, but the trick is to find that stick, for the forest can be a mighty big and perilous place, and by the time they pick, choose and refuse the pieces of sticks, twigs, logs and other detritus, they may just end up old, dull and rusty. I'm actually amused to see those TV commercials by e-Harmony, that internet dating service, that professes to find the perfect match-up for people, desperate people.
Apparently what it does is tabulate the data of thousands of people (make that hoes and sticks) and matches it up with the data of thousands of other hoes and sticks. After nuff computing, bits and bytes, nips and tucks, voila! the perfect match-up is made, and they live happily ever after.
My, my, they've certainly come a long way since the old pen pal. Apart from that, there are other types of dating services, plus the classifieds in the papers, where people tell glowing lies about themselves to other people who also tell lies about themselves, then they meet to form the perfect match-up. Usually when they meet it's, "But I thought you were taller". "Oh yeah, I thought you were prettier." Instead of painting that pretty glowing picture, why not just say, "Desperate, I need a man, any man, just write me quickly, please!"
The fact is, if they are as good as their ads say, there would be no need for the ads in the first place. "Tall, handsome, attractive, educated man, financially independent, seeks woman, must be pretty with big boobs." Yeah right, give me a break.
They say that if something looks too good to be true, it usually is. For this reason, many women I know shy away from these services, saying, "No sah, no way, that would make me look like I'm desperate." So they remain on the sidelines and try to find the perfect match up on their own. That's why some cultures save them the grief and match-up the children from birth.
I think it starts with the mothers who instill in their girls that they must seek out and have the perfect man, for the perfect match up. So the poor girl goes through life seeking this illusory creature, very much like the fabled unicorn, the Loch Ness Monster, or leprechauns for that matter. True, they may exist, but no one has actually seen one, but only heard of someone who has, plus, the quest is a lifelong endeavour, very much like those prospectors who spend a lifetime searching for gold. But still they seek.
The mothers try to inflict this on the boys too, as no girl is ever good enough for her son. "But Mom, she's pretty and has big boobs too, I love her." Hence the birth of mother-in-law jokes, which date back to the dawn of time. For the girls it's a never-ending list, starting with the cliché tall-dark-and-handsome crap, plus he must be prepared to treat her in the manner to which she was accustomed, to wit, spoil her just like her parents did. Women still seek that ideal, so pity the poor man who can't meet those lofty standards.
And if they can't find him, they manufacture him. I have always known of finishing schools for girls in Europe, where they are sent to fine-tune and polish up themselves in order to land a good man, but imagine my astonishment when I saw a boot camp for husbands. I don't make these things up, folks, but there is a boot camp for husbands in the USA that 'teaches men to be good spouses'. "Hey, wives, have you ever wished you could send your lovable slacker spouse to obedience school?
Have you dreamed of shipping off the sloppy, forgetful, insensitive couch potato for a few weeks and having him return as a combination of Johnny Depp, 'Mr Clean' and that hunky handyman at Home Depot?" That's how far women will go to find the perfect man, build him in a factory. I find it astonishing what women will do to find the perfect match-up, yet they do not take a long, hard look at themselves to see if they in turn are perfection for their intended quarry.
When you have a perfect man living with a harpy from hell, that is not the perfect match-up. When you have a good gracious, great woman cohabiting with a worthless brute of a man, you still have hell. So the trick is to match up the good woman with the great man. But even that is not guaranteed to work, as too much goodness spoils everything. If that wasn't the case, then every parson and his wonderful wife would live happily ever after, but we know how those stories go already.
Basically the ideal and the reality are poles apart as the criteria are so wide and varied. I did my polls, and almost all the women said that their perfect match-up should include a man who was kind, caring, loving, good provider, good-looking, treats her well, takes her dancing and be a good lover.
Now I ask you, where on this earth are you going to find any one man with all those qualities? Enter the above-mentioned 'husband boot camp'. It's what women want, and they make no bones expressing it all the time. The irony is, in the few times that these women manage to land such a man, this Adonis, this Greek god, this Achilles who is no heel, they somehow manage to still not find the perfect match-up, for catching and holding are two different things.
The reason is, women are basically never satisfied with their men and always demand more, even of perfection. My source is the many husbands I listen to and I keep hearing the same song: " Man, this marriage thing is hard work, and the harder I work is the more work she wants me to do." Now these words are from who you'd call good men, men who don't drink, don't smoke, don't go to street to look woman, hard worker, home at regular hours. You'd think that would constitute a perfect match-up and she would be happy.
Well, it don't go so, as the primal instinct of women is to always demand more, always more, and if the man doesn't live up, try to change him.
Reference again to the husband boot camp. So many husbands could not be wrong or be lying to me, so I stand by my findings. The worst thing that a man could do is get into a routine of goodness that a woman gets used to. He's what you call a dray horse -dependable, reliable, predictable.
At first she'll love that animal, but after a while the call of the wild will rise to the fore, and it's the whinny of the stallion that will attract her. And that's why women take lovers, but that's another story. On the other hand, the men who don't really seek the perfect match-up also have their problems. Basically, all a man wants is a woman who looks good, will have sex with him on demand and won't cheat on him.
Anything else is brawta. I do not hear men bleating and bawling that they can't find a good woman, or a perfect one for that matter. That quest for perfection always comes from the women, and if they can't get it, they try to change and mould their poor schmuck into the perfect man for the perfect match-up.
So achieving the perfect match-up is merely an act of domesticating the man, making him into what they think the perfect man should be. This reminds me of the movie, The Stepford Wives, where all the wives in the mythical town of Stepford were dutiful, obedient, perfect, willing women.
A man's paradise you would think, and made by a man. Irony of ironies, it was the brainchild of a woman, who wanted a perfect world. In her mind a perfect match-up is where the women cater to every need of their men. Hey, maybe she had something there, for if you recall, it was when women started working and gaining this so-called independence that marriages started to crumble.
So whadda you think, folks, is the perfect match-up women pleasing men, as in The Stepford Wives, the way it used to be in our forefathers' time, or should we have more boot camps for men, to domesticate them, make them perfect for these demanding women? More time.
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