Men and women view the maelstrom of dating through different eyes, I believe. Having spent years observing the reactions of both sexes, I can say they do approach the whole sensitive topic from different perspectives.
So claims Daniel Jones, longtime editor of the "Modern Love" column ("How We Write About Love"). When one has read multitudes of submissions, one can get a jist.
Women and men may feel love similarly, but they write about it differently.
A lot of men’s stories seem tinged by regret and nostalgia. They wish previous relationships hadn’t ended or romantic opportunities hadn’t slipped away. They lament not having been more emotionally open with lovers, wives, parents and children.
Women are more inclined to write with restlessness. They want to figure love out. Many keep mental lists of their expectations, detailing the characteristics of their hoped-for partner with alarming specificity and then evaluating how a new romantic interest does or doesn’t match that type.
They write something like, “I always pictured myself with someone taller, a guy with cropped brown hair and wire-rim glasses who wears khakis or jeans, the kind of person who would bring me tea in bed and read the Sunday paper with me on the couch.”
Men almost never describe the characteristics of their ideal partner in this way. Even if they have a specific picture in mind, few will put that vision to paper. I wonder if they’re embarrassed to.
. . . A woman is more likely to believe her romantic ideal awaits somewhere in the future, where her long-held fantasy becomes a flesh-and-blood reality.
A man’s romantic ideal typically exists somewhere in the past in the form of an actual person he loved but let go of, or who got away. And he keeps going back to her in his mind, and probably also on Facebook and Instagram, thinking, “What if?”
So women tend to be optimistic dreamers, looking forward as they mentally construct the perfect man, while men—with a distinct lack of imagination—opine over a known lost love.
Fascinating.
3 comments:
Have you heard of Mother Dirt products? Apparently they're getting quite popular. I'm not sure if I wanna try them though. Something about them seems scary.
Not too keen at the idea of spraying yourself with probiotics? We'll just stick to eating yogurt for now.
Haha. That was actually something that was mentioned. They were all like "10 years ago if we told you you'd eat yogurt with live cultures you'd have said we're nuts".
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