Until I Get Married

Let’s resign ourselves to the idea all men care about is one thing. We know what that is, but we underestimate the extent to which it dominates a man’s thoughts.

Women get frustrated, not because they don’t think about the same thing. They most certainly do, usually when they are alone and bored. When with a man, especially a man they just met, they tap into a different part of their mind.

Even if she knows she wants to have sex with the guy, a woman controls her desire. She wants to talk about other things. The problem is these are things a man usually has no interest in talking about, like his five year plan or her five year plan.

No man wants to talk about that. Not on the first date. The first date may be too soon to talk about sex, but five year plans? Let us all do better and try harder.

Men and women are both guilty of having one track minds. Where we differ is the destination. Women want us to steer our minds in the direction they are going, but asking for such a thing is pointless because the whole reason we ask a woman out in the first place is because we want to have sex with her at some point.

Men don’t order meals they don’t want to eat, we don’t ask out women with whom we don’t want to have sex.

So this one track mind us men are guilty of having, we keep it under wraps, out of respect for the woman. The problem is waiting for her can feel like a daunting task if she does not do anything to hold our interest.

For far too long women have been told, “Make a man wait for it.” The problem is, they don’t know how to make a man wait without losing him.

Here’s the solution: Occupy that mind.

The length of time a man waits for a woman is directly linked to the length of time a woman holds his interest.

Women, you are interesting and the man you are going out with, there’s a good chance he is interesting too. He thinks about sex a lot, but there are other things on his mind, things like his career, his hobbies, his passions. Sometimes all these things are rolled into one, other times they are separate subjects. Either way he has them, and it’s a woman’s job to ask him questions about them.

The only thing men care about more than sex is themselves. We love to talk about ourselves because it is what we know best, and all men like like to sound smart. It does not matter if we are a financial analyst or the manager of an Applebee’s, keep asking us questions about something like the ins and outs of our job, and watch us go on and on about the foreign markets or what makes those skillets come out of the kitchen sizzling.

Another hard truth: A man does not want to get to know a woman until after she sleeps with him. Taking it back to the food analogy. We really give a damn what farm the steak came from, does it taste good? If it tastes great, then maybe we will ask our waiter where that beef came from, but not a second before we know if it is good or not.

In order to get to know us more, a woman has to ask keep asking questions until she gets to the “loose string question”.

The loose string question unravels all the details we are trying to hide about ourselves. Here’s an example of my own loose string question:

HER: What is your favorite football team?

ME: The Pittsburgh Steelers

HER: Aren’t you from California though?

ME: Yes.

HER: Then why the Steelers?

ME: It is a family thing.

The answer I gave just set up a multitude of directions we can go in from here. Here are some suggestions as to where she can go and my likely response.

THE WOMAN WHO IS NOT INTERESTING: Oh, cool.
ME: I’m not feeling well, I should go home.

THE WOMAN WHO JUST WANTS SEX: Real Steelers fans have Steelers sheets on their bed.
ME: My place. Now.

THE WOMAN WHO IS INTERESTING: My family roots for the Ravens.
ME: I hate the Ravens, but why is your family Ravens fans?

Notice how the last response has put me in a position where I now have to ask questions, which increases the potential for a whole conversation centered on something other than sex?

Look, ladies, thinking about something other than sex is not our job, it is yours. If a woman actually made herself interesting or took an interest in us in a way that does not scream, “I’M HOLDING BOYFRIEND TRYOUTS AND YOU’RE THE LATEST CONTESTANT” we would actually stick around for a very long time, even after she decides to give it up.

Now here is where people want to tell me everything I’m saying is wrong.

The reason we can wait is because we are sleeping with another woman. True, but I know for a fact, a lot of women can make a man wait because they are sleeping with another man. I have been the other man, I know these things. The question is, after we’re done sleeping with the other woman, why would we go back to the woman who is making us wait? Because she’s more interesting than the other women we have around.

Sex actually has very little to do with the results we seek. Whether we have sex quickly or we wait until the mythical right time, the only reason we stay, the only reason we come back is because we are interested in her and she is interested in us. She occupies our mind in ways no one else does.