DEAR SUSAN: I’ve not been field-testing my dating wisdom this year. Too dispirited from an outbreak of shingles. I’m pretty well over it now; the days of looking like a zombie have passed. I remain wanting but still at a loss as to how to get a woman to take a more active role than acting as bait; I guess it’s become a pet peeve, and I’m overly sensitive to it. That, plus life at 70 doesn’t have me feeling much like bait! It’s a shame because I’m lonesome. But it may be time to accept that some things in life just didn’t happen. I can accept that, but it doesn’t bother me that much — and that worries me. Hard to tell if the little ‘wanting’ that remains is real, or just an old habitual wanting. — From the “Single File’ Blog
DEAR BLOGGER: This may/will sound corny, but the good way to remove those settled-in longings is to help someone else with theirs. (We all have them, only some of us — like you, my friend — are more upfront about them.) The very act of putting your arm around someone who’s hurting (physically or symbolically) does more to heal your own emptiness than you can imagine. In the book “On Caring,” author Milton Mayeroff writes, “In the sense in which a man can ever be said to be at home in the world, he is at home not through dominating, or explaining, or appreciating, but through caring and being cared for.” The very act of making room in our own deep needs for another’s is healing balm for the soul, blessing for the self. That inner wanting may just be an inborn part of the DNA that makes us human. We are all connected, you and I, and everyone who walks single file if only for a minute. Our humanness is our loneliness — and our salvation.
DEAR SUSAN: Your column dealing with women’s anger toward men inspired me. Anger is a people problem; why not admit it? Maybe men are fleeing the dating scene, but so am I. (I haven’t been out with a man in years). I was widowed seven years ago at 38, and the very few guys who have interested me were already married or engaged. Some men give up looking because of trying too hard to please; always trying to please isn’t a desirable trait. Sell your soul to someone and they lose respect for you. Get a life! I dated someone 12 years younger, and he got too comfortable too fast, ogling women on TV and making sexual comments. He kept calling and wasting my time, until I had to hang up on him. I think many times what men hate about women are the same things women hate about men. Example: both sexes want to know that someone prefers only them, no one else. Yet many of you guys are simply blowing your own horn, as if anyone will do. At work I hear older married men talk about younger girls with no respect for their wives. They act proud of this, yet their wives aren’t there to hear. Just as a man wants to be number one, a woman wants to be number one with her man. She shouldn’t have to constantly compete with every woman you look at because she’s dressed to go trick-or-treating. So, next time your relationship doesn’t work out, put your brain in gear before engaging your mouth or any other part of your anatomy. — From The ‘Single File’ Blog
DEAR BLOGGER: You (correctly) say that anger is a people problem, not restricted to one gender, but your contempt for men is very much a private hell that’s pushed you into a self-imposed isolation from the other gender. Simply because they are the other gender! Your words are spewed like vitriol, creating an aura that people can sense, and not only men feel the vibes; women can get the feel of your pent-up dislike for men, and not want to be with such a person. (Angry people can lash out at the most sudden moments, for reasons unknown. Not very pleasant company.) To have so much anger pent up in such a young person is awful — and sad. I don’t know your background, but a visit to a therapist might make a big difference in your everyday life, to say nothing of your social life.
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