介绍:
KIDS—OR LINGERIE?
"If you're Diane Sawyer, you'll always be able to get married," said George.
"But even women who are A's and A-'s can miss out. The problem is, in New
York, people self-select down to smaller and smaller groups. You're dealing
with a crowd of people who are enormously privileged, and their standards
are incredibly high.
"And then there are all your friends. Look atyow," George said. "There's
nothing wrong with any of the guys you've gone out with, but we always give
you shit about them."
That was true. All of my boyfriends have been wonderful in their own way,
but my friends have found fault with every one of them, mercilessly chewing
me out for putting up with any of their perceived, but in my mind excusable,
flaws. Now, I was finally alone, and all my friends were happy.
Two days later, I ran into George at a party. "It's all about having
children," he said. "If you want to get married, it's to have kids, and you don't
want to do it with someone older than thirty-five, because then you have to
have kids immediately, and then that's all it's about."
I decided to check with Peter, forty-two, a writer, with whom I've had two
dates. He agreed with George. "It's all about age and biology," he said. "You
just can't understand how immense the initial attraction is to a woman of
child-bearing years. For a woman who's older, forty maybe, it's going to be
harder because you're not going to feel that strong, initial attraction. You'll
have to see them a lot before you want to sleep with them, and then it's about
something else."
Sexy lingerie, perhaps?
"I think the issue of unmarried, older women is conceivably the biggest
problem in New York City," Peter snapped, then thoughtfully added, "It
provides torment for so many women, and a lot of them are in denial."
Peter told a story. He has a woman friend, forty-one. She'd always gone
out with extremely sexy guys and just had a good time. Then she went out
with a guy who was twenty and was mercilessly mocked. Then she went out
with another sexy guy her age, and he left her, and suddenly she couldn't get
any more dates. She had a complete physical breakdown and couldn't keep
her job and had to move back to Iowa to live with her mother. This is beyond
every woman's worst nightmare, and it's not a story that makes men feel bad.
ROGER'S VERSION
Roger was sitting in a restaurant on the Upper East Side, feeling good and
drinking red wine. He's thirty-nine, and he runs his own fund and lives on
Park Avenue in a classic-six apartment. He was thinking about what I'll call
the mid-thirties power flip.
"When you're a young guy in your twenties and early thirties, women are
controlling the relationships," Roger explained. "By the time you get to be an
eligible man in your late thirties, you feel like you're being devoured by
women." In other words, suddenly the guy has all the power. It can happen
overnight.
Roger said he had gone to a cocktail party earlier in the evening, and,
when he walked in, there were seven single women in their mid-to late
thirties, all Upper East Side blond, wearing black cocktail dresses, and one
wittier than the next. "You know that there's nothing you can say that's
wrong," Roger said. "For women, it's desperation combined with reaching
their sexual peak. It's a very volatile combination. You see that look in their
eyes—possession at any cost mixed
with a healthy respect for cash flow—and you feel like they're going to Lexis
and Nexis you as soon as you leave the room. The worst thing is, most of
these women are really interesting because they didn't just go and get
married. But when a man sees that look in their eyes—how can you feel
passionate?"
Back to Peter, who was working himself into a frenzy over Alec Baldwin.
"The problem is expectations. Older women don't want to settle for what's
still available. They can't find guys who are cool and vital, so they say screw
it—I'd rather be alone. No, I don't feel sorry for anyone who has expectations
they can't meet. I feel sorry for the loser guys who these women won't look at.
What they really want is Alec Baldwin. There isn't one woman in New York
who hasn't turned down ten wonderful, loving guys because they were too fat
or they weren't powerful enough or they weren't rich enough or indifferent
enough. But those really sexy guys the women are holding out for are
interested in girls in their mid-twenties."
By now, Peter was practically screaming. "Why don't those women marry
a fat guy? Why don't they marry a big, fat tub of lard?"
大家还在听
