Of Females, Women, Girls and Ancestors

Autumn leaves coloring the mountainside, football games to go to, and the return of a chill to the air—something about this time of year makes me really wish I had a girl to enjoy it with.

“This promotion throws into sharp relief that which I have not yet achieved: a marriage to a fine woman. You have become a fine woman, Elizabeth.”
“I can’t breathe.”
“Yes, I’m a bit nervous myself.”

I’m not sure what it is about autumn in particular. Stories always prejudice spring as the season when a young man’s otherwise boyish interests are turned to things romantic, but for me its always been fall. Maybe its all of the school years conditioning me into believing that this is the season for new faces and new friends—but then I’ve never met and dated a girl in the fall, so that couldn’t be it.

It may be anticipation for the holidays—I’ve always thought it would be tons of fun to have a girlfriend to enjoy the Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons with. I think a lot of it is feeling like I’m in a rush, like I’m trying to beat the clock and find someone before those fun holidays begin.

Maybe it’s the colder weather. A girl I over heard complaining one day a few years ago as I was trudging through the snow on my way to campus may have said it perfectly. She moaned, “It’s too cold to be single!”

I don’t always have girls on the brain—well, lets say, I don’t always have meaningful relationships with girls on the brain—so it’s ironic that the few times that I do, I look around and I don’t see a single girl who’s anywhere near what I’m looking for.

For you to understand my dilemma, I’ll need to outline a few definitions, because any fool could see that half the population I encounter on a daily bases are female, and of those a good portion of them must be eligible, right? Wrong!

First of all, let’s take the female gender. It consists of presumably half the human population. But the female persuasion consists of three subcultures—phylum if you will: females, women, and girls. Each single male unconsciously categorizes women using these groupings, but due to matters of personal preference, all bachelors do not necessarily categorize each woman equally.

Scientifically, female is merely the opposite of male. Webster’s defines female as “of, relating to, or designating the sex that produces ova or bears young.” But socially, a female is a narrower category consisting of any non-male who is unmarried, yet, for any reason at all, you (or I, mostly) do not consider as a potential mate. Sisters, widows, the homely, the socially awkward, the “too pretty”, the high maintenance, and those too young to take seriously are some of the many members of the female category.

A woman is any non-male, attractive or otherwise, who is married. Usually we unmarried men don’t distinguish women from females when we find the specimen unattractive. It’s the pretty ones, the ones we wouldn’t mind being coupled with ourselves, but are already spoken for, which we consciously identify as “women”.

And the rest are girls. A girl is any non-male to whom we are attracted to to the point that we wouldn’t mind sitting next to on a very crowded bean bag. A girl doesn’t achieve this status by looks alone, but looks are usually the most efficient means to that end.

With those three categories (female, woman, and girl) understood, I can more accurately explain my frustration. At times like this, when I am ready and willing to meat a girl I look around and all I see are women and females.

When a bachelor is on the prowl, he never even notices the female. On the romantic radar, females don’t generate as much as a blip—they are completely indistinguishable from males.

He always notices women, but the excitement of zeroing in on her as a target is squelched as soon as he gets close enough to see the ring or hear her annoying babbling-on about “my husband this” or “my husband that”.

So, come with me now into the cockpit of the fully trained lady killer. His fighter jet is equipped with machine guns, bombs, missiles, rockets, and a never-tiring radar system, set to detect even the faintest of frequencies. And although I find myself surrounded in the rush-hour of air traffic, none of the surrounding air craft show up on the radar as potential targets. Everything out there is either a male, female, or woman. No girls.

Enter my new singles ward.

“This is what I call a target rich environment.”

My new ward is brimming with attractive girls—and by girls, I mean “girls.” After months of no radar activity at all, you can imagine how relieved I was to finally be in a combat zone again—an area where my mad skills can be put to use (“mad skills”—I think that’s the term the young folk are using these days to describe a proficiency in something, be it dating, athletics, or otherwise).

Well, with these “mad skills” and my extensive knowledge of the female-woman-girl theorem, I figured it would be no time before this Top Gun had his first kill.

“If you think I'm going to Delhi, or anyplace else with you, THINK AGAIN, BUSTER!”

I’ve been going to this ward for several months now, and I’ve yet to get a missile lock on any girls. The problem is that in a ward that’s about 50 percent male, 35 percent “female,” and 15 percent “girls,” I’m not seeing any combat action because all the girls are already being pursued by other “friendly” aircraft (male competitors).

Each “girl” I’ve seen has been a disappointment. Some are disappointing because you think they’re “girls”, but their really just decoys—females in disguise (deceptacons, if you will). From a distance they seem to be “girls”, but when you talk to them, you notice they either have no personality, or a full-on peach fuzz fu-man-choo (there are things girls can do to get rid of those, right?).

The rest of the “girls”—the ones who haven’t disqualified themselves by either their lack of charisma or their over-abundance of facial hair, are the ones that really get my blood boiling (and I don’t mean that in a hormonal way—goodness knows I wish I did). These “girls” are the ones that would make wonderful targets for a pursuant such as myself (an F-16 Fighting Falcon with all the highest technology and training available to a combat aviator), but for some reason or another they give themselves up to engage not a fighter jet, but that silly by-plane crop duster. Sure he’s got a nice paint job on his little propeller rig, but were you really so desperate for some combat that you are allowing yourself to dog fight with Orville Wright?!

Okay, aeronautical analogies aside, I’ve been very frustrated of late to see cute girls who I’d love to meet and find out just how nice, and fun, and funny they are, but each one of them is draping herself over this chump, or is scratching the back of that low-brow.

Isn’t there a girl out there with enough dignity and self worth to 1.) wax off her transparent mutton chops, and 2.) exercise enough self control and selectiveness to wait for a decent guy to come along? Every non-male I encounter is either unappealing to me, married, or already committed to some guy who is either enjoying his flavor of the week, or batting WAY out of his league.

Even when surrounded by attractive girls, I’m not finding any that I like, and it’s a very frustrating thing.

I recently read an article about a university professor’s book, which examines the gender ratios in China and the dangers adherent to the lack of balance in those ratios. “According to the study, about 97 percent of all unmarried people age 28 to 49 in China are male.”

This professor says that throughout Chinese history, the government has delt with this excess of single young adult males by sending them to war or expelling them. “In all cases, the goal of the government is to get rid of them, either by sending them away to distant regions or by giving their lives in a patriotic cause.”

“If they’re going to die, then they’d better do it, and decrease the surplus population!”

Perhaps my dilemma would be lessened if there were just fewer males to compete with, but since I can’t control the population or expel my peers from the country’s boarders, I’ll have to find some other way to vent my frustrations.

“Oh, he's a ring-tailed roarer and tough old aligator. Oh, he's a hound-nosed bully and a real de-populator. Oh, what a fightin’ devil. He’ll spit right in your eye. He’s gonna live forever, born too mean to die.”

The article identifies young single men as “much more likely to be more violent than married men.” And the professor is quoted as saying, “Cross-culturally, an overwhelming percentage of violent crime is perpetrated by young, unmarried, low-status males.”

“You like osso buco, Charlie?”
“…”
“Hmm, it’s closed.”
“You know, Neil's a really good cook.”
“Yeah, and you should see him walk on water.”
“You don't like him very much, do you Dad?”
“Sure I do, I was just kidding around. But there's just something about him that makes me want to...”
“Lash out irrationally?”
“WHERE did you hear THAT?”
“From Neil. I learn a lot from him. He listens to me.”
“Yeah, and then he charges you for it.”

So, apparently, the result of silly “girls” making hasty decisions about whom they date will result in me losing my composure and slipping into a low-status life of crime and violence. Gee, thanks, ladies.

Finding the right girl seems so out of my control. Sometimes I think its best to try really hard—to go out and meet new girls and to spend a lot of time and money on dating. Other times I think its best to just do my own thing and just be myself and eventually the right girl will come along—but after four years of post mission “taking things seriously” life, I’ve found that there is nothing, big or small, that I can do to meet her. It’s completely out of my control.

**************************** Disclaimer ****************************

The remainder of this entry is a little sappy and pretty religious, so if reading it would either offend you or cause you to lose respect for me, you are invited to quit reading now.

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Jack Marshall, an LDS Institute of Religion instructor, recently spoke at BYU’s Education Week. I saw a few minutes of his address while flipping through the channels a few days ago. One thing he said struck me—I don’t have the direct quote, but his concept was essentially this: the more interest we take in and work we do for our relatives who have passed beyond this life, the more assistance we receive from them in the things we struggle with.

To understand what he’s saying, you’ve got to understand a bit of Mormon doctrine: much of what goes on inside those beautiful, yet closed-to-the-public Mormon temples you see, is work for the dead. Don’t start thinking we go around robbing graves and throwing holy water on the corpses to ensure their salvation! In the temple, I can be baptized in behalf of (or as proxy for) say, a great, great grandparent, who never had the chance to be baptized in this life.

Marshall’s point was that they are waiting eagerly for us to perform this work for them, a work which they are incapable of doing themselves (baptism being a corporal ordinance, meaning it can only take place on earth, by someone with a body), and that if we help them with things they can’t do for themselves, their assistance will be evident in those areas of our lives with which we struggle or stress over, yet that we are seemingly incapable of doing ourselves.

And you don’t have to be Mormon and go to the temple to qualify for this help. I believe that it’s enough if you just research and find out who your ancestors are. Do some family history work; try to accumulate a record of names that link an unbroken chain from you to your parents, to their parents, to theirs.

Being a temple attending Mormon, I feel like what this drives me to do is to not just show up to the temple and do the work for the names of people they have on file (people I have no relation to), but do my homework, find out which of my relatives are still waiting for this or that ordinance, and invest some interest, some time, and some work in someone who, from beyond the grave, has some vested interest in my future and well being.

Its been proven to me time after time, busted relationship after busted relationship, and fruitless encounter after fruitless encounter, that romantic success is way beyond my control, and that no measure of effort by me, my friends, or well-wishing living family members is ever directly related to any rendering of achievement in said field. But perhaps its not beyond the control of those angels (deceased family members) who know my name and could work their magic from behind the veil.

“SAINTS ALIVE! Dad, we thought you were dead!”
“I was, I came back to tell you something... you're an odd one, boy.”
“You came back to tell me I was odd?”

On my mission, my buddy Elder Puckett and I used to joke that every time you pass someone on the street, your deceased relatives and theirs would look down from heaven above and be simply beside themselves with frustration, because they had been working for years to arrange everything to set it up so you (the missionary), would encounter that stranger and teach him the gospel so he could eventually go to the temple and do the work for those very souls who had worked endlessly to bring the two of you together. Perhaps it has been several generations in the works, both families working to get you into the church and on a mission, just because they new that on May 19th, 1999 they could foresee that you and their relative would be walking down the same side of Pennwood Avenue. But in one brief moment of shyness, laziness, or carelessness, you let that stranger and all those generations of effort slip away.

That might be a little extreme, nevertheless I do believe that those who have gone before us still exist and are still looking out for, and working for our best potential.

What if we turn our focus to them and they turn theirs to us… then maybe that cloud nine we hope to reach with “the one” isn’t too high to reach after all.

“Once I get you up there where the air is rare a find, we’ll just glide starry eyed. Once I get you up there I’ll be holding you so near, you may hear angels cheer ‘cause we’re together.”