Posted on 12/22/2005 8:37:43 AM PST by Sonny M
DEAR ABBY: Several of my friends and I were bemoaning our status as single women in our late 20s/early 30s, and discussing an article we had read in The New York Times about how smart women are less likely to get married. We'd all like to find Mr. Wonderful and be married. But if we have to curtail our professional success, financial wherewithal and IQ to do it, how can a person even begin to do such a thing?
I have a feeling you'll say to be ourselves and it will all work out, but thus far it has NOT worked out, and we're starting to worry. Personally, I think we'd be better off to take jobs as "administrators" in a large company somewhere and hope for the best.
Help, Abby! What's the answer for smart, fun women who have their acts together? How can we best poise ourselves to find true love while being true to ourselves? -- LOSING FAITH IN FINDING MR. RIGHT
DEAR LOSING FAITH: The truth is, there are no guarantees that ANYONE (male or female) will land a mate. It isn't easy these days because people are commitment-phobic. And this applies to individuals at all economic and educational levels, not just you at the top. Pairing off is often a matter of luck and timing -- being in the right place at the right time.
Eligible members of both sexes can be found in places of common interest -- places that are intellectually rewarding, culturally stimulating, athletically challenging or financially advantageous. As to whether you should downgrade your job level in order to appear less "threatening," I guarantee that if you don't take financial care of yourselves while you can, you will regret it later. To paraphrase Abraham Lincoln, you could fool some of the bachelors some of the time, but you couldn't fool all of them all of the time.
There are worse things than not finding Prince Charming, and one of them is spending your life pretending to be something you're not. So my advice is to stop reading defeatist newspaper and magazine articles. They'll only make you desperate, clingy and depressed -- and none of those traits is attractive to either sex.
DEAR ABBY: My husband and I recently had a baby. We chose a mature, Christian couple to be our child's godparents. However, my brother-in-law is infuriated over the fact that he's not the godparent. He has disowned my husband and wants nothing to do with us. Behavior such as this in the past is part of the reason he wasn't chosen. However, I need to know this: Did we have an obligation to choose him as a godparent? How should we handle his immaturity and controlling behavior? -- NEEDS TO KNOW IN OHIO
DEAR NEEDS TO KNOW: A godparent can either be a relative or a close friend, and you were not obligated to choose one over the other. Your brother-in-law may be hurt that he wasn't chosen, but his subsequent behavior has been so childish that it's apparent you made the right decision. The way to handle his immature and controlling behavior is to forgive him for it, and go on with your lives.
CONFIDENTIAL TO EDWARD PHILLIPS IN MINNEAPOLIS: Happy Birthday, baby brother! I hope you're enjoying your special day.
Exactly! We can thank Saint Joseph for this. He must have counseled young Jesus: "Learn a trade like carpentry, and you'll never go hungry!" ;)
OK - I'm not gonna sit here and argue with you about whether you're bitter... but I didn't see bitterness, necessarily, (what was reprehensible?) in the women who wrote that letter.
The trouble with all articles of this ilk is that getting married is a bit more complex that that. It isn't as if the average gal can say "Hm...I think *this* year, I'll get married, so I get that done at the right time while I'm the proper age and all!"
It just isn't that simple, especially in a world that doesn't value marriage. Conservative, marriage-minded men who want to support families and stay-at-home wives are at least as thin on the ground as conservative women who want to be good wives and mothers who put family before career. I realize many of these articles are addressing a different class of women, but the truth is, it isn't easy for anyone anymore. Unfortunately.
That'll get you nowhere fast.
Well stated. For those men who are upset that women would have a good job, I gotta wonder what they expect us to do until they come along - sit at home eating bon-bons?
I'd gladly give up even my dream job for a family...but I gotta pay the bills until then. ;-)
that is a great read...thanks
Backing quickly away from you. I don't want the fallout to hit me by accident.
That said, you almost sound like your describing a chief of staff type, which, I do kind of like.
I think the women who are complaining in this column, are misguided in that they are rationalizing the fact that they are snobs by blaming men and claiming they are smart.
In their case, its easier to blame someone else, then to admit to their own shortcomings, and easier to identify a strong point (as they see it) then acknowledge a weakness (their personalities).
I thought you were told not to come over here, Rosie...
It's just the same old crap. Don't bother wasting your time. But both of you had good responses. I can't imagine how bored I would be with a secretary job. Assume most girls don't get married at 17 any more (because how many guys are ready? Or are they supposed to marry 30 year olds?) we have to do something so why not be good at a job for a while?
"but I didn't see bitterness, necessarily, (what was reprehensible?) in the women who wrote that letter."
Really? Well, as I said to the girl at the video rental who commented that Glenn Close and Meryl Streep were her favorite actresses, "Men and women seem to be different in some ways."
To me, the comments of the first woman simply reeked of bitterness. And selfishness, and conceit, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
I think everything has pretty much been said earlier in the thread, and frankly I can't remember a comment above that I wouldn't endorse.
Depends on who you wish to believe..
GIS for Rosalind Franklin..
" Between 1951 and 1953 Rosalind Franklin came very close to solving the DNA structure. She was beaten to publication by Crick and Watson in part because of the friction between Wilkins and herself. At one point, Wilkins showed Watson one of Franklin's crystallographic portraits of DNA. When he saw the picture, the solution became apparent to him, and the results went into an article in Nature almost immediately. Franklin's work did appear as a supporting article in the same issue of the journal.
Seems she was given credit for her work.. In the same issue of Nature that published Crick and Watson's article..
Additionally...
" Rosalind Franklin applied her chemist's expertise to the unwieldy DNA molecule. After complicated analysis, she discovered (and was the first to state) that the sugar-phosphate backbone of DNA lies on the outside of the molecule. She also elucidated the basic helical structure of the molecule.
After (John) Randall ( King's college.. her boss..) presented Franklin's data and her unpublished conclusions at a routine seminar, her work was provided - without Randall's knowledge - to her competitors at Cambridge University, Watson and Crick. The scientists used her data and that of other scientists to build their ultimately correct and detailed description of DNA's structure in 1953. Franklin was not bitter, but pleased, and set out to publish a corroborating report of the Watson-Crick model. Her career was eventually cut short by illness." ( She died of cancer in '58, at the age of 37.. )
Who knows what she might have done if she had lived longer..
The point remains, Franklin did not feel she was "ripped off", it is feminist, revisionist history types that have made that claim..
Her work was recognized... and deservedly so..
"Conservative, marriage-minded men who want to support families and stay-at-home wives are at least as thin on the ground as conservative women who want to be good wives and mothers who put family before career."
One factor, I think, is that many such people get married fairly young and stay married. A woman who refuses to get married young misses those draft rounds and becomes a free agent.
Nah...I told myself not to come over.
I give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it... :-)
Read the letter again. It's just a chick who wants to know what to do to meet a man. She's read something (the MD article) that doesn't make any sense to her and she's asking Dear Abby. She's not blaming men, she's asking what SHE needs to do.
I'm available, well in a couple months, anyway. Must be pretty and have a dozer. Send pic of dozer.
This thread isn't good for any of us, I'm afraid :~D
What about those of us who absolutely didn't meet anyone who would have been husband material? See what I'm saying? It doesn't always happen. Period. And it's not a *refusal* to get married, though on these threads, it's almost always portrayed as such.
Mr. Right has no interest in MZZZZZZ. Maureen "WRONG" Dowd.
These women are not so smart. They have to look in the mirror to see why Mr. Right has no interest in ANYTHING they have to offer.
"Assume most girls don't get married at 17 any more (because how many guys are ready? Or are they supposed to marry 30 year olds?)"
Why not? They'd probably be at about the same level of maturity, and she'd still be young enough to have a good time with his life insurance.
Yeah you shouldn't be on here either.
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