Rob's World

Last week we learned that a male devoid of that personality trait known as charisma must devote a considerable amount of time to a multitude of pursuits designed to draw feminine attention toward his person.

Those endeavors may include:

1) Reading to make his every spoken word, should he have the opportunity to utter it, more meaningful.

2) Exercising to make his appearance, should anyone bother to examine it, more pleasing to the eyes.

3) Working overtime to advance in the workforce, thus granting him the appearance of stability.

4) Traveling abroad to ensure the widest range of persons, especially the feminine variety, may bear witness to his intelligence, good health and reliability.

And finally, 5) talking to women, to refine the utilization of each of these skills so that they are not lost any of his potential wives.

As one can see, it takes tremendous discipline and dedication for such males to compensate for their lack of charisma and achieve their goal, which is to acquire the elusive status of “happily married.” Just because it’s elusive, though, doesn’t mean it’s unreachable.

After pouring so much of his energies into this all-encompassing task, if he actually succeeds in becoming happily married by, say, age 30, he may have multiple decades remaining for which he must recalibrate his goals. Yet, old habits die in the most demanding of manners.

Reading time is likely to diminish when another person enters this male’s life, and much more of it is likely to be spent in trying to gain valuable insight into heretofore alien subjects, such as management of living space, preparation of food products and figuring out how the female you spend your life with thinks. The suddenly married uncharismatic male may occasionally feel pangs of longing upon hearing news of, for example, a stimulus bill designed to combat dire economic woes that’s struggling to make it through some manner of legislative body.

“Is something important happening in the government?” this once-well-informed, once-single and still-reserved male might say aloud. “I used to know about that stuff.”

Time spent exercising is also harder to come by when you have to plan time with someone else. Compounding this matter is the fact that the male suddenly has a wider range of dietary options given that he now shares his quarters with someone more astute as to the functions of the kitchen.

More food will seem, at first, a blessing until the passage of weeks and months reveals greater proportions once absent in his neck, face and central regions. Soon, what time is spent exercising will be used not to improve his appearance, but rather to keep the women in his office from saying things like, “He used to be cute before he got married.”

Working overtime becomes problematic for the married male once there is one, or perhaps more individuals at the male’s home expecting him to arrive by a certain time. Taking his work home with him is not a solution either, as those individuals will be expecting him to pay them no small amount of attention when he gets there.

A general tendency towards working later than others must be replaced by a system of instances carefully targeted to advancing one’s career. It is best for him to master this transition after marriage but before childbirth: If he does not, he runs the risk of having a Harry Chapin-esque song written about him, or at least dedicated to him.

Single males, both of the charismatic and reserved varieties, find traveling abroad a great way of boosting their overall impressiveness. Otherwise lifeless conversations can be injected with worldly suaveness with just five words: “When I was in Venice …”

After his wedding, the thrill of going abroad does not diminish. Marriage, however, brings with bills for rent, insurance, prenatal care (gasp), etc. Any married male who can see the full extent of the bills that come with marriage and still think Hey, let’s go blow $2,000 on airline tickets! deserves either sympathy or the bitterest of envies.

Then, finally, there’s talking to women.

Those men who earnestly seek marriage and eventually acquire it don’t count on the fact that talking to those of the opposing gender, including those they aren’t married to, never really loses its appeal.

One’s pursuits of the previous four goals may eventually net him “happily married” status, but even then there’s an instinctive urge to make others, especially female others, aware that one has read Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, can bench press his body weight and has been to Venice.

These instincts, after three decades or so of practice, may lead this uncharismatic male to happily married status, but still have their place in making friends, networking and in teaching your uncharismatic offspring how to live. The trick is to employ them in this manner, and not one that will cost you your happily married status, plus half your possessions in civil court.

Perhaps learning how to employ them in just such a manner is what the next three decades are for.