January 29, 2009

• Young World

  He smelled kinda nice as he walked by  and sat in the chair next to me. Without thinking about it, I told him so. Kevin, my fellow tutor and likable pot head, chuckled as he walked by and said "She likes you man. She wants to date you." My Saudi Arabian student either hadn't heard him or had ignored his comment. He (the Saudi Arabian student, not the likable pot head) was sort of cute, in a young European-Saudi-Arabian-Fabio kind of way. He often tossed his long, dark hair out of his face, and his brown eyes were framed by long, dark eyelashes. He had a mouth full of very straight, very white teeth. And he knew he was attractive. He looked at me with those brown eyes as he faltered over his grammar homework, pencil hovering, looked at me as if to say "Come on woman, look at me. I am beautiful. This English grammar is silliness, and I am wanting the answer. You must give, yes?" I'd chuckle, and cajole him into using his pretty head to think. "Remember, the format is a form of the verb "go" + verb/ing right? So what do people do in sailboats?" He looked down and thought, and hemmed and hawed and finally, in English tinged with his Saudi Arabian accent he said "Go sailing?" I smiled. "Very good I said", and he smiled a self-congratulatory smile. And for a second I was transfixed, by the smile, by the smell (what was that smell?!) and I thought 'If only you weren't born in 1990...', shuddered, shook it off and went on about the business of tutoring.

  I cannot date younger men. My baby cousin, who is now not so much a baby as a very tall and handsome nineteen year old man but who I will continue to refer to as my baby cousin because I remember when he was four and couldn't say the word sheep correctly, was born in the same year as my tutee. Something about that is slightly icky. But that's not all. I think  I sometimes hesitate to consider dating a man when I find out that he is my age or even a little younger. One of my sister's male friends recently hit on me.  I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have dated him anyway (I mean, no hard feelings or anything), but then I facebook stalked him...er...found out that he was born in 1985 it was pretty much a wrap.

  I know I'm not all that old. I mean, 25 isn't like the 50 year old spinster down the street with 6 cats and a library full of deliciously old and well read books. Still, and no offense men, but it takes a minute for a man's maturity level to catch up to his age. I don't want to stereotype, and I know that there are tons of men (and women) who are wise beyond their age, and that age ain't nothing but a number (and a number of other trite statements regarding the nature of age) but sometimes you want someone who doesn't still chuckle at the word penis. Ok...fine I still chuckle at the word penis, but it's a funny word. All I'm saying is, there's a difference between someone in his early twenties and someone who has passed the ripe (not old) age of thirty. I've got to admit it. I have a thing for old men.

  At first I thought it was just a thing for old-er men. My ex was 3 years my elder, and when I met him I'd constantly make fun of him for robbing the cradle. I was 19. 22 seemed a tad old then. When I was in middle school I has a serious crush on my Math teacher, and I'm pretty sure he was old enough to be my father. Fast forward to high school when I discovered Mel Gibson (though, admittedly I'd seen him during his younger years in Mad Max and Lethal Weapon 1 and 2) and fell madly in love. When my ex discovered my crushes he told me I had a thing for old men. Not just older men, but old men. Men with gray hair. And pacemakers. Well, that last part was his exaggeration. I told him Mel Gibson was still fit and probably didn't need a pacemaker yet. But I do like a sprinkling of gray hair. It makes a man look sophisticated and well read, or at the very least like he spent some time in a library. That is a specious assumption, I know. After all, Rogue had whitish, gray hair, and we don't necessarily know how bright she was (though she did have a thing for Gambit so she must have been bright...mmm...loved the way he said "mon cherie"). Where was I? Oh. Old men. Yes, I kinda have a thing for them, except I've since stopped loving Mel Gibson (the apparent antisemitism and the extra oldness has combined to make him unattractive). I also have no idea where my middle school Math teacher is now, and I stopped liking him after I got that C. Math never was my strong suit.

  In any case, I have sort of dated an older man and found nothing amiss with the situation (I'm sure he didn't mind it one bit either) and though nothing on this earth will convince me to share that story, I will add that we didn't work out not because he was in his 30's but because of his insistence on being annoying.  The whole dating situation is still a bit of a mystery to me, but there are so many interesting things to learn as you go along.

  • 10:22 pm
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