Derailed Thoughts

If you ask any girl, she’ll be happy to tell you how much harder dating is for her team. “How in the world,” she’ll ever-so-swiftly point out, “would you get a girl to go on a date with you if you weren’t allowed to ask them out? Not only that, but you’re not allowed to show too much interest–you’ll scare them off! Guys are baffling. They seem interested one night and then disappear. They’ll put their arm around you one night, then won’t call again for a month.”

Talk to any guy, though, and you’ll hear an equally already-thought-about-in-previous-frustration-style rebuttal–”There is no way that your way can be harder. Sure, you don’t get to pick and choose who asks you out, but at least all you have to worry about is picking out of those who finally show up. For a guy, not only do you have to get a girl interested, plan a good date and move the relationship along at the right speed; all the while, you have to try to guess if the girl you’ve met is interested or if she’s just a flirt!”

I’ve come to a conclusion–dating may look like the same sport for both sides, but it is far from it. Women are fishers, men are hunters.

Women Are Fishers

Some women are good at their sport, others are not. Neither of them, though, has the ability to force a fish to bite. Each of them goes fishing looking for a very specific kind of fish. Every other fish will be thrown back (usually with a hole in their face or something… not a very friendly sport for the fish).

You might have noticed that there are some girls that just kind of ended up with the right bait. They catch everything. All they have to do is go over near a fish and they bite right away. Heck, sometimes their bait even works on frogs and other weird animals that shouldn’t even be looking around the lake anymore. Maybe they have to beat off a confused moose or two. Their trial (granted, I don’t think it counts as much of one) is having to throw back a couple thousand fish before they find one that they want to keep.

Others just never quite got the hang of fishing–they’re too noisy in the boat, or maybe they make it too obvious that there’s a hook in the bait. Some of them aren’t committal enough; they send their line into the water with no hook, never taking a single step to snag even the most interested fish.

For the majority, though, it’s just a long day of fishing. Watch for a good looking fish, throw in your line, and every once in awhile they bite. Most of the time, the fish looked a lot better when it was underwater with all its friends. So, you toss him back and keep fishing. Eventually it works. Til then, though, the boat can get pretty old.

Men Are Hunters

And not just any hunters, either. They’re really, really blind hunters. We spend days carefully following a target that looks good but usually end up confused, swearing we’ll pay more attention before the next time we shoot.

Like fishing, there are men that are good at the sport and there are those that are bad at it. You’ve seen the goofy guys that come out hunting with 16 inch subwoofers. There are a few deaf pigeons that hang out around those guys… for the most part we just let them do their thing. Then there are the guys who are too timid to commit–they shoot BB pellets that do nothing but confuse and annoy the animals. Being good at the sport can be a dangerous skill–some are out just for the kill. They shoot whatever they can get and then leave the poor creature there wondering what happened.

I think that most men, though, are hunting the right way. They’re careful, watching only for the right animal. It’s true, they make mistakes. Every once in awhile they fire too quickly, finding out later that they should have thought things through. Eventually, though, their long hunting trip ends up alright.

Another Bold Heading Just Because

I don’t think either side has it harder. Pretty much, dating is just a dang hard sport for either. Sitting in a boat for a long time can make you crazy, and I don’t think anyone likes wearing those bright orange pants for hunting. Wait…

Anyway, there is one problem with my analogy. In both situations, the targeted animal ends up dead. I’m not a fan of that. I suppose some people end up dating axe murderers, but for the most part I think my analogy falls apart right there.

In conclusion, may we all come out of this with the least possible number of hooks stuck in our eye and accidental gunshot wounds. Hopefully, the hunting trip will only require one standard size cooler, and the friends that we brought along won’t be PeeWee Herman or the Cookie Monster. Hopefully, I will end up some day in a happy little goldfish bowl with a nice view (as seen above).

Too much analogy for me. I’m gonna go eat some macaroni.

Symbolic macaroni?