Festival season is hunting ground for 20 something singles (not a necessarily criteria) around the world. I was out and about with a mixed group of friends in the wilderness previously known to us all as ‘Durga Pooja’ when I heard the phrase.
Whatever happened to all the good looking warm men?
Obviously recounted by a female peer of mine. It got me to thinking about desired traits in human matchmaking. Most Indians have at some time or the other glanced at a matrimonial classified (same goes for matchmaking services/websites elsewhere) and the ridiculous pursuit of various ‘virtues’. The way I see it people are always looking at grass on the other side that’s not really there at all. In other words there is no such thing as a perfect match. I concede that the good parts may outweigh the bad in many cases, but the dark underbelly of a relationship is never for the public eye to see.
Getting back to the point in contention where did they all go?
- They got married (that would still not explain disappearance)
- They aged horribly into their late 20s and hence fail on the first count
- They lost vitality and enthusiasm as they aged and hence fail on the second count
Beauty is a commodity distributed evenly enough so I’ll wash over that part. I’d like to think that the second adjective in discussion is due to changing/changed perspectives.
When I was in school there was never a dearth of people to meet and most had been on the same beaten path as me for most of their lives. This would include similarities in interest and sensibilities of acceptable human behaviour. As I moved into my mid 20s I saw that there are many other kind of people who do not match the traditional definition of ‘warm’ that I grew up with but each and every single one has a set of moral and egotistical peculiarities. At the end of the day every human requires justification to self for actions taken. A select few do wallow in self-pity and playing the underdog for most of their lives, but as for the rest of us, we have it ingrained to behave in a certain way. This makes people wary of going outside the inner circle of people since outsiders do not play by the same rules.
Polygamy(either sex) is not unheard of but unacceptable in a prospective match by my moral make-up. Similarly there would be other things (can’t think of one right now) that I may consider perfectly normal and may not be acceptable by others. The most important thing here is an understanding that the other person is different but not necessarily immoral by their rules. I notice people making their circles smaller and smaller in the absence of this understanding. For example: If a person got a make-over(lifestyle wise) that does not make them a bad person. On the contrary it makes them proactive in expanding their circle. But a lifestyle change also means a new set of friends and new interests. Old acquaintances often view this as betrayal and make their circles unnecessarily smaller.
Where are the Good looking warm men(and women)? They are as present as they always were. It’s the way you look at the world that makes them visible.
