Attraction

I have always been fascinated by people and finding out their motivations for doing what they do. I do believe that's why I am so taken with the character of Bartleby in the movie "Dogma" - also a watcher.

I like to look at a couple and guess what the attraction is/was. Sometimes it's really obvious; most of the times it's a mystery. When I get to know the people better, I sometimes ask. The result of one of my queries is detailed below.

First there's the blonde thing. I don't know if that began with movie stars like Jean Harlow in the 1930s or if it began in the 1960s when music was enjoining everyone to be a California blond(e).

I believe the thin thing began when runway models became supermodels. Twiggy probably did more for diet products than any other marketing possible. We had a discussion on Ari Herzog's blog about young impressionable people and smoking. I think a lot of people are much more impressionable than most people imagine.

Then there's the women with wide mouths thing. Think about it for a minute. This was actually confirmed by my (now ex-)boyfriend, who was very candid about his reasons for being attracted to a woman. He, by the way, really liked Gina Davis - a thin, dark-haired woman with a wide mouth.

Men who are vertically challenged usually go for a woman who is shorter than he. The man in a couple I once knew said (when asked) that he had looked for a woman with long hair who really liked the Red Sox (the shorter than him I just inferred).

I replied that he was lucky, then, that he found (name of his wife). Everyone was shocked that I had said that; but what I meant was that he was lucky to have found a woman with long hair who liked the Red Sox who was also smart and funny, to name just two of her attributes that I felt merited more comment than the long hair and the Red Sox love.

A woman I once knew said what she loved most about the man she was about to marry was that he loved her so much. Needless to say, they are now divorced. When she finally grew up, she found someone who she loved for themself, not herself. I feel deeply for the ex-husband, although he should have seen that one coming.

A couple more women have told me that they like men who really love them, or who think they are great, etc. Conversely, my ex-boyfriend once told me early on in our relationship that he had me on a pedestal. I think the fact that I fell off the pedestal is one reason why I'm still here and he is not.

Is love really blind? Maybe.

A long time ago, when I was young and still living in Michigan, a woman I knew only slightly was telling me about the man whose proposal of marriage she had just accepted.

"He wasn't my type at all," she said about when she first met him. "But I thought 'what the heck?' I'd give him a chance anyway."

When I was young, and even now, I think of the physical "type" that attracts me as being dark haired and dark eyed. I also am attracted to high cheekbones, which makes Johnny Depp my perceived ideal. And I'm big on voices.

To the horror of my sister (the one who lives in Gloucester), I always loved the voice of Steve Perry, former lead singer of Journey.

Recently I confessed that not only did I like his voice, I also found him physically attractive. "It was bad enough you like his voice!" she exclaimed. "Now you're telling me you think he's attractive??"

Oops.

Both of my long-terms relationships, however, have been with men who had red or light brown hair and blue eyes. So there you go.