romance à la Smallholder

Here's the half-remembered transcript of a phone conversation I once had with the father of one of my little brother's friends. The topic somehow got around to girlfriends. The last time I'd seriously dated was years earlier, in the mid-90s, back when I was living in Korea.

Mr. X: Got a girlfriend?

Me: Nah, not right now.

Mr. X (sounding remarkably Korean in his blunt rudeness): Why not?

Me (half-facetiously): Just looking for the right woman, I guess. I'm picky. Trying to be careful--

Mr. X (totally out of the blue): Yeah, and look where that's got you. No woman! No nothing! What a fine method, being careful!

[end transcript]

Here's the thing about Mr. X: he was married, but his wife ran away with another woman. Yeah, his method worked just fine, too, didn't it? Fucking dick.

The flip side to "he who hesitates is lost" is "look before you leap," neither maxim being any wiser than the other.

I'll make my own mistakes. Thanks, in the meantime, for the unsolicited advice.


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