Some of em can be shy, or just very wary. Just don’t chase them too hard or they’ll run away screaming.
See my problem is I spend such a long time getting to know a woman and becomming friend before I ask her out she seems to get a boyfriend. But I suppose if I have a chance to be a friend for someone I care about or run into the ‘i’m seeing someone’ I’d rather be their friend and at least be around them to some degree rather than not at all.
I may have no gaydar, but damnit I have a scary woman sense.
Bingo! I have the same problem. The more I do it, the more I realize that this is just not a good procedure. Do you know how many girlfriends I have gotten from this process? Approximately two. Yep, two. I’m gonna have to try out a new system because this one ain’t cuttin’ the mustard, that’s for sure.
So far, I’m always just a permanant resident of Friend City.
I have a book on my shelf that is round-aboutly pertinent to this whole conversation: the romance of the Wild Lover, sexuality, fantasies, et al: The Erotic Mind by Jack Morin, PhD.
One of many very worthwhile points that he makes is that we all have masks that we wear, for necessity or for enjoyment. I do enjoy the bad boys, but I definitely don’t need them. I have matured enough to realize that, in truth, I only want the mask, not the reality. I am not so much in the minority that there can’t be men out there who have realized the same thing. I know full well that this is - now - only a mask I wear, to be the bad girl. I do it well, but when the mask comes off, THAT is the real me. And it is that ability in a partner that I seek.
As for the question of how do you know before you get burned? I know what to say to that: Trust your instincts, and (again) to thine own self be true. And I know all too well the 20/20 hindsight that says “I knew that! and damn it, I ignored it!!” In all honesty, your instincts can only help you when you listen to them. And when you feed them the info to act on in the first place. I think, though, that many of us only make a particular mistake once. I have made many in my life, but rarely repeated the ones I learned from. Mind you, those were painful lessons.
Oh, and Bad Hat? I’m doing very well, thank you. And you?
Another reason why sometimes the “nice guys” aren’t the most appealing; they’re a bit on the socially awkward side!
I’ve now been out with Nice Jewish Boy twice; in addition to being a little rumpled in the clothing department, he’s kind of nervous in his interactions, at least with me. He comes off as extremely awkward…not that I’m wishing he would “put out” more, but when we were out last Saturday, and the bouncer seated some extra people in our booth because the place was crowded, he was practically falling into the aisle in his attempts to scootch far enough away from me to keep his personal space margin at whatever level must have been comfortable for him.
OK, apparently he was interested enough to ask me out a second time (and since then, a third time), but why the nervousness? For chrissakes, I’m not going to dissolve if he accidently bumps my knee or something!
Oh well, time to call some of the other respondents from my Reader ad. Nice Jewish Boy is still nice, but I’m not dying to see him every minute, and somehow doubt I ever will.
“Nice” boys learn not to be forward sexually, 'cause that’s only what sexist, objectifying “Bad Men”[sup]TM[/sup] do. “Nice” boys won’t try to push any kind of physical contact, lest the woman think he is just trying to cop a feel, or is being too forward. “Nice” boys need women to take the first step, and every step, so they know that they’re doing what she wants, and not just ignoring her to fulfill their own needs. Until the “Nice” boy is scootched up to by his date a few times he’ll be timid to try anything so forward, but after two or three times he’ll feel confident that he can then scootch up to her on future engagements without fear of being thought a “perv.”
I am a recovered bad-boy, who became too-stable, but now is stable and remembers the fun of being a bad boy, without being mean (RBBBNSRTFOBBBWOBM).
I went through the whole love myself thing and became comfortable with myself… but now the problem is that I have an invisible sign on my forehead that is apparently only visible to pan handlers and closet psychotics…
It’s nearly predictable that when a full moon comes I get a couple messages from some exes who are dipping their toes in the water… I’ve learned not to reply to them, it only creates headaches…
I’ve got one now who can put on a show and a half for the make-up part of the “break up to make up” game.
So, for whatever it’s worth, I’m taking stock that there is a stable woman out there, who likes to have fun, but knows how to return the nice treatment… actually, I’m hoping there’s another one out there – I dumped the first one when I was a wild boy…
Meanwhile, I think the psychos have radar – they seem to know when other ones are calling, and they all start to call. It can’t be anything else, because they are in different states from each other, but they all seem to start calling around the same time…
Someone made a comment about the girls wanting a nice guy once they are ready to settle down, but I think that is the problem in itself – if I look at my own life, I kept telling myself that’s what I would do – find one of these nice girls once I wanted to settle down…well, when I got ready to settle, all I seem to find are the psychos who act like I used to…
It’s nice to know that there are more of us in this boat than me…
Eonwe, FTR, I am 33 yars old, and Nice Jewish Boy is 36. I, at least, have certainly been romantically involved with nice boys, one of them for nearly three years; it took over a year of us hanging out (including sleeping over at each others’ houses) for him to make any sort of move. So I am quite familiar with Nice Boy patters of initiating physical contact (or not, as the case may be).
This situation, however, was so weird and awkward, it was almost funny. (I had to suppress a giggle as he literally almost fell into the aisle.) Who knows, maybe he was thinking all sorts of lewd thoughts and thought I could read his mind, but in that case he was certainly overcompensating by lack of contact.
I’ve felt less awkward with total strangers in an elevator. Heck, I felt less awkward at age 17 during my first pelvic exam. It isn’t just physical contact that’s an issue, either; I can’t seem to get him to look me in the eye when we’re talking, even with an entire cafe table safely inserted between us. It’s really sort of off-putting; even if it’s just perception, in the beginning of any acquaintanceship, espeially dating, perception might as well be reality.
So I think I’m going to throw another guy or two into the mix; after 2 dates, it’s not exactly cheating, right? I went out with Guy #2 on Saturday, and we talked for 6 hours on the phone and in person, and I felt no awkwardness whatsoever. But the jury is still out on Nice Jewish Boy.
My current SO was not QUITE this shy – he did kiss me, on the lips, on our first date – but I did notice that at first it helped a lot if I took the intiative, particularly when it came to when we first had sex. (To be fair, it was going to be my first time, and he didn’t want me to do anything I wasn’t ready for, though he was more than happy to oblige when I said I was!)
I’m much more interested in stability and security than huge emotional ups and downs, and I’m 26. We’re out there, guys.
And he’s a genuine Nice Jewish Boy. Though a little more socially capable than the one in the OP.
TalkingHead, yes, it is the full moon. And yes, fully recovered wild ones do tend to have psychophile vibes. I never was stalked so much as a wild child as I am now I’ve reformed. But hey, answering services are marvellous screening devices.
Eva Luna, there are more fish in your in-box than a guy who is too nervous to sit on shared furniture. There just is.
And to Lok and Jackelope, I have nixed further family intervention in my private life. Everyone who has ever asked me when I’m getting married has received the exact same response: “Well, truth is, Grandma, I’m so helplessly in love with you no mere man (other man in the case of a male relative) stands a chance.” I used this on a female second cousin who was marrying for the first time at 35, when I was 29. That whole branch of the family is now truly convinced I am a lesbian. Not that there’s anything wrong with that; it has certainly ended the interrogation.
While there is not anything wrong with it, my family has already decided I was gay once. And they were wondering if they should set me up with some guys. Thank ghu I started seeing someone before they actually got around to doing that. :eek: Too bad it didn’t last longer.
The nice guys just gotta wait until their ‘30s, when womens’ biological clocks begin to clang, clang, clang in their heads. The nice guys might actually start looking fuckable.
My family doesn’t think I am gay but at a recent friends wedding his family and the photographer did!
I am 25 and went out & was engaged to a “nice guy” for almost 4 years and he was very very shy about the whole phsyical contact thing if we sat next to each other and legs touched he would spring away from me. In the end he decided I wasn’t exciting enough (this from a man who wouldn’t go to anywhere new as he just ‘knew’ he wouldn’t like it but that is a whole other topic…)
I am still looking for nice guy as wild men scare me. A lot. But all the nice guys I meet are either friends or are taken or aren’t interested in nice stable women as they only want some seriously deranged lunatic as they would be exciting. Don’t get me wrong I’m not boring (at least I don’t think I am ??) I love to have fun and I did go through a (very) wild stage at university when I did attract the occasional nutter but who doesn’t and frankly now there are other things to do.
Can’t find a cite right now but somebody did a survey of American women. Actually they did two surveys. Equal number of comprable women in both groups. One group was asked to name the #1 thing they looked for in a date. The other group was asked the #1 thing they wanted in a husband/long term SO. The researchers then compared the two lists. There was no item in the top ten of the first group that matched any item in the top ten of the second group and vica verca.
I can’t find the list right now but the date list included things like exciting, mysterious, strong, etc and the husband list included things like stable, honest and sensitive.
In other words women are selecting men to date that they would never want to be married to.
I was always the one the women would come to after they were done with their “fun dating” phase. So they would date variations of “Mister Danger” for a while then tire of it.
It always seemed like three dates with me and they were knitting booties.
-Belrix (who always wanted to be “dangerous” but had to settle for “nicely geeky”)
Hehehehe… “psychophile vibes” – you speak from experience… too bad that wasn’t us in the phone booth – we’d have had every psycho in the 10 mile radius jealous
It’s not so much ignoring the phone and letting it go to answering machine, it’s the IMs. Perhaps I’m not too well reformed because I still find it hard to ignore them over IM…
The Question
What the heck do these people see in us that they have to come around… I mean it’s amazing to me that it’s so consistent that if I walk into a room and there is a psychopathic mess in there of the female gender, she feels a need to come over and unload her life story on me…?
It sort of cramps the ability to find others in the room who may be normal…
Enlighten me – you sages of the woods.
TalkingHead (who seems to be stuck in the forest of needy souls)
So where are all these nice guys in their 30’s? Please, send them my way! But then, I always thought the nice guys were fuckable, provided they had decent personal hygiene and social skills.
There IS hope, though; I have a date tomorrow with Dude #2, the second Nice Guy from my ad. Unfortunately, he has the same first name as Nice Jewish Boy (darn Old Testament!) so this could get confusing very quickly. Wish me luck!
When I was in junior high, I thought “bad” guys were so cool. I don’t know why; maybe it was the excitement, or that they were better looking.
Now that I’m out of high school, and after having ben treated badly by said bad guys, I leanred my lesson and will force myself to get to know nice guys.
Most women, it seems, want the “falling-in-love-at-first-sight” deal.
This usually only happens with “bad” guys.
You gotta get to know him a while, then , if romance happens, at least you know he’ll treat you good.
I’m glad I’m not the only one this happens to. All the nice guys I meet are either married or only interested in the women with lives that take “completely fucked up” to new, physically and psychologically dangerous levels.
