manslations

I often hear how difficult it is to read a man when first dating him. What is he thinking? What might he be thinking? Why is he behaving this way? Why didn’t he call me? His MySpace picture is a photo of his dead mother, IN HER COFFIN* – what’s that about?

Contrary to popular opinion, male dating behavior is about as mysterious as a plate of scrambled eggs. And treating the above questions as if they are entirely different questions would be like saying, “Ok, I’ve had scrambled eggs before, but at a totally different restaurant! How did those eggs get here in THIS restaurant?!” There’s a chicken, there’s a chef…some other stuff. Ok, that’s pretty mysterious, I’ll grant you that one. But male behavior? Not so much.

I can tell you how to interpret a man’s intentions toward you in 2 questions. If you can answer the 2 questions, you’ll know…well, you might actually know more than HE does about himself.

I’ll illustrate with a Manslations request I received yesterday:

Ok so a couple of months ago I went out with a guy and I had one good, fun date (me kissing him, flirty text messaging post date), and one awkward date (I kissed him and he didn’t walk me to subway) and then he never followed up, so I followed up and 2 weeks later he gave the “sorry I was out of touch, how are you” kind of response. I responded, without your keen guidance, a little pissed, with basically “hey I didn’t think you were interested, but I am well…” He never emailed again. I was looking to see him step up to the plate and well he didn’t.

But in lieu of the crappy dates I have been on lately I thought about our first fun date and thought maybe I was too tough on him too soon and thought I might try again. Conveniently recently his boss died and I saw the obit so being a conniving girl I thought I would email my condolences. He sent me promptly a thank you and a “how are you.”

What should I say?

-N

First of all, I love the awesome false pretense email at the end! Love it. I’d do it every day if I could. I don’t remember having actually used someone’s death as a pretext to try to get a date, but I wish I had.

That said, I think this guy likely isn’t worth the trouble. Given the information that she gave me, he was never very interested in dating her. If it’s any consolation, it doesn’t sound like she’s all THAT interested either. Wanting to go out with him because of crappy dates with other dudes is not exactly the stuff of Molly Ringwald movies, you know? I’d say she should keep looking for somebody she likes better.

Now, how can I say that? Is it because I’m brilliant? No, my brilliance is merely incidental here. Is it because I’m adorable? Also unrelated. But with the 2 big questions, I can tell you that he was maybe interested in sleeping with her, probably NEVER interested in dating her, and then gave up after a date and a half.

Here are the 2 questions.

Ready?

Wait…are you sure?

Because…I know that sometimes the drama is half the fun for you ladies. All the angst, the aching, the waiting, the wondering, the dilemmas. The wringing of the hands. It’s just like you’re on Grey’s Anatomy in real life, right? But if you want the truth…

Ok, ready? Here you go:

Forget all about what he is thinking. Look only at what he is DOING, and ask the following 2 questions:

A. Might he think that this behavior will get him laid, AND/OR
B. Might he think that this behavior will integrate you further into his life?

That’s it. You answer those two questions, and you’ve got his intentions pegged, if you like pegging things.

Now remember, this is all about what he THINKS might work. God knows that there are some men out there who might THINK that, oh, I don’t know — setting photos of dead relatives as their MySpace picture would get them laid. Sure.

But, given that caveat, let’s Manslate “N’s” situation above:

If the above description is accurate, it sounds like the guy was having some fun on the first date. Flirty text messaging is the kind of effort that a guy wouldn’t bother with if he didn’t at least want to sleep with you.

So, DATE 1 MANSLATION REPORT:

A. YES
B.Insufficient Data

Second date. It sounds like he was still thinking at least “maybe” for Question A (you two did go out, after all) but by the end of the date, it sounds like he wasn’t trying for anything physical. Not much in the liplock department, and no walk to the train. (The latter is not necessarily a slam-dunk that he was in possession of weapons of mass disinterest, but not a great sign, either.) The date with the weak ending is generally a sign that he senses that YOU aren’t interested in any question A.

DATE 2 MANSLATION REPORT:

A. NO
B. still Insufficient Data

And then, the 2 week lag in communication, which was only broken when she contacted him. There’s your dead giveaway. We can finally answer question B (and also another reading on A.) There is never, EVER a reason for a guy who wants to be around you to wait for 2 weeks to contact you. EVER. Seriously, if you learn nothing else from this, people, please learn this:

YOU DO NOT NEED TO WAIT 2 WEEKS TO KNOW THAT A GUY ISN’T INTERESTED. A COUPLE OF DAYS, AND YOU KNOW.

If he wanted to spend more time with you, why deprive himself of your presence for that long? If a guy contacts you after that long, he’s looking to get laid. You can take that to the bank**.

Ergo, FINAL MANSLATION REPORT:

A. NO
B. NO

So, that’s it. That’s really all there is to it. Try it out in your life.

As a side note, I look forward to hearing about all the men who are “exceptions” to this.

Special thanks to our sender-inner, N! (Congrats again on the creative use of a funeral to jumpstart a conversation. Ten points!)

*100% true, I swear, a good friend of mine actually dated such a man. AFTER she saw the picture. Seriously. Were you thinking, “Well…he’s family oriented, right? And he loves his mother….that’s sweet…isn’t it?”

**Once you get it to the bank, you should probably just bring it back home. The bank isn’t going to do anything with it. That’s not legal tender, it is a “figure of speech” — just one of the many literary devices you get here at manslations.com.