for the men

This was originally posted at Inspired, Sunday, February 5, 2012.

Dear Liberal Arts Men,

There are lots of beautiful women on campus. Why aren’t you dating?

Not a whole lot miffs and baffles liberal arts women more than the fact that good men don’t ask them out. In the words of a dear (female) friend of mine, “It’s not fair. They get to pick whoever they want. We can just put out bait and hope.”

These women (and for a few years, I was one of them) befriend off-campus students so they can borrow their kitchens and feed you something better than cafeteria food. They sing while washing the dishes. They laugh at your jokes. As graduation approaches, they tell you that they’re looking at this or that type of job, but that what they’d really like to do is raise kids. They’re practically wearing signs that say “ask me out.” They’re waiting for you, and opening doors won’t cut it forever.

You, liberal arts men, need to do your part. Take them to a dance. Take them to dinner. Start a relationship. Something. Dating is not a lifelong commitment. Asking a woman to a formal dance (and asking her to dance at the formal dance) is not a marriage proposal. An evening of conversation and dance is a fun thing to do with friends; a relationship is discerning marriage. Neither requires an irrevocable vow.

That means you don’t have to finish discerning (and, Catholic men, you don’t have to 115% rule out the priesthood) before you ask her out. If you don’t ask her out because you’re only 80% sure you’d want someone like her helping you raise children, then you’re really not asking her out because you’re scared. Ask her out, then talk about the other 20% (and the 80%) while you’re dating. Share ideas and see if you reach the same conclusions on the important things. That’s what dating is for. That’s not what pre-asking-out-analysis is for. Be discerning before you ask her out, but not scrupulous – there’s way more to her than you’ll find out while “just friends.”

Most liberal arts women want to be stay-at-home-moms and they want men like you to marry them so they can. They want men like you because you’re responsible, because you’re funny, because you’re clean, because you’re trustworthy, because you’re strong. Generally, people discern their vocation to marriage by dating and generally, people don’t marry without dating. Liberal arts women know that after leaving the little bubble of [name of little conservative liberal arts college] and enter the great sea of secularism, they are much less likely to find a man they would trust their future children with, unless they land a job at the pro-life think tank down the street. (And you’re much less likely to find such a woman after you graduate.) You have a responsibility to give these women a chance at marriage to a real man, a good, virtuous man who goes to their church. Ask them out. You’ll find out way more about her than you knew before – and you might find that you want to marry her. Or that you don’t. But if you’re already 80% sure you do want to marry her, it’s time to take the next step in your discernment.

Yes, it’s scary asking them out. You know what else is scary? Childbirth. So we’re even. Ask her out already.

Sincerely,
Mary (and Luke, who asked)

radiance

Originally posted at Inspired, 8/24/2012

What is beauty?

The philosophers say “id quod visum placet” – that which, when seen, pleases. Beauty is complete, proportional, and radiant, they say.

It’s easy to see what completion and proportionality are. If my left eye is missing or swollen out of proportion, I’m less beautiful.

But what is radiance?

My mother knew. Not so many years ago when I was a child, she read me the story of Cinderella from a picture book. She pointed to a drawing of Cinderella in her rags helping the stepsisters, dressed in their finery, on their way out the door to the ball. Cinderella, of course, was much more beautiful than the stepsisters.

“Do you know why?” my mother asked her melancholy daughter. “It’s because she has a smile on her face.”

I looked, and of course it was true.

Maybe that’s what philosophers mean by “radiance,” that elusive and undefinable characteristic of beauty – maybe they mean joy.

penance

I feel compelled to tell every person I know about my particular sins, as if confession will cancel the consequences.

nostalgia

I remember those days when I would work really hard on something, then turn it in and a little while later I'd get it back with an A or A-.

I like getting A-s. An A-, especially with red marks all over, is commendation for a job well done and confirmation that the professor read your work, found flaws, and isn't a pushover.

An A- says "deserved" and "well-earned."

I miss those days.

These days I mostly work really hard at getting the work done and I hardly have time to get it done well.

But after doing poorly on my first Greek Myth paper, I worked hard on my second one.

I got it back today with lots of red ink and a penciled-in 92.

A-.

Thank you, Dostoevsky

Svidrigaylov lives the basest, most debauched life of any character in Crime and Punishment, then goes and shoots himself. In my gut I pity him, and even though we aren't supposed to make this sort of supposition about people, I can't shake the feeling that after death he was probably led to infinite suffering.

But then I remembered that he is fiction.

Freshman year I threw the book against the wall several times. I was frustrated with Dostoevsky for creating characters that seemed so real then making them suffer so much. (My story writing was always weak because I didn't have the heart to make my characters suffer.)

But they are fiction.

So I can make them suffer all I like.

And therefore tell a story.

at the end of the day

I'm still just as dumb as everyone else.

the difference is