The older I get, the more I veer toward the “nature” side of the gender argument. Admittedly, I’ve been pretty skewed toward the gender-is-a-construct side of the spectrum since all that reading about transgendered rights I did in my 20s. But discussions with my biology-PhD-ex-roommate and my own personal experience lead me more and more toward the middle of the spectrum.
Maybe that’s what being middle-aged is about. Moving toward the middle of things.
Of course, in this “40 is the new 30″ era (goddamn self-absorbed Baby-Boomers), a 34-year-old is no longer considered middle-aged. But if I were 34 years old in the actual Middle Ages, I’d probably be a dried-up old granny by now. So there you go.
All this rambling speculation can be nicely tied up in this one entirely non-scientific anecdote: Army Guy very rarely says “I love you.” I mean, verbally.
Of course, it could just be that, as he puts it, he’s more of a demonstrative than a verbal sort of affection-expresser-person-type-thing. And I have plenty of male friends who say “I love you” to me on a regular basis. And then, of course, there are my own deep-seated (like, deeper than dandelion roots) issues around relationships and security and abandonment.
But I did tell him I would like him to say it more often. And he sighed. And looked pained. Like I’d just asked him to pick up the back end of my Acura while I changed the tire.
He did, however, also say “I love you and I find you very attractive.”
So I don’t have too much to complain about it. I’d have to work at it a lot harder, and complaining just doesn’t make me as happy as it makes Technogoddesss. Wherever she is.
The end.
