Question: This gentleman expressed interest in me via email and we began emailing to get to know each other. 3 weeks into the emails – we decided to meet. The night before our “date” – his Dad had a heart attack…needless to say the date was cancelled. We continued emailing for a couple more weeks and talking about meeting but he was different and then he just said he couldn’t do this anymore. He said it wasn’t anything I did…did he just run away…was it dealing with family issues? I just don’t know and it really shook my confidence because we had gotten very close thru our emails. Thoughts? ...Robin

Answer: From what you have told me, I see two possible reasons for your gentleman friend to have acted the way he did: 1) His whole world was thrown into an uproar because of his father’s heart attack, which caused him to re-evaluate his life, loves, career and direction. Unable to come to terms with the sudden emotional upheaval in his life, he decided to withdraw from interpersonal interaction until he could “put the pieces back together” and make sense of his current situation and his future; or 2) He enjoyed your online relationship/flirtation, but was either afraid of or uninterested in taking it to “the next level.”

Of course, both are reasonable explanations – two perfectly plausible motivations that precipitated his actions. That said, if I were a betting man (which, by the way, I am), I’d be going “all-in” on reason number 2. Why? Because I find it a bit too coincidental that his father’s heart attack occurred the night before you two were supposed to meet. Sure, it may have happened, but I believe the timing is a bit suspect. It seems far more likely that he came up with a very strong excuse to cancel your date, and then realizing that re-scheduling was an inevitability, decided to make himself scarce before he had to once again deal with actually meeting you in person.

But why would he act that way, when online he seemed so interesting and interested? Well, there are several possibilities. Perhaps he is not what he represented himself to be. Online, he could be handsome, tall, and athletic – the perfect male specimen. In person, he might be three hundred pounds, missing a few teeth, and reeking of body order and Old Spice. Online, he could be witty, insightful, and articulate. In the flesh, he could be painfully awkward, unable to string together a cogent sentence, let alone participate in meaningful conversation. Other possibilities abound. He may be significantly older or younger than he let on. He may be married or otherwise involved, and online romance is fine (in his mind, anyway), but actually meeting you is “crossing the line.” He may be having these kind of communications with many different women and is completely fulfilled by his email adventures. He may be in prison. Or he may not even be a man. The bottom line is this: Online relationships allow the participants to be whoever they want to be. In person, you are who you are. I believe that, for whatever reason, he just didn’t want you to see who he really was. Of course the irony of it all is that had he been honest with you from the start, perhaps you would have been just as attracted to the man as he actually was, warts and all. Unfortunately, you and he will never know.

On a positive note (I always try to find one – cockeyed optimist that I am), this truly appears to be a case of “it’s not you, it’s me.” It doesn’t seem like you said or did anything wrong. Thus, there is absolutely no reason to beat yourself up or lose one iota of self-confidence. He ran away – not from you, but from the truth. And that’s not your fault; it’s his…and his loss, as well.

If you have any questions about men, relationships, dating or a related topic, please feel free to email them to me at: david@EveryManSeesYouNaked.com. I will try to answer as many as I possibly can here in my column.

(C)2008 David M. Matthews. All Rights Reserved.

While every man is an individual and has unique and sometimes peculiar things that may irritate him or press his buttons, there are certain “pet peeves” that seem to be universal to all those outfitted with a penile appendage. In my efforts to inform you about the fundamental operation of the male mind, I would be remiss were I not to address the important topic of “What Men Hate.” The following are three things that my brethren generally find repugnant.

1) UNFAVORABLE COMPARISONS. We absolutely detest being unfavorably compared to your father, your brother, your brother-in-law, our father or male siblings, your ex, the guy who took your virginity, or any other man who’s seen you naked. Why? Because the clear implication is that, in your opinion, we are somehow deficient in some way, and that makes us feel bad about ourselves and not too good about you. If, on the other hand, the comparison is favorable, and we are lauded for our superiority over some other schlub, then feel free to compare away.

2) “HELPFUL" SUGGESTIONS ON HOW WE MIGHT IMPROVE OURSELVES. Despite what opinion you may hold, most men are fairly happy with who they are. And though you may look in the mirror and see only your flaws, we see our reflections and are generally content with what we behold. So your attempts to “make us over” leave us baffled and annoyed. And this behavior also begs the question why you hooked up with us in the first place, if you were so unhappy with who we were. And if you’re feeling that we’re being overly sensitive in handling your constructive criticism, think how you would react to helpful suggestions on how you might upgrade your body or improve your sense of style. The bottom line is this: Find a man who satisfies whatever criteria you may have, but don’t expect to help him “be all he can be.” If you’re looking for a “fixer-upper,” invest in real estate.

3) THE PHRASE,"YOU SHOULD KNOW WHY I'M UPSET." We don’t. And we shouldn’t, since we can’t read your mind, and for the most part are oblivious to any hidden meaning or subtext in your communication. If you’re angry with us and we don’t know why, it does not mean we don’t care about you or your feelings, or are too self-absorbed to pay attention to what is going on with you. The fact is, we’d love to know what has caused you to become unhappy with us, so that we can at least consider making amends. And your unwillingness to illuminate us is both frustrating and counter-productive. Remember, men are generally not particularly intuitive, and we need to be told things in a very direct manner – subtlety is completely lost on us. So next time your significant other inquires about the icy treatment you’re giving him, help facilitate the thaw and tell him point-blank what’s on your mind. At least then there’s the possibility that you’ll be able to satisfactorily resolve things and get back to what’s really important in the relationship…makeup sex.

The above is merely the tip of the iceberg, and offers only a preliminary look at the things men despise. It does, however, offer a little insight into what behaviors to avoid in order to encourage a harmonious relationship. Conversely, the information could also be used to effectively annoy the hell out of your guy when you feel he deserves it. But that would just be manipulative and mean. And guys really hate that.

(C)2008 David M. Matthews. All Rights Reserved.

Question

Most of my life I have wondered why men have this pre-occupation with the almighty “blow job“. It can be a subject of great contention for some women. My husband has told me on numerous occasions that this is a subject that men discuss AND one of his fellow associates stated one day: “Women would rule the world, if they would just give their husband’s the blow job that they want.” Hmmmmmmm…why is this? What is the fascination, the pre-occupation…the importance of it? Even the women’s magazines like Cosmo and Glamour are trying to convince us women that this is something that we should be doing on a regular basis. If all you want to do is see naked and press the flesh…why is this such an important thing also? Do men really talk about this with each other?

I know that my younger counterparts do not have as many hang-ups about this act…but as a woman who was born in the late 1950’s, I and others of time period were trained by our mothers to never consider this…this act was one that prostitutes and bad girls did. So, what do we do now that it is common practice? ...Denise

Answer

You ask a very good question, Denise, so let me respond to it in a direct and succinct manner…men are wild about getting their whistles blown. And there are quite a few reasons for this. First of all, it feels really good. There’s something about being enveloped by the warm wetness of an insistent mouth, that really gets our blood boiling. “But don’t you get the same sensation being nestled inside a moist vagina?” Yes…if your vagina has a tongue. You see, oral sex is more of an ensemble piece than is vaginal sex. A good blow job requires the mutual cooperation of lips, tongue, saliva, hand, and on very rare occasions, a receptive gullet. Tough for your nether regions to compete with such a well-oiled oral team.

Secondly, oral sex is virtually stress-free for us. Unlike regular sex where we have to be concerned about being hard enough, big enough, and long-lasting enough, “lingual love” carries with it no such angst-inducing pressures. We are literally free to relax and enjoy ourselves, knowing that our orgasm will arrive at the appropriate time, no matter how soon that is.

Thirdly, in oral sex, the voyeur in us really has a chance to come into play. Unless we have mirrors or video recording devices in our bedroom, we never really get to visually experience “normal sex” when we are actively participating in it. But with oral sex, we have the opportunity to see you work your magic or our private parts. We get to watch you pleasure us, which only further enhances our enjoyment of the act. It’s like we’re starring in our own little pornographic film…and you know how much we enjoy our dirty movies.

Fourthly, oral sex is all about recreation, not procreation. The goal is pleasure not progeny. In other words, it’s an opportunity to have a good time without the risk of eighteen years of financial commitment. It’s orgasm without a price tag – and we really like that.

And lastly, your willingness to unselfishly “service us” in this manner makes us feel good about ourselves. You’re catering to our needs without demanding anything in return. Thus oral sex is a treat, of sorts, a little bonus given lovingly to us by someone who wants nothing more than to make us feel good. And what’s not to like about that.

I am not, however, saying that you must engage in this sexual practice in order to satisfy your man. If the idea of engaging in such an act repulses you, and your vagina has been sexually doing all the heavy lifting for years without complaints from your man, then “why fix it if it ain’t broke?” On the other hand, if you’re looking to spice up your sexual repertoire with a performance piece that’s sure to earn you a standing ovation from your man’s sexual apparatus, then a blowjob is the ticket. It’s the perfect gift for all occasions, and there’s very little chance he’ll want to exchange it, re-gift it, or return it for store credit.

If you have any questions about men, relationships, dating or a related topic, please feel free to email them to me at: david@EveryManSeesYouNaked.com. I will try to answer as many as I possibly can here in my column.

(C) 2008 David M. Matthews. All Rights Reserved.

Dating is a complicated ritual that most of us have engaged in at some point in our lives. And while many of us may find it awkward, tedious, and even downright frustrating, we nonetheless continue to do it because the drive to connect with another individual is so strong.

But what are we looking for in our dating experience? What exactly is our motivation to go on a date? Good questions. And as you might suspect, men and women have decidedly different takes on this issue. Of course, women go on a date for a multitude of reasons, such as:

1. you are attracted to a guy and want to get to know him better;
2. you’re not that attracted to a guy, but are open to the possibility that there may be more there than meets the eye;
3. you think he’s excellent husband/father material;
4. you think he’s sexy as hell and can’t wait to jump his bones;
5. you don’t find him attractive at all, but he’s nice and polite, and you’ve been in a dating drought and this might just be the jump-start you need;
6. your mother, sister, best friend, cousin, co-worker, or hair stylist has a “perfect” guy for you, and you think “what the hell it’s only a few hours of my life and my Tivo’s broken;” and
7. hundreds of other reasons, too numerous to mention.

And why do guys ask you out?

1. Because they find you attractive and want to have sex with you; and
2. that’s pretty much it, go back and review reason number one.

At this point, many of you may be shaking your heads in disappointment or disbelief, thinking, “certainly men aren’t motivated to spend time with us, solely because they want to sleep with us. There’s got to be more to it.” Not really. Sure we appreciate a woman who can make us laugh. We enjoy lively, provocative, stimulating conversation. And we like to bask in the glow of your energy, vivaciousness and femininity. But mostly we want to get you naked ASAP and feel your warm flesh pressed against us. Don’t we want to get to know you? Absolutely…but in a biblical way.

Now before you start angrily heaving all things great and small in my direction, let me clarify one important point: Sex drives us to ask you out, and is the primary goal of our encounter. But it is not the only reason we continue going out with you once we have known you in an intimate way. After we have experienced the sexual side of you, we start to appreciate your many other attributes for the first time. Your great smile, your cute laugh, your bubbly personality, your sparkling wit are now suddenly, almost magically more apparent. These were all things that were already on display for us to see, but in our tunnel vision to embed ourselves in your tunnel, we probably failed to notice. Now that we’ve “done the deed” with you, we actually start to listen to what you’re saying, instead of mindlessly nodding our heads, while all we are hearing is the persistent thud of the drumming in our loins. Now, finally, we’re beginning to notice how cool you truly are. And that makes us really like you. And want to ask you out more. So we can have more sex with you…and find out what other wonderful things there are about you, that we completely overlooked in our rush to the bedroom.

The bottom line is this: Men are goal oriented in most of their pursuits, and their pursuit of you is no different. And it is not “awful,” “shameful,” “shallow,” or “scandalous,” that we behave this way. It is simply the way we were hard-wired. Yes, it may be different than the way you were hard-wired, but far be it from me to judge either way superior to the other. And sure, there are men who will ask you out who do not want to have sex with you…but they are either a close relative, gay, wanting to sell you insurance, or all of the above. Generally speaking, guys that find you attractive want to see just how attractive you really are…all over. So next time a man asks you out, you’ll have a complete understanding of what his motivation is. No more guesswork or speculation. His intentions are clear – he thinks you’re hot and wants to share in the warmth. And sharing is an admirable thing, right?

(C) 2008 David M. Matthews. All Rights Reserved.

When I use the words “men” and “rebound” in the same sentence, male minds might quickly conjure up thoughts of their favorite NBA teams. Women, however, understand that I am addressing the phenomenon of rushing into a new relationship after the dissolution of an old one. And while men aren’t the only ones guilty of this relationship ricochet, they are, by far, the most-likely to engage in this particular type of reactionary behavior.

So what causes men to so quickly move from a break-up with you to the arms of another woman? Understandably, you might think it has to do with him not being particularly invested in his relationship with you. You could easily believe the rapidity of his action indicates he isn’t at all broken up about your break-up; that he had no deep feelings for you and he cavalierly is humming to himself, “Another One Bites The Dust.” Those assumptions would be perfectly reasonable. They would, however, be completely wrong. You see, when men actually emotionally invest in a relationship, their feelings (whether they show it or not) run as deeply as your own. So when their relationship crumbles before them, it causes a huge emotional void. But unlike you, men don’t have the social support network to buoy them up in their time of pain and sadness. They can’t cry to their friends, seeks solace from their mothers, or drown their feelings in a bucket of “Chunky Monkey.” If they thought that kind behavior would be acceptable, they might engage in it. But men are all too aware that stoicism, soldiering on, and “walking it off” are fundamental guidelines in the male handbook, and breaching these would cause them to be a target of ridicule, pity and serious lampooning from their male “comrades-in-arms.”

So what’s a guy to do? He’s hurting, but he can’t tell anyone. And grieving and wallowing in private are likely to only lead to consuming mass quantities of Jim Beam, to dull his pain. Thus, he realizes, with such limited options available, he must speedily move to contain his about-to-erupt emotions by filling the vacuum created by the demise of his previous relationship. And how does he do this? By seeking out someone else to focus his attention on, both emotional and sexual. And the sooner, the better, for it is this new woman who heals his wounds by allowing him to step back into the comfortable, acceptable space of being the tough, unruffled, man that he is supposed to be. She facilitates his return to a state of being where he can once again feel masculine and in control of himself and his emotions. Order is restored and all is right with the world again.

Thus, it can be stated that the speed in which a man moves from a bitter break-up to a new amorous attachment is directly proportional to the pain he’s feeling: The deeper the hurt the quicker the hook-up. So if you see your ex in the arms of another within days of your break-up, don’t write him off as a horny, uncaring, slime-bucket. Instead, recognize that he was deeply hurt by the end of your relationship and is doing the best he can to mend his broken heart. Then, with that understanding in place, it is perfectly reasonable to go home and cut his head out of all the photos of him you own, and incinerate them in your barbecue. Hey, he deals with his pain one way, you deal with yours another. Who’s to judge?

(C)2008 David M. Matthews. All Rights Reserved.

As promised, here is the second installment in my exposé on men’s dirty little secrets.

As I’m sure many of you know, men are visual beings. We are motivated to action and stimulated most by our sense of sight. As such, when we see something provocative it can have a profound effect on us. And by profound effect, I mean, we get an erection. It’s automatic, we think very little about it and are fairly accustomed to it, as we have had to regularly deal with this “affliction” since we were but mere lads. And all of this is pretty much common knowledge to the world at large. What is less well-known, is the dirty little secret that in addition to being turned-on by unclothed women in our presence, in photos or on film, we are also aroused by the sight of naked cartoon characters. Yes, you heard me right. Jessica Rabbit doing a slow striptease will bring our blood to a boil. Hard to believe, I know, but any image, real or animated, of a fetching female form scantily clad or bare-ass naked stimulates our, uh…imagination. Of course, this revelation, though startling it may be, hardly impacts your everyday life. But it is kind of interesting, don’t you think?

But on to more serious topics – like what really gets to a guy? “Nothing,” you scowl, “Men are insensitive slobs with barely a feeling among the lot of them.” Hogwash. Men often feel very deeply, but they have been socialized to keep their feelings to themselves at all costs or be exposed as something less than manly. And we hate that. But unfortunately for even the most stoic among us, sometimes our emotions still make a bold, unexpected dash for the surface, despite our best efforts. And thus we come to our next dirty little secret: We may have been unmoved by “Titanic,” the plight of Elian Gonzalez, or the clubbing of baby seals, but most men get misty-eyed watching “Field Of Dreams.” It’s not because of Kevin Costner or baseball – the only feelings “Bull Durham” evoked in us was lustful anticipation that Susan Sarandon would treat us to a peek at her peaks. No, this movie tugs at our heartstrings for another reason. It could be because it deals with fathers and sons and unmet expectations, redemption and forgiveness. Or maybe it’s because it takes us back to a simpler time when nothing was more satisfying than a game of catch with Dad. Or perhaps we just get all sappy at the idea of turning our backyard into a revenue-producing sports venue. Whatever the reason, the one thing you can be sure of is that we’ll blame our tears on eye-strain, cat dander or even global warming and we’ll die before admitting that this film is our “Steel Magnolias.”

Even as I write these words, I know you may find this next revelation most distasteful of all. Nonetheless, I am bound by my desire to reveal even the most disconcerting truths about the men in your life. So here goes: One of our dirtiest, dirty little secrets is that if your mother is attractive, chances are your man has fantasized at least once about having sex with her. I can almost hear a collective “Eewww” escape your disgusted lips. But alas, it’s true. Despite what you’re comfortable believing, your mother is a woman, and as such qualifies for the same treatment we give all other women. I mean, come on, she’s not our mother. She’s yours. And maybe she even looks like a hot, older version of you. And you know how much we like having sex with you! So it only stands to reason… In any case, unseemly as it may be for us to fantasize about the woman whose womb you once called home, be comforted by the fact that we are not likely to act on our prurient flights of fancy. But if you invite your mother to come visit you and your significant other for any length of time, you might want to suggest she dress modestly and bring a long, terrycloth bathrobe. No use tempting fate.

So there it is, still more revelations from the seamy underbelly of the male mind. I hope our little journey allowed you to gain some insight without grossing you out too much (a little grossing out builds character). Perhaps at some future time, I can be convinced to revisit this subject and ‘spill the beans’ some more. I mean, there’s so much more to reveal. Maybe I should write a book about how men think. Hmmm…

(C)2008 David M. Matthews. All Rights Reserved.

Every Man Sees You Naked: An Insider’s Guide to How Men Think