That’s fun! I stated to my doctor yesterday. “You’re skirt hem has a 2”yellow border the same width and color as your sandals—you’re all color coordinated.” Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail secured by a yellow elastic band.
“Thank you ,” she smiled.
“Of course, we women notice these things. Women dress for each other, not the men. They usually don’t care,” I added cheerfully.
“Not my husband.” She looked directly at me. “He checks what I’m wearing every day as I leave the house and makes comments.”
“Really?” I said, never dating anyone like that.
“Oh yes. He really notices.”
It’s a funny thing, I have never dated anyone who seemed to notice things like that. I’ve had friends who said they could wear a paper sack and their husbands wouldn’t notice. When I was nineteen a young man I dated commented, “Why don’t you wear that blue stuff on your eyes like some girls do.”
“I don’t like make-up” I responded unaffected. At the time I only wore mascara if I was going out and lip gloss.(years later a friend convinced me always wear your lipstick.)
Those were the years. The men tended to be outdoor types anyway so I could stay as natural as a brown female guppy.
I had a fashionable roommate who carefully paletted her eyeshadows in three shades of color to match whatever she wore.
One day she came home rehearsing the conversation over dinner with a new nterest. “He loves the way I put on eye make-up,” she stated. “He was fascinated how every color matches the color in my clothes…and he said he’s always noticed that about me since the first time we met.”
“Wow,” I thought. Who would think? I took a closer look at her eyelids that day. She was good at it. It is natural for some of us as in creation to use color to attract sometimes. Flirting can involve more than being warm and friendly. It can also be about showing the art of who we are with those who would be attracted to that quality about us.
The nature channel recently showed footage of a little blue South American bird, a beauty, who balloon-flared his neck feathers into a brilliant blue fan five times his size and pranced beautifully to attract a plain little female bouncing from branch to branch. The flip side of this fan was a dark eery thing with three eyes visible only to other males to keep them away. The female approached, stopped, cocked her head and flew off. His fan shrunk as quickly as his ego dissolved. Head down he chirped a note of disappointment and sat dejected and alone on the branch.
“It’s never easy to put yourself out there,” the commentator said, “even for a bird.”
As we singles continue to dazzle our smile when we see someone we fancy or dress for success to attract a desired match our way, we must always keep in mind the right bird for each of us will be attracted to who we are.
If we are single and looking for a mate, we are all bouncing around a tree of life interacting with others on branches at various levels just like the birds. Each of us has a little song to sing, dance to flare or peculiar trait that will attract the right mate.
Just as that little male blue bird, we don’t know what others are looking for—we just have to use what God has given us. Who knows what that little female wanted who briefly checked him out and then flew away? It doesn’t matter. It wasn’t the right bird for him. She didn’t appreciate what he had to offer. And so with the birds dating/mating scene, so goes ours.
In the end it always comes back to Grandma’s adage: “Act natural be yourself. And if he likes you that way he will take you that way.”
