Creaky vs. Squeaky

Age is nothing but a number.

Yeah, right.

As the saying goes, all dogs are the same in the dark. However, in the harsh brightness of daylight or any kind of light for that matter, the old timers and puppies go to their chosen corners of the boxing ring.

Which is better? A groomed and accomplished German Shepherd that commands loyalty or a wily and affectionate Golden Retriever puppy that just loves everyone? Whatever you choose, it doesn’t come without its tricks.

Dating an older man can be a great enriching experience. Their wine cellars alone are enough to make a girl weak in the knees. Then there is the wisdom, the cultured manner of dining and those vacations that are not drenched in tequila or regrettable Facebook photos. Actually, they don’t do Facebook.

I’ve been particularly partial to older men, mainly because I can connect to them more and I seriously feel I was born in the wrong decade. I like the band Chicago and I believe in stretchy disco pants. I like sculpted cheeks and contoured makeup. I like gold and glitter. I believe in the magic of aerosol hairspray and I think Jackie Collins is my Judy Blume.

I also like them because, between this party of two, I will always be younger and thus more fun. But then again, because I’m more fun, I get bored… easily. The older man is stable, he has discovered the charms of decorating one’s home and he actually reads books. There are no depressing boy’s night outs, which is never just the boys, really. You don’t have to worry; they’re just there. They’ve sown their wild oats, maybe been married once (or never, which is scary from age 47 and up) and lights out is at 11 p.m. I love routine. This is what the older man offers: predictability and peace of mind. Okay, I sound like a Volvo ad.

There is something sexy about having a salt and pepper beau. You don’t feel like you’re living a petty existence. The conversations are interesting and touch on broad subjects such as the decline of CNN and the great wines of Oregon. This has been my experience. It’s like school all over again and this time dating the professor is not looked down upon.

However, there’s a flipside. This flipside is perhaps the reason why I’m still single. They can be difficult. Correction, they are difficult. They’re set in their ways and there are times that you feel like an appendage to their lives. If you go, they won’t do batshit crazy things. They’ve been around the block, and you’re still reading the map.

Then there is the sobering reality of the age gap. Suddenly, the diabetes sets in and you’re still panting for a cupcake. I have realized, one too many times, that they can die. Just die. That if we have children, he may not even be able to carry them. Arthritis, among many other things.

I briefly went out with a man significantly older than me. It wasn’t anything serious. We went for a few dinners together and I enjoyed our conversations mostly about the stimulating food culture of Northern California. I love to eat and it was great having an equally enthusiastic dinner partner. I began thinking that perhaps we had something special. He was full-on about it. I wasn’t sure, but all signs were encouraging.

He was a venture capitalist in biotech and he was just fascinating. Imagine: he had just funded a cure for diabetes. Yes, the cure is on its way. I found that noble and impressive. He seemed to be so passionate about his cause. It wasn’t the money, he really was changing the world in his own way. He was a great man.

Then one night I decided to introduce him to my best friend Sam who flew in to California from Hong Kong. Sam has always been good in reading my dates. It was a fun dinner, a party girl, a racecar driver, one of the former hosts from The View, Sam, me and Biotech.

First of all, he travels with all his dogs, like big hunky Rottweilers. I liked it in the beginning. I love dogs. Then I noticed people thought he was blind and perhaps I was the overdressed nurse? Then I realized said dogs were very vicious. I really felt, in one epiphanic moment, that there was no future between us, because those dogs would kill Milo, my trusty Golden Retriever. The thought of my dog being exiled was simply unacceptable. My dog and I are a package deal. I can never get serious with anyone who won’t love my puppies.  And as I said, older men are not the most flexible of people. So there it was, that floundering seed. Still, I gave it a go and before this courtship went anywhere I wanted to hear what my wonderfully judgmental and overly protective friend thought.

We were having fun and everyone was equally thrilled about his new drug. See, with these guys, drugs are for saving lives. Then the racecar driver mentioned the name of a guy he had just met from Biotech’s home country.

Biotech’s face glowed when he heard the name. “He’s my godson!” And there the cookie crumbled. Racecar Driver was five years older than me and the thought of Biotech being old enough to christen a person five years older than me started feeling like a math equation that I didn’t feel like solving.

My friend said, “He’s kinda happening.” This was upon finding out that Elton John was one of his friends (Biotech was not that old but he ran around with that London crew). “But we kinda like hanging with someone who hangs with Maroon 5.”

Wisest words ever.

Then, to add salt to my new aversion to older men, a good friend of mine was knee-deep in a relationship with a man almost double her age. The older man was smokin’ hot and he also was a very powerful man. Now this can be a turn-on for a week or so, but the power bit gets kind of old fast (pun totally intended). She was an accomplished woman with a Ph.D. in something I cannot even pronounce. So it made sense. She didn’t look like a floozie. She was the Suzy Wetlaufer to his Jack Welch.

Then one day, in the big house that they shared, she opined, “He doesn’t want to have kids and he doesn’t want another marriage.” Then, after a long breath: “And he wants me to quit my job and go with him on business trips.”

This kind of union, the May-December coupling glamourized by Hollywood, is in reality not all that much fun. She was in an ivory tower and slowly earning a Ph.D. in alcoholism as she drank all day. Plus she lusted after the guys from Jersey Shore.

That really scared me. So I didn’t even bother to consider going further than dinner with Biotech. 

Then almost at the same breath I met someone during a ski weekend. In my last article, he was the angry and petulant boy who hated babies. This column is about to become episodic. We struck up a friendship and we started hanging out in London. He was actually invited to be part of the cast of Made in Chelsea, but his parents didn’t approve. Parental approval: what a refreshing thing, I thought to myself. I was done dating parents or, specifically in my case, godparents.

So it was fun! We went to clubs — like real clubs, not dry member’s clubs. The sort of club that put stamps on your wrist. It’d been a long time. I had an amazing time. I realized he didn’t like babies because he was a baby. He was full of dreams and yet he lived for the moment. His friends were super cool and it was just so much fun that I stopped hanging out with my friends. My friends loved 5 Hertford, and I now loved Patty+Bun, a hipster (sorry for using the word but it’s pertinent to the situation at hand) burger joint that only served cool people who wore skinny ties with T-shirts. It was a bit of a statement.

Again, my friend Sam flew over for a few days to London this time. He called me up to come to this fabulous party and I found myself lying to him. I told him I was in the country writing my article. I didn’t want him to meet my new suitor and his friends. They weren’t Maroon 5, they were One Direction. I knew in my heart that this wasn’t going to roll either.

If I was at best an ingénue with Biotech (which is a very, very indulgent description in my part), I was  a cougar, or worse, Stifler’s Mom to Burger Boy and his friends.

The thing is there’s no preferable age group. No one is immune to the evils of the beating human heart. As much as an older man is grateful for the company of a younger sprite or a younger man putting the sophisticated femme fatale on a pedestal, both can go down south very fast.

They are still men. Young boys have A.D.H.D. and older men are inflexible. So when I had a chat with my friend Wendy about the ideal man I actually made a list more specific from the standard dream boy list. Something that I thought was very boring and romantically fascist in the past.

List:

1. Must love my family and friends and integrate with them.

2. Must love his job and be passionate about it.

3. Must love dogs.

4. Must love traveling.

5. Must not bring shame to my home and be kind to all people.

They pretty much have those characteristics except for the shame part. The great showcase for these shameful qualities can be seen in their text messages.

Example: “Shall we dine at quarter past six?”

I mean, did Biotech also invent an iPhone with a quill?

Or Burger Boy’s text: “OMW (on my way), Thnkz. Thnks.”

And here I thought he was going to correct it to “thanks.” Clearly, Gen Z has a thing against vowels.

I know I’m quirky. I know that I’m adventurous. My mom says I’m too modern, whatever that means. I know sometimes I do things just so I can write about it. This, however, had been sobering.

Wendy asked me if I was flexible on my top five. I told her no and there was even a more thorough bottom five. This is why the one is called The One.

The One transcends time and I can introduce him to everyone I love and not wait for the shoe to drop. More importantly, it won’t matter if my friend is his godson or if he’s my friend’s godson. He’ll be The One.