The deal with me and women

Let me introduce you to the woman of my dreams: Holly Golightly.

  

I'm in love with Audrey Hepburn. And of all the roles she played, I am most in love with Holly Golightly from "Breakfast At Tiffany's." Let me show you my calendar at work. This is the one bright spot in my day, the one thing I have that always gives me a lift when I'm feeling down:

I'm extremely, extremely in love with the opposite sex, and Holly/Audrey basically encapsulates everything that captivates me about women.

For one, she's an unabashed girly-girl. Like, whatever happened to girls like that? Oh, I'm not some Neanderthal with Stone Age ideas about sex roles. But let me give you a little background. My parents divorced when I was 11, and me and my little brother went to live with my Dad. My Dad later got remarried, but my stepmom never played a major role in our lives, and even before the divorce, my Mom wasn't notable for being very girly — she was very much a tomboy and still is. Exhibit A: One of the highlights of her life was when she got her first pickup truck. She'd wanted one for years. Later, she upgraded to an even more butch model because she thought the first one was too dinky.

Now my stepmom is dead, and when I go home to visit my Dad, it's just him, me, and my little brother again, just like it was after the divorce. That's the way it's always been, that's all I've ever known: Just us three guys against the world.

Aside from my marriage, I've never really had a real strong feminine influence in my life at all.

I have spent quite enough of my life around men, cut off from any real femininity, and I am done with it. When/if I have kids, I want ONLY daughters. I want to spend the rest of my life on this earth surrounded by pink bows and ribbons and tiaras and makeup and the 15 bottles of hair-care products women always have in their showers. With Holly/Audrey, I'm pretty sure I'd have it.

Secondly, she possesses that elusive quality of elegance, or class. I'm not sure when this stopped being a common or desirable feature among women, but it seems like I don't see it terribly often these days. If you watch a lot of old movies, it seems as if it was once quite common; alas, in this day and age, it seems to have fallen by the wayside.

I wish I could give a more precise definition of what I mean here; "elegance" and "class" are hazy qualities that could mean different things to different people. I'm tempted to fall back on Potter Stewart's old saw: "I know it when I see it." Indeed I do. When I DO see it, I find it pulls me in like a magnet. By contrast, women who conspicuously lack elegance usually repel me.

But for something so essential, it just won't do to leave it undefined and subjective. If I'm going to declare the importance of such a quality, fairness dictates that I at least try to hash out what I'm referring to.

So here's my best shot: Elegance and classiness refers to a certain "air" that some women have about them, a quiet, inner, unforced conviction that, as women, they are special and deserve special treatments. Subtlety is key here; that's why I use words like "quiet" and "unforced." There is no pushiness or whininess here. No in-your-face queen-bitch attitude. There is not even a hint of nastiness or ill-feeling toward others. It is just treated as a given — a kind of sweetly naive confidence. Women who have it just make me melt.

And third: Holly Golightly is just a tiny bit of a bitch, and she's high-maintenance. For whatever reason, this is a turn-on for me. I suspect it might be genetic: My Dad married two high-maintenance women with tendencies toward bitchiness — my stepmom in particular was a terrible, soul-rending harpy.

I'll never be able to go that far. I simply won't subject myself to the sort of abuse my dad put up with. But that being said, a little bit of bitchiness is essential for me; I do not function well otherwise. Having a woman who acts bitchy toward me sometimes makes me feel like I matter — it makes me feel, well, like a man. Scarlett O'Hara is one example of the type of woman I need — hell, I named my car "Scarlett O'Hara." And Holly Golightly finds the absolute perfect balance. JUST bitchy and high-maintenance enough, without going over the line.

I haven't had much luck in finding this, and I'm beginning to suspect I never will. Well, I know the Swan had all these things. But the Swan saw nothing particularly special in me.