I have recently been bought a new and delightfully bigger bed, courtesy of Mum and Dad – there are some perks living at home! – and when it’s hardly appropriate to bring men back to my parents, a house built up of walls so thin you could hear a bed bug fart three doors down, who else better to share my bed with than Jane Austen? When taking a break from Pride and Prejudice I can now place the book under the un-used pillow, instead of on my desk, which, by the way, is barely an arm stretch away…(laziness is one of many appealing qualities I’ve been blessed with).
I’m not going to admit how many times I read this particular novel, only that I am reading it for the second time this year, and that I’m still picking out quotes that haven’t stood out to me before. It’s funny how my favourite authoress can put any man problems into a true, yet harsh, perspective. I picked out this little gem the other day;
‘It is very often nothing but our own vanity that deceives us. Women fancy admiration means more than it does.’
‘And men take care that they should.’
Now, this got me to thinking of all the times I’ve heard girls try and convince themselves, and everyone close enough to hear, that some guy is in love with her. ‘He texts me all the time,’ ‘he always talks to me first on Facebook,’ ‘he said I looked hot the other night!’ I’ve learnt over the years that girls are absolute buggers for reading into signs. I, on the other hand, won’t even dream about thinking a guy likes me unless he’s at my front door, chocolates in one hand, flowers in the other, with a stonking erection peeping out the top of his boxers. Hey, offer me sex and chocolate at the same time and I’ll be yours forever (give me cake and I’ll do anything you want). But girls aren’t always to blame in getting carried away, like Jane says, ‘men take care that they should.’ And why is that, I wonder? I’ve known many a guy tell me he’s after a relationship, whilst showering me with compliments and attention for months, only to tell me I’m an over-analysing physco when I ask if he wants to take it further (hence the lesson I learnt there). Women have been branded the ‘attention seeking whore’, but in cases like this, men are no different. Everyone gets lonely, everyone feels safe knowing they have someone to rely and fall back on, but that doesn’t mean stringing that person along is right. Jane knew this about (some) men, I’m sure, just look at her characters, Willoughby and Wickham, using women for sex and money, doing a runner when one of them gets preggers, sounds a lot more realistic than some rich man saving a woman from the hell that is her life, then living happily ever after in Pemberley heaven.
However, it’s not only men that are revealed to be complete plebs in the dating world. In Jane’s novel, Persuasion, there’s a character called Louisa Musgrove, who jumps off some step so Captain Wentworth, the guy she likes, can catch her (because she IS an attention seeking whore). Fair enough, she does it once, ha ha very sweet. But no, she has to go back up the steps, further this time, and do it again. Second time round the unprepared Captain doesn’t catch her, leaving Louisa to face-plant the concrete floor and crack her head open. What a moron (Louisa, I mean). It just goes to show how very observant Jane was about the females approach to wining a guy, or trying to. We are so often putting ourselves out there, heart on our sleeves, ready and willing to get scooped up in the wonders of love, yet without solid proof that the guy we like will actually be at the other end to catch us. This is dangerous grounds here! We are literally chucking ourselves out there, like foolish imbeciles, RISKING DEATH, and then think we have the right to get upset and angry when we find the guy never liked us in the first place. If Louisa had done her bloody homework she’d have found that Captain Wentworth used to be engaged to her sister-in-law! (Louisa doesn’t die by the way, she just causes a whole lot of unnecessary commotion then ends up marrying some loser that paid her a lot of attention while she was ill. Typical). That is the key, ladies, when it comes to dating a guy, find out his past, do some digging. If you discover he’s slept with about seventy prostitutes, and hasn’t been faithful to one of his girlfriend’s, then I’d say the odds are a bit shady. What gets me is when girls actually go for these types of men. It’s like telling someone ‘don’t drink bleach, it could kill you,’ only to watch them hurry off and neck a pint. MENTAL.
When I was about seventeen, and having an abundance of man problems, I thought everything would turn out all right, all I had to do was be a Jane Austen heroine, strong, independent, good at hiding my feelings. Then my Mother knocked that notion out the window when she told me –
‘There’s no way you’d be a Jane Austen heroine, you’re far too desperate, most girls are these days.’
NICE. I can always rely on my Mum to be honest, brutal, but honest, and even though I was ready to lob myself in front of a car right then, it was probably the best thing she could have said to me.
I’m sorry to say it, but a lot of girls are appearing desperate these days, especially if they’ve just met a guy on a night out. If he texts you the next day then he texts you, if he doesn’t he doesn’t. Don’t take it personally (and don’t bombard him with texts and calls), he probably just can’t be bothered or doesn’t like you that much. Most females can’t accept this without getting upset, but there’s no need, he obviously wasn’t the one for you! You were most likely off your face when you met anyway, trying to grab his penis whilst you let him eat your face (because you were that desperate to get him to like you – see the problem here!? Men might grope your fadge at the bar, but he’s just doing it for the crack –literally- not because he’s dying to get you to like him). Not a great beginning, if you want respect from men then start as you mean to go on!
Anyway, this quote from my Mum benefted me a lot after this, making me think every time I had a man issue – what would Jane do?
Honestly, it helps.
Peace and love from your Yorkshire Monkey x
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Yorkshire Monkey
My parents believe I find it hard to accept working for actual money.
Latest posts by Yorkshire Monkey (see all)
- What Would Jane Do? by @amyecharles – December 28, 2011
- The Predicament of a 21st Century Man by @amyecharles – December 11, 2011
- The ‘Best Man Friend’ Syndrome by @amyecharles – December 4, 2011
