“All of us take too many things for granted, the rights and rewards we enjoy for which others greatly sacrificed and often even died. On Memorial Day we do reverently honor our fallen, and we still wildly celebrate our nation’s birth on July 4th…
But Labor Day, once a holiday that truly paid tribute to workers, has become just a three day weekend of boating, beaches, and barbeque, with nary a thought of the valiant, against-all-odds struggle of both individual and organized labor. These days it should probably be called a Bank Holiday, like in England, because the financial sector has had a great three decades at the expense of labor…
This Labor Day, September 3rd, instead of the all-day backyard barbeque, let’s take a few hours to mobilize our faith in ourselves and in the founding principles of our nation by hitting the streets once again to honor and support America’s two greatest assets – the worker and the Middle Class. They are one and the same.”
Q: I have a very close friend who recently told me she was physically attracted to me, and wants to start a friends with benefits relationship. There is a lot of sexual tension between us, and although I’m very sure I won’t develop feelings for her, her friends have told me that she hopes down the line we can have a full-on relationship. I’m afraid of her developing emotional feelings, and endangering our friendship. I really love the girl and don’t want to lose her as a friend. What should I do?
A: Holy goodness, that’s a toughie. It is really awesome that you realize there may be issues with engaging in a friends with benefits (FWB) relationship. If she’s already made mention of hoping for more than just ass with you, then odds are things will get complicated. She’s going into things with hopes for more, and she will probably get attached more than is warranted in a FWB arrangement. It seems like, despite what she may say, she won’t be able to help herself from getting overly emotionally involved. At the end of a FWB relationship, depending on the kind of a person she is, it may just take a moment for her to wrap her head around the shift back to strictly friends status, but there is the possibility of her taking it hard, like a legit break up, and you may lose her as a friend.
You also don’t have to jump into the deep end with the FWB thing. Talk about it with her, express your concern about losing a friend. Probably don’t mention her friends speaking to you; let the conversation just be about you and her. Gauge her responses to your concerns, it may be clear at that point that it’s best not to go any further. If you decide to give the FWB thing a go, maybe keep it PG-13 for a bit and see if her attitude towards you shifts. I feel like a lot of people can shrug off a few make out sessions, but damage control after sex can be a bit harder.
I, like so many of us, grew up loving ‘80s classics. The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, Saint Elmo’s Fire, on and on. I could recite these movies word for word, line by line when I was growing up, and to tell you the truth, still can.
The movie that took the cake for me was, by far, Sixteen Candles. Something about it captivated me. And of course, I was enthralled with the smoldering and sexy Jake Ryan, just like almost every other girl. With that amazing bone structure and those perfectly gorgeous piercing bedroom eyes, he had my heart beating out of control (I have to pause and take a moment).
In case you live under a rock and haven’t seen Sixteen Candles, I will take this opportunity to tell you to pause your reading and pick up where you’ve left off once you have watched every amazingly corny moment of it in its entirety.
The other day this slice of ‘80s awesomeness was on TV so I flipped it on while I got ready for work. Somewhere towards the end of the movie between when Samantha’s sister is in the middle of her drug induced nuptials and when that limo pulls away revealing the ever breathtaking Jake sitting there waiting for Samantha it hit me, Jake Ryan was a douche bag.
Plain and simple.
After carefully mulling over the key moments in the film that led me to this conclusion, I was dumbfounded that it had taken me so long to realize this. Between throwing a Project X style party and destroying his parents home, being an asshole to his girlfriend, then basically pimping her out in a rufied state to some random dude he doesn’t know, and lending a kid without a license his dad’s Rolls Royce…well I am pretty sure all of that has nut sack written all over it. The cherry on top of all of it is that horrible scene where Jake and his friend appear to be doing innumerous pull-ups, only when the camera to pans out you realize that in true bro fashion they have been standing on the ground the whole time thinking they are hot shit. Watching it now, it kind of reminds me of Mike “The Situation” from Jersey Shore!
Long after the candles on the cardboard cake had been blown out and the credits had rolled, I was still reeling. I began looking at the guys that I am attracted to and re-evaluating the relationships that I have had, both short and long, with this new epiphany in mind. And then, Doh! Facepalm! The pieces fell into place. Things like this are the reason I, and so many other girls, like assholes. We are conditioned to like the guy that is a complete douche at times because it has been beaten into us since our youth. Not to say there isn’t other conditioning that I am sure is involved, but humor me here.
On top of it all, and I am sure people are going to rip me a new one for this, but the ending of this movie is so far from the scope of reality that it’s insane. When on earth has this happened? In a high school setting, when has the smoldering, popular, sexy as all hell dude ever left his perfect ten girlfriend for a chick that he doesn’t know and that is by no means bad looking but definitely wouldn’t turn your head? Never. It doesn’t happen. Berate me all you want for this, but you cannot say that I am wrong. (I didn’t blossom until after high school and was very awkward for most of it, so I was definitely on the plain side of that coin.)
And I know it isn’t just me that this crap has subconsciously affected, go ahead and flip on the radio to Taylor Swift, her songs are all filled with this exact scenario, which in turn is screwing over yet another generation of females who are being set up with the same recipe for heartache and disaster that Sixteen Candles so generously left my generation. It’s a vicious cycle.
Now that I have come to this conclusion, I can actively work on trying to pick better dudes. Like guys that treat me well, who don’t pimp me out to people when I’m inebriated, and who actually can do pull-ups. I don’t think it’s too much to ask, but thus far this seems to be a pretty tall order.
