Dear Abby: Explain women to me

[cereta]

DEAR ABBY: I'm a 27-year-old male, and I have no clue how to read women's subtle interest cues, if they ever display any. I'd like to think they have, given that I put in at least two days a week at the gym working with weights.

Since you are a woman, could you please be so kind as to give this man a clue what to look for? It's driving me nuts! -- AVAILABLE IN ILLINOIS

DEAR AVAILABLE: The most obvious clues that a woman finds you attractive are eye contact and a smile. That's your opening to make conversation. The rest is up to you!

Comments

[cereta]

Dear Available:

Listen carefully, because I'm going to let you in on a little secret. Women? Are people. They're all individuals, just like men. They find different things attractive (why, some might not even be impressed with your two-days-a-week-honed body!), and they express their interest differently. There is no key to understanding "women," and the fact that you consider women a monolith might be a sign of why you're not getting more obvious cues.

That said, eye contact and a smile? Might be nothing more than a friendly response to your gazes accidentally meeting. By all means, try starting up a conversation (unless she is reading or listening to something or checking her phone or or or...), but be prepared to back down if she's not interested. Don't look for subtle cues. Accept the really fucking obvious ones, like a short response and a return to what she was doing. Or, better idea, try an online dating service or other activity in which people's purpose is clear. Then you won't have to try to read "subtle interest cues."

[vass]

I think this guy could do worse than follow Captain Awkward's dating advice for lonely guys, and read/watch/listen to as many books/movies/music created by women as possible.

I also wonder what his standards for women are, if he thinks that women are likely to be interested in him because he's available and works out twice a week.

[cereta]

One thing I find myself wondering is how many, if any, women friends he has. It seems to me that he would do well to put romance/sexual encounters on the shelf for a year or two and work on making some friends among these strange people called "women."

(I could, of course, be totally misreading the situation, but if he's writing to Abby because she's a woman, I'm guessing he doesn't have a lot of women friends.)