Vixen Manual - Karrine Steffans [56]
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Vixen Tip
Yes, it is very romantic to sit in a fine dining establishment with their best bottle of Chianti and make puppy-dog eyes at one another over flickering candlelight, but once in a while, do it his way. Suggest that the two of you go to Hooters on game night. Order a pitcher of beer, a platter of wings, and get into the game. Need a little more excitement? Visit your local strip club, preferably one that serves dinner, and enjoy a little exotic entertainment with your meal before going home and ravishing your man. Fishing, four-wheeling, or just lying in bed watching reruns—it doesn’t matter. Just be with him, listen, and learn.
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Women who socialize with men, preferably those with whom they do not share an intimate relationship, have a tremendous advantage over women who don’t. Because of the way our society has historically defined male and female roles, however, a young woman who befriends mostly men is usually labeled a “tomboy” or “fast” (and occasionally worse). This assumption often comes from other women who envy or resent the camaraderie between that woman and the men who gather around her. Since women are taught to believe that men and women, outside of the professional world, can communicate only on an intimate level, the assumption is that a woman spending time with several men is surely doing so for sexual purposes. This kind of social stereotyping often keeps women away from men in casual, friendly environments, as the women do not want to appear easy or available, both to onlookers or the men in question.
This archaic thinking serves only to keep us divided and continually mystified by each other. As progressive as society seems to have become, some women are still reluctant to see men as viable friends and confidants. This is arguably one of the main reasons for our startling national divorce rate. Perhaps if more women and men were friends first before dating and marrying, a stronger level of understanding and willingness to fight for, instead of opting out of, marriages and relationships would be achieved.
Ever since I could remember, I have always been more comfortable around males. As a preteen, I would borrow clothes from the boys I climbed trees with and dress like them at school. We hung out on backstreets and in the alley behind our neighborhood KMart, experimenting with cigarettes and graffiti. It was one of my male friends who taught me how to ride a bike by pushing me down a hill on his ten-speed. My first fight, in the fifth grade, was with a boy. Yep, sure was. After he cut in front of me in the lunch line, I coldcocked his ass. He, his black eye, and I promptly ended up in the principal’s office. After he told the principal it was an accident, we were best friends!
None of the girls in school understood my relationships with the neighborhood boys, why I was the only girl hanging out with them, or why they all paid attention to me and not the more feminine girls. As a result of them being unable to understand why I preferred being around boys instead of girls, from a very young age, probably around ten years old, I became accustomed to being called a slut and having vicious rumors spread about me. Now, some twenty years later, it’s pretty much the same. Some little girls never really grow up, choosing instead to maintain the same fixed opinions formed in childhood, instead of engaging someone like me in dialogue, exploring my motivations and what I could possibly glean from being in the company of the opposite sex. It’s easy to judge from the safety of one’s corner, but in doing so you limit yourself. So many women still fail to understand the dynamics of the male