True Love Ways

Ashley Fetters

As a 20-year-old collegiate female, primal instinct puts me on the hunt for two things: food and the opposite sex. I have a very thorough comprehension of one of these things. Which one? Well I’m 5-foot-11 and clumsy, I spend Mondays and Thursdays in the library, and I was recently dismayed to find Willie the Wildcat and I share the same general repertoire of dance moves. Clearly I am not Northwestern’s resident expert on dating and relationships. So when I got the call to write for True Love Ways, I wasn’t so sure whether I’d be able to hold my own. But when it comes to having a clue in the post-adolescent mating game, I find it’s helpful to think in terms of an activity I love and understand–eating.

In my experience members of the opposite sex march straight into one of three distinct categories when they first show up in my life.First, there’s the guy who’s like a leafy green salad.

Let’s talk about salad for a second. Why do people eat it? Personally I eat salad because it’s the healthy option. I don’t eat it because I love it, but I eat it because it makes me feel good, and it makes me feel good about myself and the choices I’m making. It’s palatable and low-maintenance and has nothing but positive effects.

However-I don’t know about the rest of you, but for me there are times when “palatable” just isn’t quite cutting it. For exampl, when it’s 3 a.m., and I’m ravenously hungry, I am sure as hell not thinking about salad.

There’s a certain type of guy whose role in my life oddly resembles this salad phenomenon-he’s got all the right qualities and all the right things going for him. He’s the kind my mom would probably call a “winner,” a “good egg” or, the most guilt-inducing of all, “a keeper”: He’s smart, thoughtful, interesting and probably likes kids and golden retrievers and all the same writers as I do. And when this Jolly Green Giant of sorts makes his appearance, he makes himself very, very available. He’s the type I want to bring home to my parents, that I’d be proud to associate with in public. He’s exactly the kind of guy I know I should really want … but don’t.

At the end of the day, the problem with any Salad Guy is essentially the same as the problem with salad: He might have all the fundamentals right, but nobody craves the fundamentals. While it’s true you can have salad all the time with no regrets, sooner or later you’ll develop a craving for something a little more, you know. . . irresistible. In short, just because you’re nourished doesn’t mean you’re satisfied.

On the opposite end of the spectrum from Salad Guy, there’s the man who’s less like edible food and more like straight-up narcotics. Here’s where we meet Crack-Cocaine Guy.

Crack Guy is that guy who’s less of an attraction and more of a big, ugly addiction. His presence in my life has all the same characteristics as a textbook-case drug habit: I know it’s a bad idea, but I can’t avoid it. I don’t enjoying wanting it, I don’t even necessarily feel better when I have it, but the desire for it is there regardless. Crack Guy is often little more than a good-looking, devastatingly magnetic jackass who happens to say the right thing just often enough; usually, he’s exactly the kind of up-to-no-good belt-notcher my dad used to warn me about in high school. And most of the time, consciously, I know he’s just a drain on my energy, a sap on my focus and my resources. But as any addict can wearily attest, that doesn’t stop me from using, abusing and going back for another round.

Right in the middle of this continuum, between vegetables and drugs, is that extraordinary man who is the metaphorical equivalent of a pie.

Anybody who knows me knows how I feel about pie-let’s just say I’m really, really into it. I could eat it every day. When there’s pie in sight, I can’t stop thinking about it; even when there isn’t a pie in the immediate vicinity, I’m probably still thinking about pie. Point is I’m obsessed with pie. And here’s my favorite thing about it: Addictive as it is, pie is not actually that bad for you. It’s made up of bread and fruit, with a little butter and sugar thrown in there, too. Basically you could do a lot worse things to yourself than eat pie. So without further ado, here he is in human male form: the Pie.

The man who metaphorically resembles a pie is an unusual find indeed. The rare Pie is the narrow overlap between the nice, wholesome guys I’d like to raise kids with and the overpoweringly sexy guys with whom I’d like to create them. A Pie man manages to be both irresistible and enchanting while still genuinely good; getting involved with this type makes me feel alternately like the sexiest and the luckiest woman on the planet. Falling for him is effortless, and I can still respect myself when I wake up in the morning.

It’s probably necessary to point out that I can count on my fingers the number of Pie-type men I know. And one of them is John Mayer, circa “John Mayer Has A TV Show.” Hopefully that’s some indication of how exceptional an occurrence it is to meet one of these sumptuously satisfying men. But take it from someone who remembers the exact date and place of the best pie she’s ever eaten (Aug. 4, 2005, in Two Harbors, Minnesota): that perfect graham-cracker crumbly, blueberry-intoxicating guy is out there somewhere, and when I find him, I’ll know.