Let me speak directly and boldly to the women who have seen themselves in similar example. With all due respect, my most difficult task may be to help you recognize yourselves as part of the problem. The angry women in the past have been so consumed by their husband’s disrespect and failures that they couldn’t acknowledge their role in his inability to respond. But certainly, they had helped to make him what he was.

Look at it this way. Verbal bludgeoning never made anyone more loving or sensitive. You simply can’t tear a man to pieces and then expect him to meet your emotional needs. He’s not made that way. Rather than attacking an unresponsive man and driving him away, there is a method of drawing him in your direction. It is accomplished by taking the pressure off him—by pulling backward a bit—by avoiding the worn-out accusations and complaints—by appearing to need him less—by showing appreciation for what he does right and for being fun to be with. Happiness is a marvellous magnet to the human personality.

Sometimes it is necessary to interject a challenge into the relationship in order to motivate a disengaged spouse.

A demeanour of self-confidence, mysterious quietness and independence are far more effective in getting attention than a frontal assault.

I remember a bright young lady Janet. She came to me because she seemed to be losing the affection of her husband. Frank appeared bored when he was at home and he refused to take her out with him. At weekends he went sailing with his friends despite the bitter protests of his wife. She had begged for his attention for months, but the slippage continued.

I hypothesized that Janet was invading Frank’s territory and needed to recapture the challenge that made him want to marry her. Thus, I suggested that she retreat into her own world—stop ‘reaching’ for him when he was at home—schedule some personal activities independently of his availability, etc. Simultaneously, I urged her to give him vague explanations about why her personality had changed. She was instructed not to display anger or discontent, allowing Frank to draw his own conclusions about what she was thinking. My purpose was to change his frame of reference. Instead of thinking, ‘How can I escape from this woman who is driving me crazy?’ I wanted him to wonder, ‘What’s going on? Am I losing Janet? Have I pushed her too far? Has she found someone else?’

The results were dramatic. About a week after the change of manner was instituted, Janet and Frank were at home together one evening. After several hours of uninspired conversation and yawns, Janet told her husband that she was rather tired and wanted to go to bed. She said goodnight matter-of-factly and went to her bedroom. About thirty minutes later, Frank threw open the door and turned on the light. He proceeded to make passionate love to her, later saying that he couldn’t stand the barrier that had come between them. It was precisely that barrier that Janet had complained about for months. Her approach had been so overbearing that she was driving him away from her. When she changed her direction, so also did Frank. It often happens that way.

Having raised the subject of sex, let me ask you an interesting question. Which marriage is likely to enjoy the greatest physical attraction, the steady-as-a-rock relationship or the one that runs hot and cold? Surprisingly, it is the one that varies from time to time. The highest voltage occurs not in the static marriage that is characterized by overfamiliarity, overexposure and demystification. According to Kinsey researchers, the healthiest relationship is one that ‘breathes’—one that drifts from a time of closeness and tenderness to a slightly more distant posture. That sets up another exciting reunion as the cycle continues. Couples that work or play together day after day are at a disadvantage compared to husbands and wives whose lifestyle takes them apart briefly and then brings them back together.

Do you see the relevance to our discussion? Those individuals who constantly hover over their partners, drawing their complete reason for existence from that one person, actually handicap the relationship. They interfere with the natural ‘breathing’ that proves to be so healthy over the years.

Unfortunately, the man of the house was taught some misconceptions in his formative years, too. He learned, perhaps from his father, that his only responsibility is to provide materially for his family. He must enter a business or profession and succeed at all costs, climbing the ladder of success and achieving an ever-increasing standard of living as proof of manhood. It never occurs to him that he is supposed to ‘carry’ his wife emotionally. For Pete’s sake! If he pays his family’s bills and is a loyal husband, what more could any woman ask for! He simply doesn’t understand what she wants.

Inevitably, these differing assumptions collide head-on during the early years of marriage. Young John is out there competing in the marketplace, thinking his successes are automatically appreciated by the lady at home. To his shock, she not only fails to notice, but even seems to resent the work that takes him from her. ‘I’m doing it for you, darling!’ he says. Diane isn’t convinced.

What gradually develops from that misunderstanding is a deep, abiding anger on Diane’s part, and a bewildered disgust from John. This pattern has been responsible for a million divorces. The wife is convinced that her low self-esteem and her unhappiness are the result of her husband’s romantic failures. With every year that passes, she becomes more bitter and hostile at him for giving so little of himself to his family. She attacks him viciously for what she considers to be his deliberate insults, and bludgeons him for refusing to change.

John, on the other hand, does not have it in him to satisfy her needs. He didn’t see it modelled by his father and his masculine, competitive temperament is not given to romantic endeavours. Besides, his work takes every ounce of energy in his body. It is a total impasse. There seems to be no way around it.

In the early years, John tries to accommodate Diane occasionally. At other times, he becomes angry and they slug it out in a verbal brawl. The following morning, he feels terrible about those fights. Gradually, his personality begins to change. He hates conflict with his wife and withdraws as a means of avoidance. What he needs most from his home (like the majority of men) is tranquillity. Thus, he finds ways of escaping. He reads the paper, watches television, works in his workshop, goes fishing, mows the lawn, plays golf, works at his desk, goes to a football match—anything to stay out of the way of his hostile wife. Does this pacify her! Hardly! It is even more infuriating to have one’s anger ignored.

Here she is, screaming for attention and venting her hostility for his husbandly failures. And what does he do in return? He hides. He becomes more silent. He runs. It has become a vicious circle. The more anger she displays for his uninvolvement. the more detached he becomes. This inflames his wife with even greater hostility. She has said everything there is to say and it produced no response. Now she feels powerless and disrespected. Every morning he goes off to work where he can socialize with his friends, but she is stuck in this state of emotional deprival.

When a relationship has deteriorated to this point, the wife often resorts to some very unfortunate tactics. She begins to look for ways to hurt her husband in return. She embarrasses him by telling his business associates what a pig he is at home. She refuses to attend office functions or provide any other support for his occupation. She tells stories about him to their church associates. She shuts him down sexually and undermines his relationship with the children. To be sure, she can be a formidable opponent in the art of infighting. No one on the face of the earth could hurt John more deeply than his own wife.

Let me make it clear that I’m not condemning this woman out of hand. She has a good case against her husband. He doesn’t meet her needs properly and he’s an inveterate workaholic. To that extent, the man is guilty as charged.

But every story has two sides, and John’s version should also be told. His wife is wrong to believe that her contentment is exclusively his burden. No one should be expected to carry another person emotionally. Only Diane can make herself happy! She has no right to lay that total load on John. A good marriage is one in which the dominant needs are met within the relationship, but where each spouse develops individual identity, interests and friendships. This may be the most delicate tightrope act in marriage. Extreme independence is as destructive to a relationship as total dependence.

The group would never believe, never in a million years, that Dottie Renfrew would come here, to this attic room that smelled of cooking fat, with a man she hardly knew, who made no secret of his intentions, who had been drinking heavily, and who was evidently not in love with her.

So what’s the secret? The secret is that Dick, though so dreadful, had ‘fastened his deep, shadowed eyes on her’, and by this simple act has produced ‘a sudden harsh thump of excitement, right in there’, which Dottie simply has to follow up, to allay the wild sexual curiosity he’s evoked. So all he has to say is:

Do you want to come home with me?

And the rest is one of the funniest, most touching and honest accounts of what happens to a girl like Dottie in the whole of modern fiction.

One-line propositions, as this shows, need not be ugly just because they’re functional. Think of Elvis Presley helping an entire generation of men to stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, and put some beef into their own approaches with the passionate urgency of It’s now or never!’

Please hold me tight, Kiss me, my darling, Be mine, tonight!

`How do you like your eggs done for breakfast?’ has done good service for a charming Australian producer living on a houseboat in Little Venice. And a contemporary of John (Reds) Reed recalled him getting a girl into bed with the taunting question:

Aren’t you PAGAN enough?

And who could ever forget the one and only Clint Eastwood in The Outlaw Josey Wales, narrowing his eyes at the heroine and saying simply:

Show me!

Clint Eastwood, unsurprisingly, both gives and gets heaps of propositions in the course of his screen capers. Often he doesn’t have to say even that much — he’s so magnetic that it just drops right into his lap! As he invariably plays a man who has been subjected to a severe word rationing, his propositions are not of the flowery and verbose sort. But he always avoids terrible old friends like `your place or mine?’ And he never descends to the nasties that, as every female

Knows, are part of the local patois on every street corner in the land.

For some men specialize in what can only be called anti- propositions, the toe-curling one-liners that come like a sock in the solar plexus. Unless a woman has spent her life researching an Eskimo tribe, down an abandoned mine or up a pole on a remote hillside, she will have had any number of variants on:

C2 How about a bit of how’s your father?
C2 Got time for a quick one?

C2 If we get a move on, you can just fit me in.

I haven’t got any time to waste, do you screw?

You get the feeling that the scum of the earth is leaving its ring around your bathtub.

New York spies report Dustin Hoffman’s beautiful leggy ballet-dancer ex-wife being accosted in a lift by an ambitious homunculus with ideas above his station. `Hi, honey?’ he began,

What would you say to a little fuck? To which, with magnificent disdain she replied:

Hello, little fuck.

That’s the way to tell ‘em. If it hasn’t happened to you, get ready. You’re overdue for your run-in with the nasty, brutish and short. Prepare some excoriating response that will blast the blister who dares to say to you, in the fragrant phraseology of one of Trevor Griffith’s Comedians:

There’s no chance of a quick shag, is there?

I ask you, who could refuse? And how would he like his eggs for breakfast? As a serving suggestion, straight over his head, plate and all! Go to it!

Some men are more conscious than others that even with a Welsh lilt, a cap for Wales, and the best replacement set of false front teeth that the Land Of Your Fathers can afford, a man might not be enough in himself. In the past, especially, it was customary to accompany a proposition with the inducements thought necessary to make the lady likely to accept it. Sir Charles Dilke, the noticeably Liberal politician and famous fornicator, used to offer women a signed photo of himself in return for their favours!

But most men know that something more tangible than this is expected, and if it’s a serious business proposition, it’s going to be more than a quid pro quo. A man looking for a long-term arrangement would often fix on a particular woman, and make his proposition, just like a proposal, in full and in form. Actresses were particularly vulnerable to these approaches, as they were often unjustly held to be not as respectable as they ought to be. So they often found themselves fighting off the johnnies who weren’t content to remain safely at the stage door.

In Masks and Faces the leading character is the actress Peg Woffington, who had flourished as the leading female star of the stage a century earlier. Charles Reade, the author, was a close life-long friend of the actress Laura Seymour, and this love affair gave him a rare insight into what really went on behind the scenes. Here one admirer has called on La Woffington to take possession of her as his mistress:

POMANDER: I had the honour, madam, of laying certain propositions at your feet.

WOFFINGTON: Oh, yes, your letter, Sir Charles. I ran my eye down it as I came along, let me see — ‘A coach’, `a country house’, ‘pin money’ — Neigh ho! And I am so ired of coaches, and houses, and pins. Oh yes, here is something — what is this you offer me, up in this corner? POMANDER: That? — My heart!

So far, so good, we may think — especially those of us who are not exactly overwhelmed with such offers. Dorothy Parker summed it up:

Why is it no-one ever sent me yet

One perfect limousine, do you suppose? Oh no, its always just my luck to get One perfect rose!

But unfortunately Pomander himself would have to be taken along with his goodies. And he is an odious, vain, arrogant man. Mistress Peg wouldn’t touch him with a barge-pole, and takes an indecent delight in telling him

POMANDER: Favour me with your answer.

WOFFINGTON: (tearing the letter up) You have it.

POMANDER: (aghast) Tell me, do you really refuse?

WOFFINGTON: My good soul, are you so ignorant of the stage and the world, as not to know that I refuse offers such as yours every week of my life? I have refused so many of them, that I assure you I have begun to forget they are insults.

POMANDER: Insults, madam! These are the highest
compliments you have left it in our power to pay you.

WOFFINGTON: Indeed! Oh, I take your meaning. To be your mistress could be but a temporary disgrace — to be your wife might be a lasting discredit!

Game, set and match to Woffington in this encounter. But perhaps the suitor had a lucky escape. In real life ‘lovely Peggy’ had scores of lovers, among them small but sexy star actor David Garrick, the Dudley Moore of the eighteenth century, and was openly unfaithful to them all. She had an actress‘ temperament, too. Once, in a fit of jealousy, she followed a rival actress off the stage and plunged a knife in her back!The men whose propositions she turned down generally had more to be thankful for than those who were accepted.

Nowadays, the proposition direct is more likely to be an unpretentious one-liner, than the old-style offer that sounded more like a legal contract. When the heroine has her hair blonded ‘all white and silky’ in To Have And Have Not, the Hemingway hero, perennially short on words at his best, throws around no more of the magic monosyllables than it takes to say:

Let’s go to the hotel.

Sometimes the proposition is slipped in unannounced, and even with a kind of innocence, like this boy-girl number from Brendan Behan’s hit musical play, The Hostage:

SOLDIER: I will give you a golden ball,
To hop with the children in the hall,

TERESA: If you’ll marry, marry, marry, marry,

If you’ll marry me.

SOLDIER: I will give you the keys of my chest,

And all the money that I possess

TERESA: If you’ll marry, marry, marry, marry,

If you’ll marry me.

I will bake you a big pork pie, And hide you till the cops go by,

SOLDIER: If you’ll marry, marry, marry, marry,

If you’ll marry me.

But first I think that we should see If we fit each other —

TERESA: (to the audience) Shall we? SOLDIER: Yes, let’s see.

And they jump into bed together like two puppies in a basket, children of a divided Ireland finding a moment of peace and happiness against the never-ending backdrop of the Troubles.

The great one-line proposition isn’t usually as sweet and child-like as this. But it is by way of being an undiscovered art-form of the twentieth century, practised by all manner and degree of men. Inevitably, ‘would you like to come up and see my etchings’ has now been superseded by the invitation to view a video. Home computers are also often kept in bedrooms, strangely enough (`I like to relax with it before I go to sleep’) Well, yes. This is the age of the chip. But chips with everything?

There’s a lot to be said for the Proposition Direct. You know where you’re working. A woman can often warm to a man who comes clean, and briskly suggests an interlude of workers’ playtime. ‘Look,’ said one man to me at the end of a wearisome conference, when financial cut-backs and reorganization problems had reduced company morale to rock bottom:

How would you like to come to bed with me tonight? You’re the most attractive woman here, I’m getting the annual award tomorrow for Salesman-Most-Likely-To — they’re all expecting it of us. We should do it — just to give ‘em all heart.

Tall, well-groomed, with a fantastic lean and hungry look, he was indeed the Man Most Likely To. Never say an Englishwoman cannot hear the call of duty, even when it comes sounding strangely like the call of the wild. But pour encourager les autres? What would you have done?

Inevitably the prototype of the ‘let’s not mess about’ approach was D. H. Lawrence. He was always writing ground rules for lovers. Here is one set addressed, rather aggressively, as if to enemy rather than friend:

To Women, As Far As I’m Concerned

1. The feelings I don’t have I don’t have.

2. The feelings I don’t have, I won’t say I have.

3. The feelings you say you have, you don’t have.

4. The feelings you would like to have, we neither of us have.

Got that, all you ‘orrible little women out there? Yessir! I can’t hear yer! SAH! YESSAH!

Admittedly the rule numberings are not in the original. But Lawrence seriously intended the whole thing this way. Doesn’t it make you wonder why anyone, particularly women, ever rushed to join Bert’s Army? Just listen to the end of this tirade:

So if you want either of us to feel anything at all You’d better abandon all idea of feeling altogether.

• Geddit?
• Goddit?
• Good!
• GEDDEMOFF!

That’s the way to tell ‘em.

The direct approach does not mean a man has to treat a woman like an overbearing NCO with the greenest rookie in a pack of raw recruits. He can dispense with diplomacy and still be attractive. There’s a macho grace in a man with enough cojones to take the bull by the horns. Ben Jonson’s great hero, Volpone, pinning the unsuspecting Celia to the bed, simply informs her:

Thou bast in place of a base husband Found a worthy lover!

Lucky old Celia. It always strikes a woman as a weakness of this magnificent drama that Celia at this point acts so wet. Confronted with this thrillingly romantic figure, half man, half fox, courting her with wine and song, sensuous compliments, pearls and diamonds, all goody-goody Celia can do is pray, weep, clap her legs together and screech for help. Some opportunities are wasted on some women.

On the other hand, most propositions are not at all hard to resist. Any woman would gladly take money for every time she’s heard the one that begins ‘We’re both adults . . Then there’s the one solemnly recommended by US sexologist John Eichenlaub MD as guaranteed to make a woman buckle into a man’s arms:

You are an AEI tumblebun.

Hop off, Eichenlaub. Corniest of all is any proposition that begins ‘My wife . . Yukkiest of all is anything in the genre which may be called ‘naming of parts’.

This is a category especially favoured by propositioning males. It’s quite staggering to a woman how dearly fond men are of giving a special separate personality to their own personal private pendant — and not just ‘the old man‘, ‘the holy trinity’ or ‘the wife’s best friend’. When you get to know men well enough to find out these things, you discover that they’ve all got some hysterical little nursery nickname for the biggest thing in their lives (if not the biggest in yours).

Choice in this depends on individual preference. ‘Percy’ and ‘Willie’ are always with us. RAF types go for ‘George, the automatic pilot’, ‘the Red Baron’, and even Biggles. One lapsed monk used to refer to his lower self as ‘The Bishop’, shrieking with ribald laughter. But my best was a 15-stone hunk who’d played prop-forward for Wales, and was famous up and down the valleys as a scrum in himself. The lucky girls kept a welcome in the hillsides for his ‘Binkie’! Think of that next time you see Willie John McBride!

So, no matter how much they sound like Noddy in Toytown and the Blighted Enid at her worst, here are some real-life, true (honest to God!) propositions in this line:

CI Percy’s ready to come out to play.

Wake Willie up, shall we?

What say we let George take over? — he’ll fly us home.

But the star award goes to the rugby player. His bid, which brought the girls running from their spinning wheels as far away as Llanfairfechan and Llandeilo consisted simply of:

Binkie wants a bite.

Doesn’t set your teeth a-twitch? Try imagining it in a magical lilting Welsh accent. As said by Richard Burton, perhaps?

But remember to be very nice when you say no.

Don’t think negatively, “This man doesn’t think much of me to call right before he wants to see me,” or scream, “No, I’m busy,” and slam down the phone. He isn’t thinking that at all. He isn’t thinking that he’s not treating you like a creature unlike any other. Give him a break. Dating girls are an unusual breed. As we’ve suggested, nicely say, “No, wow, I wish I wasn’t busy!” Then sigh and get off the phone. He will soon realize that you simply want to be asked in advance for a date. Again, men are not trying to hurt you when they call at the last minute. Don’t be offended, just train them to call earlier without actually demanding it of them.

Spontaneity is not “Hi. Want to see a movie this afternoon?” That call might have come out of boredom or the fact that the woman he really wants to be with is busy. He didn’t call you in advance, dream about you for a week, and get all excited about putting his arm around your shoulders during the movie. He didn’t think of your date together as something precious that must be scheduled in advance like a reservation at a very exclusive restaurant. Spontaneity is fine, but it should happen during the date, such as an unexpected drive to the beach after dinner.

We often hear about “spontaneous” women who go out with men on twenty-four hours’ notice. We wish them luck. When a man knows he can have you five minutes after his last girlfriend gave him the boot, he’ll call you because he’s lonely or bored, not because he’s crazy about you. In such cases, buyer beware: it won’t last. Free spirits might object to what we are saying, but for long-lasting results we believe in treating dating like a job, with dating and regulations. Just like you have to work from nine to five, no matter how you feel, we believe you have to silently train men to make plans with you (elusive, busy, happy you!) ahead of time. When you do The Dating, what you’re really doing is giving men the secret, silent code that they understand very well. If you make it too easy for men, they’re certain to take advantage and then you can forget about getting a Dating marriage.

We realize that the days in between dates with the man you are crazy about can be long and excruciating; but, remember, it’s worse to say yes indiscriminately whenever he wants to see you and risk him getting bored. If you play your cards right, he will reach the conclusion that the only way to see you whenever he wants, at the last minute, is to marry you!

Needless to say, men don’t always know that they shouldn’t be calling you on Thursday or Friday night for a Saturday night date. Other women have spoiled them by accepting last-minute offers. As we’ve stated, ideally he should ask you out at the end of your last date or call you as early as Monday or Tuesday for the next Saturday night. The Dating will make you foremost on his mind, the first thing he thinks about in the morning. And if you are always on his mind, he won’t want to wait until Thursday to call you.

It may be a telltale sign of how a man feels about you if he doesn’t call you early in the week. The best way to encourage him to phone sooner is to turn him down when he calls on Thursday for Saturday night. Hopefully, he will get the hint. This is not a game. It is essential that men ask you out early in the week because, as a Dating woman, you simply can’t put your life on hold until Thursday or Friday! You have friends and lots of things to do. You need to know ahead of time if you’re going to have a date Saturday night or go to the movies with the girls. When men are calling you as late as Thursday, you become a nervous wreck. You’re frenetically checking your answering machine, or if you live at home, you’re constantly asking your mother if he called. Basically, you’re living on the edge. Dating girls don’t live on the edge. They have plans.

If he hasn’t called by Wednesday night, make other plans for the weekend. Then you must politely decline if he calls Thursday and nonchalantly asks, “Hey, pet, what are you doing Saturday night?”

Practice the following answer in the nicest voice possible: “Oh, I’m so sorry, but I’ve already made plans.” Don’t break down and go out with him even though you’d much rather do that than hang out with the girls or go out with another man you don’t like as much. And don’t counteroffer by saying, “But I’m free Monday.” Men have to ask you out without your help. But don’t reprimand him for calling do late in the week. Be very nice, but very firm when you say no. Also, don’t say what your plans are because it doesn’t matter. What matters is the message you’re sending, which is: If you want to get a Saturday night date with me, you must call on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday.

Now you may be saying to yourself, “This is all so rigid, lots of men make plans when the mood strikes them, what’s wrong with spontaneity?” These arguments sound convincing, but the reality is not so pleasant. When Ted first called our friend Beth on a Thursday night for a Saturday night date, she said yes right away. That set a bad precedent for him calling her at the last minute for future dates. Although they went out for a few months, he never thought that much about her during the week and she felt confused by the relationship because she was never sure if she was going to, see him Saturday night.

Here’s another phone tip: if you’re home on a Friday night because you’re tired or don’t have a date, leave the answering machine on or have your mum or roommate say you’re not home. That way, if by some chance he calls you on a Friday night because he’s not doing anything either, he’ll think you’re not home. The worst thing you can do is give him the impression that you aren’t busy and sought after by other men. Don’t let him think that you’re a couch potato, even if you are. Don’t think playing games is bad. Sometimes game playing is good. Men like to think that they are getting a catch. Show him that you have a full life, that you are independent.

On any other night when he calls and you pick up the phone, don’t feel you have to tell him exactly what you are doing. After a few minutes, just say you’re busy (nicely) and can’t talk anymore. You won’t be lying because sometimes you are busy — doing the laundry; just don’t tell him you’re doing the laundry. Never let him think, even if it’s true, that you are home thinking about him and making the wedding guest list. Men love the seemingly unattainable girl!

Lest you think this advice is old-fashioned, remind yourself that you are a very fulfilled person — stable, functional, and happy—with a career, friends, and hobbies, and that you are perfectly capable of living with or without him. You are not an empty vessel waiting for him to fill you up, support your or give you a life. You are alive and enthusiastic, engaged in work and in living fully on your own. Men like women who are their own person, not needy leeches waiting to be rescued. The Dating are not about being rescued!

In fact, the biggest mistake a woman can make when she meets a boyfriend she wants to marry is to make him the centre of her life. She may jeopardize her job by daydreaming at her desk about Prince Charming rather than rolling up her sleeves and working. All she thinks about and talks about is him. She bores her girlfriends to death with details about every date. She is constantly looking for ties to buy him or clipping newspaper articles that he would find interesting. Not only is such behaviour unhealthy, but also it’s the surest way to lose him.

First of all, he may be overwhelmed by all the attention. Second, he may never propose. And third, he may never rescue you emotionally and financially in the way you think. Even if he marries you, he may always have that night out with the boys, his hobbies, or that Sunday morning basketball game. And he may want a working wife. So better get used to the idea now that you must have a life of your own a job, interests, hobbies, friends that you can fill up on in between dates and even when you are married. The worst thing you can do when dating is to expect him to be your entertainment director. Don’t call him just because you’re bored or want attention. Be happy and busy. He should always be catching you coming or going.

We hear again and again about women whose worlds shrink when they meet Mr. Right. When you meet Mr. Right is precisely the time to take up tennis, get an MBA, or go on that camping trip with your friends.

Women love to talk. And one of their biggest -faults is talking to men as if they were their girl-friends, therapists, or next-door neighbours. Remember, early on in a relationship, the boyfriend is the adversary (if he’s someone you really like). He has the power to hurt you by never calling again, by treating you badly, or by being around but indifferent. While it’s also true that you can reject him, the fact is that it’s the boyfriend who notices you, asks you out, and ultimately proposes marriage. He runs the show. The best way to protect yourself from pain is to not get emotionally involved too quickly.

So don’t stay on the phone for an hour or two recounting your feelings or every incident of the day. You’ll become transparent very quickly and run the risk of making him tired or bored. He does not want to date his crazy younger sister, his chatterbox mother, or his gossipy next-door neighbour. He wants to talk to a girl who’s friendly, light, and breezy. By getting off the phone first, you don’t have to wonder if you’ve kept him on too long, bored him, or revealed too much about yourself. Because it can be very difficult to monitor the amount of time you spend on the phone when you are “in like” or in love, we again suggest using a timer or stopwatch. When the bell rings, you sweetly say, “I really have to go now.” A timer is objective; you are not.

It doesn’t matter if you’re having a great conversation and you want to tell him all about what happened to you between the ages of five and six that shaped your life. When the bell rings, the conversation is over. Remember, you always want to be mysterious. Having to get off the phone first creates a certain amount of mystery in his mind. He’ll wonder why you have to go so soon, what you’re doing, and if you’re dating someone else. It’s good for him to wonder about you. The Dating (and a timer) will make him wonder about you a lot.

You may think that men will find your abruptly ending a phone call rude and won’t call again. On the contrary, just the opposite often happens simply because men are irrational when it comes to love. For example, our friend Janet set her timer to four minutes one evening. “Got to go,” she said at the sound of the bell. Five minutes later he called back to insist that they start seeing each other twice a week instead of once a week. The four-minute call worked like a charm, bringing him closer to her, not (as you would expect) farther away.

If you’re a genuinely nice person, you will probably feel cruel when you do The Dating. You may think you are making men suffer, but in reality you are actually doing them a favour. By doing The Dating, you make men want to spend more time with you on the phone and in person. They get to experience longing! Tell yourself you are doing them a favour when you feel heartless about doing The Dating!

Another tip for driving a boyfriend to madness is to turn off your answering machine on a Sunday afternoon, and see if he doesn’t go crazy trying to pin you down. When Cindy tried this tactic, her boyfriend ended up calling so many times that day that he activated her answering machine. (Some machines will automatically turn on after fourteen rings. Can you imagine him letting it ring fourteen times?!) When he finally got her on the phone that night, he possessively asked, “Where have you been? I wanted to take you for a drive in the country.” It’s good when men get upset; it means they care about you. If they’re not angry, they’re indifferent, and if they’re indifferent, they’ve got one foot out the door. Getting off the phone after a few minutes is not easy, but it works.

Invariably, when you call him, he will get off the phone first or quickly and you might misinterpret his busyness as disinterest. You may even think that he’s with another woman! Understandably, you feel empty and nervous for the rest of the day or evening or until you hear from him again. This nervousness might make you call him again to ask, “Is everything okay?” or “Do you still love me? miss me?” And, you end up breaking more rules!

So, if you don’t want a man to know how much you like him, or that you feel empty and insecure, don’t call him. If he leaves a message on your machine to return his call, try not to. Only call him back right away if it’s a scheduling change regarding an upcoming date or event, not just to chat.

Not calling will leave him desiring you more, make him want to see you again and call you again. It prevents him from getting to know all about you much too quickly and getting bored. Besides, when you call only once in a while, it becomes special.

Don’t worry about seeming rude. When he loves you or wants to get in touch with you badly, he won’t think you’re rude, just busy or hard to get—and men always call again.

Have you ever noticed that the conversation is always better when men call you? That’s because when they call you, they’re doing the dialing, they want you, miss you at that moment, and can’t wait to hear your voice. When they call you, they’re the aggressor, they’ve thought about what they’re going to say and have made the time to say it. They’re available!

Your heart work for you when they call you because you may not be home and they’ll wonder where you are or have to call again. When they call you, you might be busy and have to nicely cut the conversation short. It will be easier to do Rule 6• Always End Phone Calls First, when you let them call you.

But none of us are saints, and the reality is that we sometimes have to call men back. Not call them, mind you, just call them back. If, for whatever reason, you have to return a man’s calls, try to wait. Don’t call right back. When you do, keep the conversation short and sweet. Don’t tell his machine what time and what nights you can be reached or volunteer any additional information about how he can reach you. That would be making it too easy for him and you will appear too eager. Let him figure it out! Remember, you’re a Rules girl and you’re very busy! A Rules girl typically comes home to many messages on her answering machine from men trying to fill up her weekends.

Now what if he leaves a message on your machine on Tuesday night and you’re dying to get a Saturday night date out of him? Do you call back Tuesday night? Your heart answer is no because it will seem obvious that you are probably calling to get a Saturday night date. Better that he call you again by Wednesday night (the absolute cutoff) for a Saturday night date. Better not to have a date on Saturday night than to get in the habit of calling him. Your heart is not about getting a date, but a husband. Don’t win the battle and lose the war.

Remember, your heart is also about not getting hurt or dumped. We never want you to go through unnecessary pain. Life has enough pain without our adding man pain to it. We can’t control cancer or drunk drivers, but we can restrain ourselves from dialing his number. If you call him and he doesn‘t return your call or doesn‘t ask you out, you’ll be crushed. If you call him, he’ll think you’re not so elusive and he won’t have to work so hard. If you call him, he won’t get trained to ask you out at the end of each date. He has to learn that if he doesn‘t ask you out when he sees you, he might not reach you on the phone so soon and not see you for a week or two. It’s not that you’re impossible to get, you’re just hard to get. Remember, you’re very busy with activities and other dates and you make plans ahead of time. But don’t reprimand him for not calling sooner by saying, “If you had called earlier . . .” Just say, “Really, I’d love to, but I can’t.” (He’ll figure out he has to call sooner.)

If he’s in love with you, he’ll start calling Monday or Tuesday for Saturday night. If he doesn‘t love you, then he won’t call you again and again until he pins you down.

However, don’t be surprised if a man takes a week or two after the first date to call. He may have a lot of things going on, or he may be dating other women. He may be trying to fit you into his schedule but just isn’t sure how to do it. Remember, he had a life before he met you! Don’t flip out! Just get busy (so you don’t think about him twenty-four hours a day). Give him space, wait for him to call.

Here’s a good example of how to handle such a situation: Our friend Laura waited two and a half weeks after her first date with David to hear from him. David was newly divorced and needed time to think before jumping into another relationship. A Rules girl, Laura gave him time and space. Unlike most women, she didn‘t call to “see how he was doing” or with some other excuse like, “Didn‘t you say you needed the name of my financial planner?” Sure, Laura was hurt, but she made plans with friends and went on blind dates. She had a pragmatic attitude. She knew that if he liked her, he’d eventually call; if he didn‘t, it was his loss! Next! When David finally called, she was nice and friendly. She didn‘t demand to know why he didn‘t call sooner and want to talk about it. They dated for ten months and are married now.

One last thought about the phone: sometimes we want to call a man we are dating not to speak to him, but just to hear his voice. We feel that we are simply going to die if we don’t hear his sexy voice this minute! That’s understandable. We suggest you call his home answering machine when he’s at work. Hang up before the beep. It really works!