I read once in a lad magazine aimed at white-collar men with disposable income that women, though they protest otherwise, adore being paid compliments by strangers. In fact, women live for it. It’s why they spend hours perfecting their appearance: To bait flattery, inflate their self-esteem, and possibly enjoy an intimate encounter with the type of hunk that reads lad magazines.
Maybe I wouldn’t mind the unsolicited attentions of men if they looked as if they read lad magazines. I don’t know though, because the only strange men who pay me compliments look like reprobates. Yesterday in South Station, after I bounded up a flight of stairs, a man disembarking from the adjacent escalator said “You’re in great shape! Look how you went up those stairs!” He was in his late 30s, about 5’2, wearing baggy jeans and a torn windbreaker. His face had that Skeletor-look that afflicts many rail-thin men after decades of fast-food and alcohol. When he smiled, I saw a tooth. And to top it all off, he was genuinely impressed at my prowess on a flight of roughly a dozen stairs. I couldn’t help it. I flinched and ran away.
Certainly I don’t take it as a compliment when the compliment comes from the dregs of society. I reason that they have nothing to lose by attempting to flirt with a female who’s, like, so out of their league. But then I fret: What if they don’t see me as being out of their league? What if I’m comparable-looking to women they’ve successfully “had” in the past? I don’t spend an enormous amount of time on make-up, hair, shoes, and all of the other trappings women employ to signal willing sexuality, but do I look downright lower-class?
Maybe I should beautify my plebeian aura. I booted up iVillage’s Makeover-o-Matic. I didn’t feel like registering in order to upload my own photo, so I selected the model that best represented my self-image at the time, gave her a new hair-do, teeth whitening, color contacts, and make-up… and the results are quite striking. Guaranteed to stave off compliments from any man, whether he reads lad magazines or hawks Spare Change newspaper.
