All in the Family featured the curmudgeonly Archie Bunker. Archie was television’s most famous grouch, blunt, blustering, straightforward and untouched by the PC crowd. He was the archetype of the conservative male. Michael desprately tried to reeducate him, but he persisted in his breviloquence.



Looking back at the last 40 years, we realize: ARCHIE WAS RIGHT!

5/21/2010

Falling in Love

They say a lucky man will have three great women to love in his life.

As a young man I was fascinated by the fairer sex.  Everything about them was alluring. The way they smiled at me, the way they tossed their head and bounced their hair even those funny little sounds they make, its all designed to grab a guys attention.  It works too.  We all know it works.  The girls know it works and the guys, if they were to stop and think about it, would know it works.  Of course we never think about it, we hear the Siren's call, and we obey, gladly.

In high school I followed that call wherever it came from.  I lavished my attention on whatever female was trying out her "come hither" look.  At first I was a generalist.  I dated blonds, brunettes and whatever variants of in between I came across.  Then I discovered red heads.  I dumped the hot blond I was dating the day I did.  That year, both the Catholic and public high school class valedictorians in my town were pretty red heads with good Irish Catholic names.  One was Catholic one was Presbyterian. I dated them both.  Both were good kissers.  Had things worked out differently I might have married one of them.  The red head was my great love number one.

It took me about two years of college to get over the red head.  There were lots of girls in between.  Just because a boy is heart broke is no reason to fail to hear the Siren's call.  I sampled a couple darker haired versions of femininity. I went back to blonds.  Great love number two came along.  If you can picture a tom boy mixed with Dorris Day, then you have an idea of the blond.  When that ended I didn't bother to date anyone for two years.  That doesn't mean I didn't go out.  There was a charity case and a couple of college girls that I was forced to entertain etc. Women may have come and went, but there was no romance on my part.

One winter day in January I met Mrs Ipsa.  We married that May.  No sense thinking too hard about these things.  The Siren was calling, what could I do? 

I have a confession.  The anniversary of my marriage is just a few days away.  I find myself falling in love with a much younger girl. 

She tosses her head.  I run my fingers across her curls. She gives coy looks.  I'm give her a smile.  She makes those cute funny girl sounds that key you in to her joy or displeasure.  The first day we met, she smiled at me and cooed.  I've been hooked on her ever since.  Those big blue eyes fill my soul with joy.  When she is sure she has my fullest attention, she'll wink her long eyelashes and give me a giggle.  She finds this grown man fawning over her amusing.  Sometimes she toys with me and grins only to pout just to grin at my foolish attempt to get he to smile again.  One of her biggest thrills is to climb on my lap and twink me on the nose.  Some how she knows I would never suffer this indignity from anyone other than her.  She likes that.  It's part of her power over me.

I know this will never last.  These types of love affairs never do.  They burn passionately but the end is always the same.  Some other boy will come along.  He'll be younger than me.  He'll have a future.  I have gray hair.  He will have a life in front of him.  She'll see him as a great adventure and me as a great past.  Then she'll be gone.  Sure she'll call and visit me, when he lets her.  I'm sure I'll get a card and a phone call every so often.  She'll want to "be friends". Women are cruel like that.  I won't be man enough to let her go.  I'll crave every little visit I get from her, looking forward to them like a lost puppy looking for his home.

Until then I'll drink in the smiles, and the coo's and the batting eyelashes.  I'm a sucker for my little girl and her big blue eyes.

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