Mama always said…

People always talk about parental wisdom in the reverent tones that lend a sense of depth and meaning to even the simplest statements. If I told someone on a street bench that life was like a box of chocolates because “you never know what you’re gonna get,” I would certainly be greeted with eyerolls, and groans. But precede that with “Mama always said,” and you have philosophical gold. I don’t know what makes parents so particularly wise, but I do know that my mother has carefully chosen three bits of wisdom that she would like me to remember and live by.
1) Always brush your eyebrows up when you go on a date.
People usually look at me funny when I relay this one, and I can’t say that I blame them. I don’t know anyone who brushes their eyebrows up, ever. Perhaps it’s a holdover from the 1960’s, when my mother was of dating age. I have never brushed my eyebrows up. But then again, I am single. Maybe I should go buy an eyebrow brush.
2) Stay within your color family, and all your clothes will match.
Yeah, people generally don’t understand this one either, but it is very sound advice. Think about it. If you generally dress in cool shades of blue, green, black, etc, you can mix and match at will, and never have to worry about what you have to “go with” that shirt when you’re shopping. Of course, the Great Neutralizer (jeans) goes with everything, but still…
3) All men are assholes.
Aw mom. It’s so true… so true. This is the piece of wisdom I most often repeat, and pass on to friends. Sometimes I want to print it on a T-shirt, and throw fliers from the rooftops that say “Men = Assholes,” complete with crude diagrams. Other times, I just quietly shake my head in silent agreement with my mom. I would love more than anything to believe it’s not true, but sorry guys. All evidence to the contrary.
Take for instance, the guy who dumped my friend after THREE WEEKS of dating, because she wasn’t “the one,” and then literally ran away from her when she happened to see him on the street a few weeks later.
Or how about the guy who removed me from his myspace top eight friends two days before actually having the guts to break up with me?
How about the guy who stood my sister up on Valentine’s Day because he met some other girl on earlier that day, whom he decided to take out instead?
I could go on and on in this vein, but you can see where I am headed.
Okay, I know there are guys out there who are angrily decreeing that they are “one of the good ones!” Girls want bad boys and nice guys finish last. Blah blah blah, schmoopycakes. I call bullshit. You know what that is about? That is just guys who were more in love with the girl, than she was with him, and he had his heart broken. I guarantee you that if you gave that “nice guy” a girl whom he was not at all interested in, the 180 turn to asshole would make your head spin. Because men are not equipped with the ability to function on a certain level of humanity. There I said it.