It's nice to know.

One benefit of being a man that is spoken for is that you can easily recognise when some women are flirting with you or find you attractive. In my younger single days, I often would try to pick up a woman and, many times, would not be able to tell if she was truly interested in me or just humoring me in an effort to be nice. When you're a single guy, you tend to think of every attractive girl as a potential target (for lack of a better word). Many times I forced myself onto women that weren't initially interested in the effort to make a connection. Sometimes it worked but, more often than not, I was rejected. It was the nature of the game. The mentality of a single man trying to pick up women in a social environment clouds his judgement. Many times men don't pick up on those subtle cues that women make because they're blinded by lust, desperation, loneliness, ego or whatever. Maybe it's because I'm not on the prowl anymore or it could be that I get sex regularly enough that I'm more clear headed than I was in my younger days, but I find it much easier to pick up on a woman's interest level now.

What's the point of this rambling you ask?

I am (or was) an attractive man at one point in my life. Not the chiseled tall dark and handsome type of dude but you could say above average. I've been told that I share a resemblance with a young Jack Nicholson or Christian Slater. Often women would hit on me when I was younger. As I get older and I lose more and more hair and what's left turns gray I can't help but ask myself "Am I still attractive?" I've been out of the game for so long that I wasn't really sure because it's been a long time since a woman hit on me. That was until this last couple weeks.

Through no fault of my own and making no effort whatsoever, three women have come on to me recently. The first was a waitress in Kill Devil Hills. L and I walked into a restaurant and she went to the restroom while I got us a table. The waitress was extremely flirty with me when she sat me at the table. I can't remember what she said but it was an obvious come on. The second was at the casino in Atlantic City. As I went down the escalator a group of women came up the other direction. The lead woman said "Hey sexy! You're going the wrong way. I'll be waiting at the top." OK so she was probably drunk off of the free alcohol but she still came on to me. I had no witty comment to come back with so I just smiled at her and her friends and could feel my cheeks turn red as we passed on opposite moving escalators. The third woman who made a pass at me was playing poker at the same table in a local bar this past Wednesday. She sat right next to me at the table and steadily made comments to me that had double meanings and seemed to ignore everyone else at the table. During a ten minute break, she followed me outside to the deck where I introduced her to my wife who was playing at a different table. After that, she stopped talking to me. I never made any first moves on any of these women and was wearing my ring in all three instances.

I would never cheat on L. It's just nice to know (or at least pretend) that women I've never met still find me attractive. Every once in a while my old ego needs a boost make me feel good again.