Fishing With Mandy

I had an interesting conversation about marriage yesterday with the woman I respect most in the world.

Her marriage is in trouble.

And without getting into the whos and the whys, let’s just chalk it up to a lot of philosophical and personality differences.

She said something important that I thought about the rest of the day. She said she felt sorry for her husband. Because she wonders whether he should be with a type of woman much different than she is.

She even has one in mind for him. A girl from his high school named Mandy.

My friend loves foreign literature. And she loves international travel. And discussing philosophy. And keeping up with current events. She loves conversation. And intimacy. Her children, and extended family.

He loves video games. And golf. And fishing. And fantasy football.

We’ve all seen this movie before.

She’s from a very well-educated, well-traveled, relatively well-to-do family.

He’s from a very uneducated, uncultured, semi-dysfunctional family.

They married young. And now they have to iron out the kinks, or it’s going to break.

The reality is they are two very different types of people. And my friend believes her husband might be better off with a girl like Mandy.

Mandy lives very simply in Texas. She didn’t graduate college and probably never considered going.

What she does is put on a bikini every day and go fishing in her bass boat.

That’s her husband’s dream girl, my friend said, totally putting words in his mouth. But that didn’t make her wrong.

Just a bunch of fishing, sex and sandwiches. I guess I can think of worse things. Like fishing, sex and no sandwiches.

But that’s when I got introspective: How important is it for us to find our Mandy?

If there’s ever going to be another special someone in my life, how important is it that she meet my Dream Girl criteria?

And in my life, what does Fishing with Mandy look like?

Does defining your ideal mate close your mind to people who might actually be your perfect match?

Does not defining your ideal mate keep you wandering aimlessly through the dating wasteland?

These are questions worth pondering, boys and girls.