LESSONS FROM A HANDBAG

Something a co-worker said recently reminded me of one of the men who frequents the local cigar club.
The word "handbag".

When I was last asked whether one should buy a nice handbag for one's significant other, my reaction was "good heavens no!".
See, the female handbag addiction should NOT be encouraged. Ever.
If allowed to flourish, it only gets worse with time.
It's a disease for which there is no cure.
There are no twelve-step programs.

The person at the cigar club had, several months ago, speculated that he should buy his girlfriend "a nice handbag" for her birthday. Which he had forgotten about.
He had just remembered it that moment, and thought that Macy's was open till nine.
Yeah, a handbag, that would keep the good woman happy.
Bribe her, and keep the love coming.


JUST A HANDBAG

Dude, you should have put her birthday on your calendar, and got her something nice - not necessarily expensive, but it should have been carefully chosen - way in advance.
Arranged a lovely dinner, and made sure that there were flowers and cake.
Waltzing in around ten o'clock, reeking of stogies, with a "handbag" that's wrapped in tacky department store giftpaper, is totally transparent.

If her birthday means so little to you, you probably do not deserve a girlfriend.

No dinner. No flowers. No cake.
And NO believable excuse.
You. Weren't. There.
Total dumbass.

A handbag is not a substitute for your presence, your affection, and your concern for her happiness.
But once you open that door, she might fixate on handbags.
Because she can't rely on you.

That particular man at the cigar club is now single again.
Without even understanding what happened; the relationship petered out.
He no longer enjoys her presence, her affection, or her concern for his happiness.

She's probably taken his bag to the gun range and shot it full of holes.
As well as purchased several expensive replacements.
She knows she can rely on her handbags.
They're always there.
He wasn't.


As a fellow bachelor, I should probably sympathize with him.
But I've got a streak of schadenfreude a mile wide.
I do not mind that other men are single.
At times it's rather amusing.


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