The toothless farmer...
...and why logic is eating away at love.
Yesterday, eating mediocre barbecue in Red Hook, Brooklyn, I turned to my best friend and said, “I’m two frozen margaritas on an empty stomach away from exploring Frasier fanfiction.” And while that might seem funny, you should know that I’m quite serious — I’ve been revisiting my old favorite show to prepare for an upcoming trip to the Pacific Northwest (an area of the world redeemed only by the show Frasier, in my opinion).1 The thing that’s been the most fun for me rewatching the show, other than my very vivid sexual fantasies about Niles Crane, is seeing and hearing all the things that don’t exist anymore. For instance, in one episode where Frasier and Niles throw a singles party, they’re trying to figure out where to meet women.2 They start listing off places — “we could join a health club,” or “go to a singles bar.” And I’m like, nope, that doesn’t exist anymore. Neither does that. Boy, they’d be in a tough spot in 2025.
And then I started thinking — where exactly do people fall in love these days? Admittedly, I don’t know anything about this other than what my girlfriends tell me and what I see on my red-pilled conservaTwitter. Some go speed dating, most just stick with the plethora of apps. On the little screen that lives in my hand all day, I see Dark Psychology Memes writing tips that would make The Pickup Artist blush and askaubry posting malecringe rageporn for Karenwomen across the globe. I think I’ve written about the battle of the sexes before, so it’s really nothing new — I mean, read the book Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus to learn more about that. But is it worse now? Again, my AI-powered Apple hand-extension seems to tell me it is. I just have no clue.
In my mind, everything is the same, even when everything changes. Love is weird. In the early 1900s, if a guy didn’t leave you black and blue and he had a steady job, there was your husband — love was something that grew on you after years of working as a team to raise a family. In the mid 1900s, as women gained more independence through feminism, the “political became personal” and Ms. Magazine told you that you didn’t need no man to go live your best life, girlfriend — creating another rift in the concept of finding “true love.” And now, in the modern era, we have Tinder filtering out dudes by height and men asking Grok to cover girls’ faces in yogurt — not exactly the most conducive to romance. But really, how is that any different from years of men and women settling their differences for a little nookie, a couple kids, and a dual income? I was raised to believe that women are angry, rigid, and picky, and men are oversexed and a little stupid (but in a cute way, like when a golden retriever runs into a glass door). And regardless of all that, sometimes you look at one of these weird, foreign creatures and think, “wow, I could really spend my life with you, even though I don’t think I’ll ever understand you.” It’s hard for me to think that human beings have changed that much — we love others despite our better judgement, or the feeling would be called logic, not love.
However, for the sake of a juicy story, let’s say the internet is right. Nestled within the hysterics of the modern age is an unusually small crevice for love to bloom, perhaps smaller than there ever was. In a time when everyone is dying for connection, the political becoming personal has been taking to a hysterical extent, and relationships aren’t just about love or survival — they’re a sign of moral superiority and lifelong values. And whether posts like the Zorhan dating screener are clickbait or not, they contribute to a larger culture of love-logic-ing, where we try to turn an impulse into a rationale. I find that love is always reflective of culture. First, love was about staying alive. Then, love became an accessory. And now, sure enough, it’s a means of attack, a way to vent aggression.3
I’m not saying that every love should be love at first sight, but it also shouldn’t be love at first judgement. Love can grow over time, and for many people it does. But who’s to say that it grows rationally? That farmer you married in 1912 might have three missing and one pair of overalls, but damned if he doesn’t fix your coffee every morning and bring it to bed for you. And after so many years together, you’ve grown accustom to his face, as they used to say. On a dating app, he’s be swiped right on faster than two cats humpin’ in a wool sock. In some ways, it’s a little surreal to see people isolating, making something so simple into something so hard. Relationships are the hard part — having to navigate life with another person who might have different opinions than you do. But the act of falling in love is easy, if you let it happen naturally and get out of your own way. I don’t know why we’re making it so hard on ourselves, but that seems to be the way of the world — turning something really simple and innately human into something unnecessarily complex.
I imagine that Portland is full of caricatures of liberals — the fat, undercut, blue-haired non-binary enemies of Fox News — and Seattle just isn’t the same without the Sonics.
Niles can meet me in a back alley somewhere if you know what I’m saying. Yowza! I love a skinny, effeminate little man!
Given all the lead-poisoned vapeheads, I’m hardly surprised that we’re feeling a little testy.