Lest anyone suspect that my standards for women are too high, let me allay those fears by enumerating in advance my criteria for the match. First, the potential girlfriend must be approximately my age—let’s say 30 plus or minus three or four years. Second, the girl must be beautiful (and I use that term all-encompassing to refer to both inner and outer beauty). Third, she must also be reasonably intelligent—she doesn’t have to be Mensa material, but the ability to carry on a witty, insightful argument would be nice. She has to be sweet and down to Earth, empathetic, really in touch with her emotions but also rational. Has to be able to put up with my eclectic personality, not TOO mature but not a kid either, has to be  independent and tough when she needs to be.

She must be open to different experiences, have a variety of different interests and not rigid in her thinking and remain open-minded. And lastly, she needs to be comfortable in her own skin, be herself always and never change her values to accommodate me or anyone else. So there they are – my simple requests, which I’m sure everyone will agree are anything but unreasonable.