Jill Conner Browne - The Sweet Potato Queens Field Guide to Men: Every Man I Love Is Either Married, Gay, or Dead

CONTENTS

COMMON VARIETIES AND HABITATS

DISTINGUISHING BEHAVIORAL TRAITS

METHODS OF ATTRACTING THEM

TRAINING AND THE TRAINERS

FOOD AND FEEDING

For my sweet mama, Janice Wendt Conner, who taught me the joys of reading and eating (especially at the same time) and who provided me with the best daddy the world has ever known.

And for my beloved sister, Judy Conner Palmer, who shared my idyllic childhood and has, to this very day, somehow resisted smothering me in my sleep.

Getting Started

Every Man I Love Is Either Married, Gay, or Dead

I f being a mother is like being pecked to death by a duck (and dont we all know thats true?), then being a wife or girlfriend or somebodys significant other must be more likewell, what is it like? How best to describe this relationship? As so often happens when I come up against a tough question, my thoughts turn to Daddy and his stock of growing-up stories. And as usual, Daddy came through.

As a young man, Daddy used to visit a certain bootleggers establishment in Attala County, Mississippi. (Since Mississippi was legally dry until 1968, everybody knew the local bootlegger and where to find him.) The bootleggers wife had a medium-sized monkey that she kept as a pet and doted on like it was blood kin. One day, when Daddy happened by to make a purchasefor medicinal purposes only, I imagineMr. Bootlegger was nowhere to be found, but Mrs. Bootlegger shouted through the screen door that Daddy should come on in and shed help him.

No sooner had Daddy crossed the threshold than something dropped from the skyactually, the sill above the doorand landed with a very loud shriek, its little grabby hands and feet on the back of Daddys young and tender neck. With no thought or planning whatsoever, Daddy reached up and back, grasping whatever it was and flinging it as hard and fast as he could against the far wall. The first time he actually saw his assailant was when it landed smack against the wall in a sort of plastered-out, spread-eagle position. Then it slid silently down the wall, leaving a pitiful trail of urine to mark its descent. It was, of course, the monkey.

Well, needless to say, much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth ensuedfrom Mrs. Bootlegger and also from the monkey as soon as he roused himself. Daddy thought it best to flee the premises posthaste, without pressing further his own desire for a drink (although, truth be told, the incident had considerably heightened the urge).

What, you may well ask, does this have to do with the issue at handthat being relationships between women and men? Over the course of my own personal love life, I have played the role of the innocent and unsuspecting one, bounding goofily along, happily trusting that all was right with the universe, and fully expecting all my needs and desires to be fulfilled, only to be blindsided by something singularly unpleasant and often life-alteringthe metaphorical flying monkey, if you will. Ive even been the monkey, too, once or twice. In childlike exuberance, I have dropped unbidden and unwelcome into a situation and found myself whizzing through the air, smashing into the wall, and landing with a thud on the floor in a befouled heap of my own emotions. With no small degree of shame, I must also admit to putting myselfmaybe without malice but certainly not without aforethoughtinto situations I had no business being in and, karma being what it is, received the much-deserved wall-flinging and then some. Ive even been the innocent wall, merely standing by in the wrong place, with bad timing, too, when Ive been suddenly hit with the flying monkey messes of someone elses creation. And who hasnt been Mrs. Bootlegger, forced to watch in helpless horror as those you love play out some hideous scenario that you know can have no happy ending?

Love gone bad is at least interesting, if only in a macabre sort of way. Its surely not boring. Love gone blah is simply deathslow, torturous, and ultimately longed-for death. When youre mired in a lifeless, life-stifling, life-smothering relationship, you start to take it for granted. Life sucks, always did, always will, and so youre just hunkered down, enduring this relationship. As far as I know, nobody is handing out prizes, tangible or otherwise, for endurance of life its ownself. In my experience, if you ignore your life, it will pretty much ignore you right back. I reckon the universe figures why should it bother sending you anything else if you havent got any more gumption than that.

Prizes are handed out in a continuous stream, however, to folks committed to living. When you finally wake up and look around, you realize that your life has been so bad for so long, its no longer even painful to you. And when you get yourself up on your hind legs and take action, youll not only wonder how you stood your misery for so long, but you will ask that all-important question, Why? Why did you bear that burden for so long when apparently you were wearing the Ruby Slippers the whole time? It doesnt really matter too much whyas long as you start clicking those heels together and devote a fair amount of time each day to grinning and looking around you.

But what are you looking for? What are we all looking for? If its love, the city animal pound is full of creatures literally dying to love you, and you can have all you can fit in your car anytime you want. No, its not just love we crave. Were looking for another person to love and, equally important, to be loved by. One without the other just sucksas in, shit through a straw. And we can all testify ad nauseam to that, but no one has voiced our agony better than Kacey Jones, the Official Songstress to the Sweet Potato Queens, when she recorded Every Man I Love Is Either Married, Gay, or Dead. Kacey sings many songs that perfectly describe many aspects of our lives, but we consider this one to be our anthem. (Go now to www.sweetpotatoqueens.com to get your very own copy.)

Now, we happen to be heterosexual female types, through no fault of or credit to ourselvesits just the way we turned out, which is the way these things do happen, by the way. As such, we find that we, personally, are most interested in loving and being loved by heterosexual male types, and thus we refer in this book almost entirely to this particular branch of humankind. We are fairly sure, however, that the hoops we all jump through in the dance of love are pretty much the same, regardless of our orientation, and so we trust that you will instinctively make the necessary mental adjustments to the characters described herein. I mean, we all have to get ready to go to the dance and find a suitable partner when we get there. It doesnt really much matter whos dancing or how or with whom, now does it?

Okay, so were going to say here that the first step is to find the guythe one who makes your heart beat a bit faster, your breath come a bit quicker, your knees wobble, your hands tremble, your mouth water, andthe ultimate test of True Love (or, at the very least, Lust) at First Sightthe one who can make you lose your appetite. Omigodthis is the Holy Grail of Guys. I wish I could find one of these a