The bride had dreamed of exactly this kind of wedding day. The sky would be blue, the leafy trees green and white puffy clouds would be floating overhead, as she and her beloved, with their assembled guests, looked out over the islands of Penobscot Bay. And so it was. Few present could have hoped to improve upon creation. A time for enduring vows, for embracing eternity, for true love.
And afterward, it was time for the families to poke lovingly at the childhood foibles of the newlyweds. The best man described an impromptu swim where the groom’s wardrobe proved to be a pair of tighty-whities his mother was still buying him long after his friends had graduated to boxers. A bridesmaid recounted how she had known before the bride-to-be that the pair was a match made in heaven, especially after the blue-eyed blond beauty’s face would flush bright red every time the smart, athletic mate-to-be walked past her in medical school. Now they were a pair of bright young docs headed into the ever-rising sun of their future. Those of us who had also fledged their young sighed and swooned.
But then an errant thought crossed the mind of the naturalist. Why does nature seem to delight in arraying males of a species in resplendent colors and encourage outlandish displays of strutting, head-bobbing and breakdancing, while females wait and watch in amused bewilderment? Why does the brilliant vermillion-colored male cardinal sing his heart out from the topmost branches of a tree, thereby making himself so vulnerable to predation? Or what provides the athletic caveman with the fortitude to confront large and dangerous creatures to drag back to the lair? In the immortal words of Paul Simon: “I do it for your love.”
True fact.
All biology, it is worth recollecting, is fundamentally a vast mating ritual run by the female of the species. The irony is that guileless males across the entire spectrum of the animal kingdom seem to assume they are choosing a partner, when the exact reverse is actually happening. When another singer croons, “I am a fool for your love,” now, that is getting closer to an eternal verity.
Of course, these are not appropriate thoughts for a wedding toast. But the naturalist could not help himself, for he is approaching his dotage. His job is mostly done, with his progeny out in the world. The males of his tribe continue to fool themselves into thinking they are searching for appropriate partners, while being carefully screened by apprising young women, as they act out ever more foolishly in the mating arena. Extreme sports, anyone? Skydiving in a squirrel suit without a parachute? Surfing in Maine in the winter? Meanwhile, females wait and watch to see who will survive and then carefully select those whose genes will fit and be fit. Round and round we go. “It’s all in the game, the game called love,” sang the Four Tops.
But once you have sown your oats and the harvest is complete, then what? When your beloved turns to you and you realize the light in her eyes burns with a fire from a different source than you remember when courting, and you discover that your adolescent remark or behavior that had once been endearing is, instead, infuriating. Then what? Allow me to provide a recent example. Imagine you are approaching a dock in the seasonal outboard you have just launched. You expertly back your handsome vessel down as you arrive and jump onto the float to secure her lines. But, alas, you have neglected to take the spunky Yamaha out of reverse”¦. So, naturally, you swan-dive valiantly back toward the boat, leaving the float, but you are not quite the man you used to be. So even though your dive is graceful, you end up with your hands on the gunwales, the rest of your body in the Gulf of Maine and your boat headed somewhere offshore in reverse.
Swinging your leg up and over the side as you are being pulled smartly alongside your speeding craft is easy to imagine—kind of like mounting a horse as it gallops out of town in the movies—but actually quite hard to do. And the spectacle of a boat headed out of the harbor in reverse is arresting to all who happen to be watching from ashore as they scramble for a rescue boat while dialing 911. Whereupon, shortly thereafter, the ambulance crests the hill with wailing siren, skirting passed”¦ you guessed it, your wife coming down to the harbor to see how you are doing on launch day. And when they pull you out of the drink and deliver you to her, wet and shivering, let us just say that terms of endearment do not spring from her lips. She has renamed your boat “50-50,” as in there is a 50-50 chance she will let you keep it. The fundamental point is, from a biological point of view, you have well and truly demonstrated how expendable you are.
This is when you turn to the red phone. The origin of red phones dates to a period in world history, unknown to those under the age of 50, when aging male leaders considered it prudent to have a special phone installed and kept handy at all times so they could speak with each other—man-to-man—before unintentionally initiating a serious conflict. Like thermonuclear war. The red phone is useful to guys at this stage in their lives when it is helpful to consult other clueless husbands prior to making an inadvertent comment or undertaking a humiliating activity that could easily escalate into the revival of a new and more personal Cold War era.
Just pick up the red phone and dial 1-800-HELP. Take it from me, you need it.
Philip Conkling is president of the Island Institute based in Rockland, Maine.