Just Li'Es

It appears men fall for fair complexioned women, do you know why? I said wondering about the news item I had read.

Well, the reasons are obvious, my husband observed without taking his eyes off the tv serial he was watching intently.

What are they? I prompted him.

Don’t you think a light transparent skin is pleasing to the eye and it also connotes innocence and purity of mind and heart? He reasoned.

I expected you would say something like that, you men can’t see beyond your nose and forget that like beauty a fair skin also is superficial. Its like saying women clad in spotlessly white clothes are a personification of purity, I said remembering the play, “A Street Car named Desire” I had read in college.

It is true, is it not? It sounded more like am affirmation.

Then does it mean that the hearts of dark women are not pure and they are not innocent? I shot back.

Can’t say, for all I know they might be harboring a dark thought or two in their minds, he contended.

You men are highly prejudiced and don’t realize that appearances are deceptive and you cannot judge a person’s nature by the color of his or her skin, I argued.

The same news item says women are attracted to tall dark men, someone like the Mills and Boon hero, I said .

That doesn’t surprise me, said he.

What do you think are the reasons for the yardstick (for measuring beauty) being different for men and women? Shouldn’t it be the same for both? I asked unable to understand the logic behind it.

Certain things can’t be explained, he said after a long pause.

They certainly can, I asserted and I know what I am talking. Have you noticed that very rarely we see  a couple who are well matched in color, height and weight, someone made for each other? I said.

No, I don’t think I did, he parried.

Can you guess the reason for this? I said.

The answer I got  was a blank stare.

Well, the reason is simple. The “fact” is “Unlike poles attract “and “like poles repel. “ Attraction is not skin deep for women unlike it is for you men, who blindly fall for a fair complexion, I emphasized.

He appeared to ponder over what I said.

N. Meera Raghavendra Rao