My Ken Doll

There's this dad of one of the kids at school. Let's call him Ken.

He has got to be the cutest man child I have ever seen. When Ken comes to your house to drop off his daughter to play with your daughter, he knows your name and shakes your hand with a smile and a dimple and that amazing tousled hair. He's sporty without being obnoxious, lean, young, an actor (so of course, just a dream, he can't really be here, looking that cute, and we don't expect any big conversations that aren't scripted by smarter people like writers, like me). But imagine if I gave him a script of all the things I wanted him to say, and then he said them, TO ME.

We could lounge in the treehouse, laughing at my jokes, which he would deliver modestly and off-the-cuff. He'd jump down to offer someone help to carry in groceries, or pizzas, from the car, but he wouldn't ever be too far away. His cuteness would flow behind him like a cloud, and I could float down behind him, all of us dizzy from it's pink, enveloping vapor.

It doesn't matter that he's divorced, that he had his daughter at 8 years old or whenever, or that he's from Ohio, or that he probably smokes when no one's looking. I don't have to know anything more about him.

I just know when he comes over and shakes my hand, I want to give him my couch. I just want to stand there a minute longer and gaze upon his pretty face and watch him talk to other people. Is this reverse sexism? But it's so fun.