Did your parents mess up your view of relationships?

My mother and father divorced when I was eight. After living without my parents married to one another, I decided I didn't have to get married either. Why when the outcome can be so messy?

Years went by and then one day I met a man and we moved in with one another. We had a daughter. Such a cute little thing but had some serious stomach issues as a baby... whew. We shared the responsibilities with each other. He took out the trash while I cooked. I cleaned the bathrooms and he cleaned the litter box. We took turns changing diapers and giving baths. Everything was perfect or so I thought. It all happened so fast. I never saw it coming.

He asked me to marry him.

What? I asked. I thought we were happy?All this time I had been avoiding this question and here it was. What was I to do? I loved him, yes. I wanted to spend my time with him, we have a blast together. I wanted to lie down every night beside him, he has a nice tummy to put my head on. He didn't like to take baths that much at the time, seriously that issue has gotten better... yay! I had to think about this one.

After the years of dealing with my parents mistakes and their love life, was I going to fall right into their footsteps and get married? What if it didn't work out? My daughter would be the one to suffer the most, I thought. Happily she would be living her life, thinking everything was hunky dory and then one day her parents would get tired of one another and they would split. I wasn't sure if I wanted to place that on her. After some thinking and then some shopping, I started to change my mind. I would have to take a chance on this love thing and in the end I might lose but he might lose too.

There is a funny, funny thing about marriage. After the years pass your love does change as some people worry about. It flips and floats and meanders along. At times you will get on one another's last nerve but you know what? It's cool. Send him out of town for a weekend with the boys. I like to think of it as family and a family is all I ever wanted.

Having seen what your parents went through in their marriage, did it ever hinder your love decisions?

Watching them, did it make you more aware of what you didn't want in your relationships?

What comes between your Calvin's? Looks like a lot of men...

In New York City, men, women and children are getting more than just an eyeful from the latest racy ad Calvin Klein has posted on billboards around the city. Many are hearing an earful and speaking candidly about the photos. The photo shows a young girl without a shirt kissing one fellow while another looks on ready to spur into action all the while another male looks as if he has already gotten his fill and is resting by the wayside.

"It's pretty provocative," added local resident Alicia Shay, 24. "Just the positioning of them all -- she's kissing him, the other guy has his hands down her pants, they're all misty even. It's really inappropriate." [myfoxny.com]

"I think it's obscene," said Rachelle Brunn, who was passing by the extremely large billboard in Manhattan's Soho neighborhood. "They always have ads that are pushing the envelope, but this one is the worst I've seen since I've been here. My biggest concern is that it gives teens the wrong idea." [Yahoo]

Calvin Klein has always taken risks with his choice of advertising media. Brooke Shields posed while fifteen in which she delivered the line, "You know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing." In 1999, Klein launched a campaign for a children's underwear line that depicted two small boys only in their underwear. Recently Eva Mendes racy ads for Obsession were pulled from the American market.

A Calvin Klein spokesperson said the "intention was to create a very sexy campaign that speaks to our targeted demographic."

The question I ask has to be about the target demographic. It seems as if the target demographic ranges in an age bracket of teen to early twenty's. Are these pictures not showing one girl rolling around on a velvet sofa, sweating, topless and making out with one gentleman while lying on top of another? Are these pictures not showing that while the girl is making out with the one guy, another has his hands down her pants? You can say what you want about the guy on the ground but it seems as if he was involved in the romp at some point, heh?

With the target demographic being teenagers to early twenty-year-olds is this what parents want there children to lust after? Marketing these jeans with half naked people all the while embraced in sexual activity to young teens and early twenty somethings seems irresponsible to me. Are we supposed to want our teenagers involved in menage a trios or group sex acts? Even as a young twenty something, could these ads promote the idea that getting naked for a bunch of men is the thing to do?

Are these ads irresponsible?

"Guys Only Trips" Maybe the guys don't need the women? Women, what if we all just walked away?

It's funny when your lover or significant other wants to tell you something knowing your response will not be a favorable one. They will just drop it into the conversation so quickly you might miss it if you are not careful. Last night after returning from my long weekend in Memphis were I was a bridesmaid for one of my best friends in the world, Joe and I were cooking dinner in the kitchen. Preparing the chicken and pasta mixture, hubby drops it that the trip to New York we have been talking about for over a year has now turned into a men's only trip. While speaking with his father about seeing the New York Yankees play the Detroit Tigers in July and recruiting a group to go, I guess he forgot to mention that his wife had been in on this plan also. I have been trying to get to New York for the last year in order to see Wicked on Broadway. I have too. I love, love, love the book and have heard the musical is a must-see! He waits until I am dropping the pasta into the boiling water to tell me this. Argh! I could just run away and not look back. Men and their "Men's Only" stuff. I think the reason women started their nights out was because of the men always just hanging with "The Boys." Why do you think golf was invented? For men to get away from their wives?

I should have known this would happen. With it being the Age of Aquarius and more and more men and women are taking "Guys Only" trips or "Girls Only" trips, why should I think that a woman could be invited along with a bunch of men? If you have known me as long as my hubby has, you would know I could care less how drunk men get when they decide to "Party." For the last ten years I have travelled the country following Phish and watching men and women plaster their minds with booze and drugs. You can do what you want to do. I could care less that if you don't care about your health, you have no one to blame but yourself when it comes down to it. I'm not your mother. So to be told I can't go on a "Guys Trip" because I may become all "girly" on them as they drink their brains away, I am angered. Very, very angered.

When did social parties and trips become all one gendered? Are men so scared that women will hone on their drunken doozies and stripper club trips, we are no longer allowed to travel with them? How many nights a week or month do men need to hang with just guys? What do you think would happen if the women of the world just walked away one night when the men were out on one of their "Guys Nights?" No dinners on the table at night, no clean toilet seats, no back scratches or back rubs, no sex?

How often does your guy do the "Guys Night Out" or "Guys Only Trips?" Why can't we all just get along?