| Clearly, this was the voice of experience. And it made me think what, if anything, I could tell my own daughter to keep her from making a mistake someday. But the problem with the "never marry a man..." list is that it approaches the notion of an ideal man from a purely negative context. Rather than telling my daughter what to beware of, I'd suggest that she marry a gentleman. But then what, exactly, is a "gentleman" in this day and age? British-born American writer Oliver Herford once remarked that a gentleman is someone "who never hurts anyone's feelings unintentionally." (This is always said with a wink so that the listener understands that it's okay to insult someone, so long as the recipient is deserving.) Another wag defined a gentleman as "someone who knows how to play the accordion, but chooses not to." A bit more specificity might be helpful. And in that department, it's hard to top John Walter Wayland's definition written back in 1899... The True Gentleman is the man whose conduct proceeds from good will and an acute sense of propriety, and whose self-control is equal to all emergencies; who does not make the poor man conscious of his poverty, the obscure man of his obscurity, or any man of his inferiority or deformity; who is himself humbled if necessity compels him to humble another; who does not flatter wealth, cringe before power, or boast of his own possessions or achievements; who speaks with frankness but always with sincerity and sympathy; whose deed follows his word; who thinks of the rights and feelings of others, rather than his own; and who appears well in any company, a man with whom honor is sacred and virtue safe. Pretty much says it all, doesn't it? Perhaps the important thing for all single men and women is to look inward and cultivate these qualities of character. Doing so would make them worthy to receive the affections of their ideal mate, should they have the good fortune of encountering him or her. Dr. Randy Pausch - thhe author of The Last Lecture - succumbed to pancreatic cancer at 47. He, too, struggled with these questions and left behind this time capsule of advice for his daughter, Chloe, who was 2 at the time: "When men are romantically interested in you, it's really simple. Just ignore everything they say and only pay attention to what they do." That's good advice. And not a bad way of sizing up people generally. Good investing, Alex | 
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