Jack Sheehan on the posturing that goes on when guys get together and the subject turns to women

Sunday, Dec. 31, 2006 | 7:04 a.m.

This being the last day of 2006, I'm ready to clear the attic of my mind and reflect on a period of time when I wasn't nearly as content as I am today. It's all part of gaining perspective as we charge into the new year.

Several years ago, when I was 40 and single, I went out to dinner once a week with a group of successful Las Vegas businessmen. It was sort of a male-bonding thing, with good friends getting together to network, share war stories and commiserate over the types of issues that concern all men in the prime of life: namely health, finances and relationships with women.

Naturally it was the last of these three topics of conversation that dominated the conversation. The first two were just ice-breakers each week before we got to the good stuff.

Of the nine men who regularly attended these dinners, five were divorced, three were married and one had never been married, so there was an open field of personal issues to discuss.

Most of the spicy material was provided by the divorced guys, who out of basic male insecurity and the bruised egos that go with a failed marriage were always trying to convince themselves and others at the table that in the days since their marriages had ended their lives had become an ongoing bacchanalian celebration.

It wasn't that we divorced guys were offering explicit details about our dating experiences - the fascination with that sort of thing fades away for most men in their 20s or early 30s. Rather, we were subtly trying to convince the married guys that they were missing out on a wild world out there where sexually liberated women were more than willing to hook up on a first or second date.

The married guys would always respond with something like, "It must be nice," while the divorced guys were privately hoping that they could find a partner who could provide them happiness and stability like the married guys possessed.

We always want what we can't have, or what we perceive to be the missing ingredient in the ongoing quest for perfect happiness.

In practice if not in theory, the married guys were the bigger flirts. Invariably, when an attractive woman would approach our table and ask what the group was up to, the married guys would beam like vapor lights and do everything in their power to impress her, while the single guys would hang back and act slightly above it all. I never quite knew what to make of it, but I'm sure some sociologist who had studied the mating habits of peacocks could provide an answer.

Was it that the married guys knew that by being considered "safe," they could get away with more, or that they had license to pour on the charm without being perceived as having an ulterior motive? Or was it that the single guys felt the best strategy was to play it cool and survey the game like a veteran poker player, just in case the woman had her eye on them?

I do know that after the first bottle of wine was ordered at our table, anecdotes would pour forth as freely as the chardonnay that were as rife with gossip and innuendo as anything you could hear under hair dryers at the corner beauty parlor.

One could have published a daily scandal sheet and brought down reputations and careers from the stuff that passed between us. (Which reminds me that when the recent story erupted about Gov.-elect Jim Gibbons and whatever did or didn't happen between him and the cocktail waitress outside McCormick & Schmick's last October, I was not in the least surprised that both local papers covered it as though a tsunami had washed away Southern Nevada.)

Face it: When it comes to escaping the challenges and inconveniences of our daily lives, there is almost nothing as effective as gossiping about the travails of others.

Oddly, the most damning stories told in our little dinner group were on ourselves. The things we admitted to one another embarrass me even now, some 15 years after my last attendance at one of the gatherings. I know at least three of us in the group were Roman Catholics, which explained our own personal need to confess, but there were also two Jews and a Mormon, so it's hard to pawn this proclivity off on religion.

The never-married guy in our group entertained us one night with a saga about how his fiancee had snuck off for a romantic skiing weekend with one of his business associates. So what did our friend do when he found out? He ambushed the couple in an airport parking lot, cold-cocked the offending philanderer with one punch and ended up in jail. But at least he got the engagement ring back.

Another of our gang confessed how his girlfriend had tracked him during a clandestine afternoon soiree with another woman, left a note on his dashboard informing him that he'd been busted, and then let the air out of his tires. As upset as he was about this, he managed to patch it up with his main squeeze the next day and swore to her he would never be unfaithful again. The promise lasted less than a week.

It's alarming to think of the games people play when they are going through the selection process of finding a mate. The posturing, the half-truths and the strategies we employ either to impress or deceive members of the opposite sex know few limits. We often do things that are so inconsistent with our normal patterns of behavior that we view ourselves in the third person. We wonder, who was that person who acted so stupidly?

With all the joys that accompany finding a wonderful loving mate, as I was lucky enough to do 13 years ago, comes the additional relief of knowing I no longer have to indulge in all the posturing that goes with being a single male on the prowl.

That, without question, is the hardest work I've ever done.