Give The Guy A Chance

As you surely know by now, my niece Aubrey and nephews Craig and Sean live by my sage wisdom and soak up all my knowledge like sponges.  They typically don’t like to make decisions without seeking advice from their good old Aunt Jill.

Naturally, I don’t like to interfere, but since they come begging for my help, I sometimes gently sway them in a particular direction.  I have been particularly helpful with dating advice.

I felt like it was critical to help the boys understand what kind of girl was acceptable and good enough for them.  I started them off with a strict no unicorns policy.  If a girl believed in unicorns and My Little Pony and such, she was certainly too flighty.  Craig nodded and pretended to listen, and Sean agreed with me 110%.

As far as I know Sean has not dated a unicorn-loving, Hello Kitty kind of girl.  I have no idea about Craig’s dating life because he is the strong silent type.  Aubrey never said a word about her love life either until about a year ago, when she Met Someone.  Someone’s name is Bill.  This Bill.  That Bill Character.  This Bill Person.  Hmmm.

I have been highly suspicious because obviously no one is good enough for my smart, beautiful, funny niece.  Aubrey’s parents, who are unbelievably gullible, fell for This Bill right away.  He’s a nice guy, he is really good to Aubrey, we like him.  Blah blah blah.

Thank goodness Aubrey has me as the voice of reason.  I vowed to get to the bottom of This Bill Situation.  I met him briefly before but had not had a chance to really get to know him through my patented methods of fear and intimidation.  But there he was Thursday, captive for an entire family Thanksgiving, and I finally got to the root of the problem.  The problem with Bill is…there isn’t one.

Bill is nice looking and a good kid and adores Aubrey.  He’s polite and funny and fits right in with our family (as in, he did not run away screaming).  Bill knows how to clinch a deal too.  When he and Aubrey were headed out I assumed he was going to shake my hand.  But he actually gave me a big hug and told me how nice it was to meet me.  Can you believe this guy?  Infuriating, right?

Aubrey has a familiar personality; she’s a bit hyper, a tad high maintenance, and slightly dramatic.  What she needs is a guy who is calm in the eye of the storm; a guy who sits back and just lets her be, a guy who doesn’t take a fluffy cloud and try to pin it down.  Bill seems to be all those things, and in that sense he reminds me a lot of Dan.  I can think of no higher praise.

I would be scared to death to write all this if I thought for a minute that Aubrey read my blog, but luckily she does not.  Still, shhhhhhhh.