I saw a movie this week. It was the latest in long-running series called Father of Four. The series has been running since the Fifties. As the kids grow up, they just replace them with new actors. Anyway, in this episode, there was a romance. What struck me watching the movie was that the male romantic lead was visibly shorter than the female lead. In the Danish film, there was no attempt to hide it. They had them walk side by side through a meadow. The man is NOT in charge. He is a not a Frenchman who will pursue you to the ends of the earth. If you are a romance novelist, the Danish man is not your dream man. He will cook and help with the housework. He will take being a father seriously. In fact, you may have to force yourself on him. Danish women carry their own packages Why are Danish men like this? Danish women, they say, like to do things for themselves. They can carry their own packages. So, the Danish male approach is largely passive. They wait to see if the woman is interested. Danish men do not want to offend women. But they can occasionally err a bit on the soft side. For example, a few weeks ago, we had a big storm in Denmark, and it knocked down some large trees. Before the local government came to collect them, some people were sawing off bits for free firewood, or to make furniture, or other arts and crafts project. On our street, there was a very large tree down, and as I was walking by that Saturday, I saw a young couple trying to take part of it home. The small, slender young woman was sawing away at this big tree with an old-fashioned manual saw, while her boyfriend was just standing there, smiling, with his hands in his pockets. Maybe he had a back injury — he was about 25, so maybe had a very youthful back injury. Or maybe he was a big wimp who was willing to let his girlfriend saw a giant tree stump while he stood there, acting like a giant tree stump. And here is the universitypost adm.
