Karl Klockars

Prologue:  The past few MGGTPUG can be found here, here, and here.

I should have known this instinctively.  This should almost be a gimme – but I believe it’s easy to get caught up in the rush to hit up sports bars and movie theaters and singles clubs and so on.  It’s easy to breeze right by ground zero for a demographic of women that shouldn’t be overlooked.  That subsection of women is into drinking wine, eating cheese, listening to music, enjoying nice summer evenings outdoors with friends, and things of this nature.

They’re smart, cultured, and probably make more money than you do.  If not, they’re down for drinking bottles of grape outdoors, so perhaps a you can get a bottle of Mad Dog 20/20 and take her to the train tracks.  I speak, of course, of the women of Ravinia.  Gentlemen – learn from my mistakes.  And read on.

I’m almost embarrassed that I didn’t think of this earlier.  I mean, it’s right there.  Well, right there by the train tracks, a train that can on occasion be too packed with fancypants yuppies to have your tickets taken.  Free rides, baby! I digress:  On that train every summer are dozens of women wearing flowing skirts and spaghetti-strap tanktops.  They carry small coolers, bags of crackers and tapenade.  And if they’re not laden down with a stroller holding their well-coiffed yuppie spawn, gentlemen, then so begins the sport.

I’ve been to Ravinia only a couple times, but both events were well populated with wine-swilling cheese eaters.  Blankets, small portable tables, candleabras and more, all spread out on the lawn ready for downing Chablis and Merlot and then intake of havarti and brie.  If it were less well-mannered, it could be a real party.

Alas, the venue doesn’t lend itself to letting your freak flag fly, so you’re just going to have to imagine these ladies downing whiskey in a dive bar before you actually experience it – a complete 180 from how most of my friends and I would get to know the girls we’d try to pick up.

Guys – what you have to realize is that even though this isn’t the normal location for you to try to gain the affections of women, you have to play the odds.  And let’s be honest:  there are indeed hundreds of females in attendance at any Ben Folds or Jonny Lang performance who’ve dragged their significant others along for a winesoaked shindig where they trot him out in front of her best girlfriends to prove how much of a catch he is.  (And, of course, revel in the ensuing jealousy that always follows when the guy doesn’t seem like he hates every second of the experience.  He’s so dreamy!)

But then, ask yourself – are all of those aforementioned girlfriends attached?  Can you swoop in and prove yourself similarly enlightened?  Learn to talk about blue cheese and a bottle of Cabernet Savignon that doesn’t have the Charles Shaw label stuck to it.  You’re golden, boys. There are a tremendous amount of people there, and while most might be the middle-aged couple who only goes to Ravinia because it’s safe and you can sit down, don’t discount the smaller wedge of population that’s there looking for a guy that might enjoy having her take him out to dinner.  The Ravinia woman is the kind of woman I imagine picking up the check.  She’s empowered, man.

The Ravinia woman who’s there solo is also the kind of woman who’s okay with drinking alone – in public.  The kind of woman who appreciates the finer things, but still goes out and sits in the grass and listens to music.  (No, it’s not Slayer or Motorhead.  Deal with it.)  She can be fun, although most likely in a somewhat inhibited, flowery-print-dress kind of way. Maybe she listens to smartypants artists.  And I’m sorry, but she might listen to more Dave Matthews than you’re comfortable with.  More likely than not, this is not the girl that you pick up at a Machine Head show, friends of mine.  And for what it’s worth, you’ll be much richer for getting out of your comfort zone.  Now here, try some of this fruit salad and check out that girl in the culottes and blouse over there.

I never saw fit to end up at Ravinia during my single-guy years.  And being a western suburbanite, it was kinda out of the way of my usual roundup of St. Charles bars and the Stratford Square mall.  So imagine my surprise when I saw the buffet of differently-demographic’ed females surrounding me while I pounded crackers with my cheap swill wine.  (Aside:  At a Ravinia show, I looked at my wife with a mouthful of parmesan crisp and asked, “Does this make us yuppies?”  She answered, in all her wisdom:  “No – we just like cheese.”)  How little I knew.

This is why I hope to be able to pass on to you, Gentle Single Male Reader, the wisdom and experience I have acquired in my past few years of married bliss.  Ah, to know then what I could have told my past “me” now, then, or something.  You’d have drank less Gallo from that big jug, you’d have dated girls that knew their Mahler from their Metallica, and from the shoe store to the outdoor concert spectacular, you’d have known so much more.

Please note:  None of these suggestions are valid during any future Backstreet Boys or New Kids On The Block performances.  Every year, Ravinia gets a wild hair across the crack of their collective ass and books some random act.  If you appreciate making performance art, try to act like you would for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.  Sit down, be quiet, applaud politely and enjoy your Chardonnay.  Who cares if they just did The Right Stuff?  Wait- what are you doing there, anyways?