It’s not that we want to know we are smarter than our boo, we just secretly want to think that we are. Like my girlfriend said, it’s about control. Some people, smart or dumb, don’t want to be challenged. They want a partner who will go along with whatever they say. If that is the game, then the real issue is not intelligence but who gets to steer the relationship. That little power shift says a lot. Once you see it, you cannot really unsee it.

I have this one girlfriend who only dates dumb guys. “They are easier to control,” she says. She trained, yes trained, on sorry sap to perm her hair. Every six weeks he’d willingly put on his plastic gloves and work the perm in her hair as she sat on a stool in her kitchen. When you purposely seek out a mate who is missing a few cards in their deck, what does that say about you? It says you may care more about obedience than about partnership. That is not always a good sign.

Not all dumb people are easy to spot. It usually take them working on a project, playing with a gadget, trying to master technology, filling out an application when you first catch a glimpse of their ineptness. You are shocked and disappointed. One of those moments was with the same “Cup of Tea” guy. For the life of him, he didn’t know how to e-mail using BCC. Little gaps like that can suddenly change how you see somebody.

I would get e-mails with 200 other addresses on some chain letter type -ish. Finally, I told him. “You know, there is a way to e-mail without showing everyone’s e-mail address.” “Really, I didn’t know that. Say, can you make me another cup of tea. Just the way I like it?” If you can’t ignore that kind of thing, you start seeing the whole person differently. Sometimes the smallest details reveal the biggest truths. That is when the fantasy starts to crack.