Waiting on Some Beautiful Boy

A couple summers ago I played a game with my best friend while we were on a trip together with her little sister and another friend. It started out simply enough: name two people and make the other pick which is better looking. It sounds shallow, but we were coming from somewhere filled with people we didn't know and we noticed that, although our opinions about extremes tended to match up, the middle got a little fuzzy.

For the last several years I've had a fairly solid idea of what is likely to make a guy attractive to me (i.e. slender but athletic build, striking cheekbones, a solid jaw, elegant dishevelment, etc). Also, I am very stingy with deeming someone good looking; they have to be pretty fine and a little non-traditional to earn my recognition. My friend is a little less reluctant.

Over the course of the game, it changed, out of necessity. It became: name two people and decide who is more attractive and who is more good looking. Most people would probably say that these are the same. I once thought so too. But I realized during this game that they are fundamentally different. Good looks are traditional. They are measured by physical symmetry and social constructs more or less. There is, of course, always the bias of personal preference. Attractiveness is a different monster. Attractiveness is driven by personal preference and--whether consciously or not--factors in personality, humor, confidence, etc.

I noticed during the game that my answers for good looking and attractive often did not match up. But these were people I knew. I could factor in the more important stuff like personality. More recently, and more disturbingly, I've noticed some of my more material or fashion preference boundaries for guys being blurred.

In general these rules must be kept:
-No man should ever have hair long enough to pull back into a solid ponytail.
-No person (male or female) should ever wear socks with sandals, at least not outside their homes.
-Guys should not get their ears pierced.
-Sweatpants and leggings (without anything over them) cannot be pulled off and should be left at home.
-Jeans should not be worn beneath the butt.
-Facial hair should be used sparingly and should not take carefully planned shapes.

Basically all I really ask is that people put some effort into getting ready in the morning. Take a shower and put on some real clothes please. No offense intended to anyone. But unfortunately 2,3,4 seem to be popular on the UO campus.

The really horrifying point, and the main point, is that my strictness on these rules has waned. Okay, not on all of them. I still scoff every time I see socks and sandals. But I noticed the other day that I found a guy attractive that had his hair in a ponytail. Mind you it was a very small ponytail, but the realization was a tad upsetting. It also should be said that I found this man highly attractive when he had not only a normal haircut, but a fabulous one, because with his face he could pull off anything. But like I said, this is not okay. I have standards. I have also become more lax with the general presence of facial hair as long as it follows the rules. Scruff is okay. Mountain man or sculpted, not okay. And the dirty, almost greasy look? Not as gross as it used to be.

I want to know what this all means. Does it mean that as long as you are decently good looking and confident you can get away with more? When does horrifying become refreshingly bold? I still don't prefer any of these things and I am resistant to the idea that my standards are slipping. But. Sigh. I suppose I'll figure it out eventually. Until then I'll be "waiting on some beautiful boy to save [me]."