I for one, believe that the human need for love and romance is indomitable, and two recent articles — one focusing on young women’s point of view, the other on that of young men — in the New York Times’s Generation Faithful series totally back me up.

In Saudi Arabia, as the articles describe, the opposite sexes live nearly entirely separate lives — the harsh and hardly women-friendly restrictions are a topic for another post — in a culture that values carefully arranged marriages in support of large familial groups. The details herein are fascinating, particularly for revealing the ways that young Saudis do yearn for romance, love, and intimacy even as they embrace traditional and religious restrictions against co-ed interaction before marriage. They also show the extent to which technology is aiding and abetting forbidden exchanges between young men and women with the same — or perhaps even more intense — excitement, hope, and fears shared by people everywhere. I mean: they’re prohibited from flirting, but their ring tones all play love songs.

One question I was left with: what happens to the romance of the anticipated and the forbidden once these young folks do get married? Conventional wisdom holds that arranged marriages often do form the basis for solid, lasting bonds. If so, can they offer some pointers? Or should we at least be more open-minded when our moms want to fix us up?

Show of hands. How many of us have not called in sick to work after a breakup? When you can’t even pick yourself up off the kitchen floor, how can you be expected to cowboy up in your cubicle?

So, FINALLY, someone has come to their senses and started offering “heartache leave.” (I know BG covered this in brief a ways back, but I’m still awash in admiration.) The Japanese PR firm Hime & Company (www.himeclub.com, for those of you who read Japanese), decided to start offering its employees this benefit because it found that those going through a breakup are often distracted at work, leading to costly mistakes and strange, distracting behavior.

The time for recovery is set by your age. Those in their early 20s only get one day off. (I guess on the assumption that people in their 20s get over heartache more quickly.) The mid-20s rank two days off; those 30 and over get a full three. I don’t know about you, but the last time I went through a breakup — and I fall into that last demographic — I needed about a week before I could sit at a desk without systematically snapping all my pencils in half.

Leave it to Japan — which can add this to its list of welcome innovations including smart cars, Hello Kitty, and raw fish — to understand the impact of heartache on the workplace.
I can’t even get my employer to recognize that my work suffers when I have the flu.

According to a recent study by Solutions Research Group, 37% of laptop users (and would-be better lovers) bring the contraptions into bed. Work productivity increases (good) at the cost of sexy time between nighttime companions (wait, bad! not worth it!).

The obvious takeaway: do not allow gadgets between the sheets. Unless, you know, it’s that kind of gadget.

Anyone above the age of 16 may not have noticed, but prom season is in full swing right now. Perhaps no place in the Land of Breakup is more fertile than prom, where so many relationships reach their denouement. So it shouldn’t be surprising that Rob Spillane has compiled a book of prom memoirs by various and assorted writers entitled The Time of My Life: Writers on the Heartbreak, Hormones, and Debauchery of the Prom. I haven’t read the book (yet!) but I must say that the cover — a random collage of prom-goers from the powder-blue-suited 70s up through the more modern vamp-goth ensembles of the zeros — totally made me do one of those huge did-she-just-walk-into-prom-wearing-THAT? double-takes.

Fortunately, those of you in New York City can hear these stories right from the folks who wrote them tonight at McNally Robinson (50 Prince Street, near Lafayette), at 7 PM. The free reading features writers Cintra Wilson, Walter Kirn and Mike Albo. If it weren’t for the fact that I have to work (darn bills keep demanding to be paid), I’d be there with shoes-dyed-to-match-my-dress on. Instead, I’ll task you all with going, then coming back here and reporting on it. Now go forth and boogie…under the tinfoil stars and giant heart made of balloons, of course.

Remember that Seinfeld ep wherein Jerry gets shunned by his buildingmates for refusing to engage in the “kiss hello?” Likewise, I have long been made uncomfy by physical gestures of affection absent any underlying, genuine, time-tested personal connection. (In fact, I finally had to make myself stop with the rebound-b.f. crap a few years back, because it was too much new-hands-feel, new-person-smell too soon.)

But am I in the minority? I first heard about cuddle parties — group events featuring PJ-clad guests and consensual, non-sexual hugging, hand-holding, nuzzling, spooning, and so on — about five years ago, and at least according to this report from Philadelphia’s CBS affiliate, they are still going strong. Clearly, they have touched, non-sexually, a nerve.

I dunno. Call me posh, but when I get the need for physical contact, I’d much rather shell out for a massage. Anybody with me? Who’s been to one of these things? Am I just being a prude?

No, you aren’t the only ones! Lots of couples try to spice up or revive their relationships, specifically the s.e.x. part, by sharing some porn. If you get lucky and find a tip-top specimen, it can be a very inspiring experience. Unfortunately, the market is glutted by low production quality and generally sub-standard fare. But if you’re looking for something unique, something artistic, perhaps even avant garde — or if your partner happens to be an environmentalist, an entomologist, or either Bjork or Matthew Barney — then the Sundance Channel has just the thing for you.

It’s called Green Porno and it stars no less than certified fox Isabella Rossellini. Tagline: “LIVE NUDE BUGS!”
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Here, your weekly installment of Ask Lynn, BG’s alter ego’s column at MSN.com (powered by Match.com). This week, we meet “Never Had a Boyfriend,” who … well, you know. What she has had are plenty of hookups. But how to upgrade from “casual” to … formal? Read her whole letter, and Lynn’s advice (hint: let something develop before you wind up squashed on some couch) and then come back here to comment!

Bonus: for much, much more advice to other Never-Had-Boyfriends — and Never-Had-Girlfriends — click here, and here. You are so not alone. I mean, okay, maybe you are right now, but really, you are so not.

Paul & Jackie return! And baby makes three…

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My dad has done a lot of things for me. He taught me to drive. He bought me my first car. He changed the oil in said car. But of all the car-related things my dad has done for me, he has not once, in ALL the years I’ve known him, ever set fire to my ex-boyfriend’s garage. Not once.

Should I feel, I don’t know, somehow deprived? Like my dad wasn’t involved enough in my life?

Apparently the heart is more resilient than we all give it credit for. At least that’s according to a new study from Northwestern University.

Eli Finkel, assistant professor of psychology, studied college students over a nine-month period and discovered that on average people who are anticipating what their breakup will be like grossly overestimate their level of distress. He says that is especially true of those who are strongly in love when they make their forecasts.

“So those people are especially wrong,” said Finkel. “They think they are going to be devastated, and they are much less devastated than they thought.”

It turns out, in most cases it only takes a few days for us — men and women alike (the study revealed no difference in sex) — to start focusing on all the bad things that annoyed us about our partners. And in our minds we start exaggerating how terrible those things were. (Like how much he hated your cat. There’s something seriously wrong with a man who can hate a little tiny, sweet kitty THAT much. Seriously. No really, you’re better off without him.)

Though to be fair, the study does go on to say that the same is true of many dreaded human experiences. We anticipate that many things — surgery, a trip to the DMV — will be much worse than they actually are.

No, wait, sorry. The DMV will actually be worse than you imagined.