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Dear Breakup Girl,

How important is it that you and your partner are on the same wavelength academically? I met a wonderful man who treats me really well and respects and supports me. We have a lot in common, laugh a lot together, and enjoy each other's company tremendously. I hope I don't come across as a shallow person, but I am a college graduate working on a promising career in the world of finance, and he is a high school drop out. He is not dumb; he can hold his own in conversation with me and my friends who are all professional types (doctors, lawyer, corporate execs etc.). He has held a good job for the past 5 years as a diver and is doing OK financially. So far the only thing that bugs me about him is occasional bad grammar. I am 26, and it's just that all my life I have had this personal rule that I will not date a man whose level of education is below mine. I just assumed (rightly or wrongly) that it would make for better compatibility. The one time I deviate from "my rule," I meet this guy, and I swear he treats me better than any of those guys who I consider to be in keeping with "my rule." We have tons of fun, being with him is so effortless; everything just naturally falls into place; it is like he is the other half of me. Plus, he is self-confident and really secure with himself as a person. That is such a turn on because my last boyfriend was so insecure (in spite of his MBA)!

Is my rule now proven to be useless? Should it be tossed out or is there stuff that I need to be wary of but can't see because love has a way of blinding me? I really need to decide whether or not to stay in the relationship because I don't want to hurt him in the long run. We have been seeing each other for four months, and he has proclaimed that I am the girl of his dreams. Dating someone casually is one thing, but now things are starting to get serious; I don't want to cause him any harm.

Breakup Girl, can you please give me some points to consider in deciding whether to continue or to walk away?

--What's Education Got To Do With It

Dear What's,

Yes.

1. A diver! Are you in Next Stop, Wonderland? If so, keep him. Hate to give away the end, but it's fate.

2. I so understand the grammar peeve -- "irregardless" is my Kryptonite -- but, um, lots of well-educated people use bad grammar. (HEINOUS of me to mention it, but, um, we actually had to tidy up yours a teensy bit.) The bad grammar wouldn't bug you the same way if he were a "professional type;" that is, it wouldn't seem to remind you of or "prove" something.

3. Flipside: lots of MBAs are insecure. But you knew that.

4. 2 and 3 said, sometimes, yes, off-paper compatibility and on-paper achievement go hand-in-hand. Sometimes. I'm sorry, you guys, but they do. Sometimes: resume/diploma stuff is the parchment embodiment of common interests, backgrounds, ambitions, expectations. Sometimes.

5. 4 said -- especially with so many "sometimes"s --  you can use "academics" as a blurred guideline, one slippery clue of many ... not a hard and fast rule. You should have standards, yes. As in: you should not date down. You should feel gotten, understood. You should have zippy, engaging conversations. You should want to bounce things off each other. You should not constantly, teeth-grindingly, ego-boostingly feel like The Smart One.

Is that what you have here? You tell me. But your rules should be about how you two relate, not where you two matriculate. You and he --  not New Haven and Cambridge --  are the points that measure that "wavelength."

Love,
Breakup Girl

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