Sean #9: Final Exams

I'm puzzled by one particular idea about love: It seems to be commonly held that love is like pregnancy. You have it or you don't. And once you have it, well, there's nothing you can do about it. From that point on, you are only a victim of forces over which you have no control. Infidenlity? Well, it just happened. You didn't mean to fall in love, but you did, and then...[helpless shoulder shug]. Finally figured out the object of your affection is criminal, addicted, abusive, narcissistic? What choice do you have? You're in love.

The problem is that no one seems to appreciate how easy it is to fall in love. A twelve-year-old can do it. Over another twelve-year-old. You've seen twelve-year-old boys. A creature surely only a mother could love, and yet...there they are: the girls. In love with love. How many seasons of The Bachelor have there been? (Wikipedia says it's the 17th, but the Bachelor claims to be celebrating its 20th. What, them? Exaggerate? Promote something as more than it is? Surely not.) How many solo limo rides? How many girls/women/boys/men have left in tears, hearts broken because they were "in love"?

Now we can add one more. One that fell way too hard, way too soon, based on way too little. We were worried about Ashley from the beginning, weren't we? All those trust issues that seemed to be all she could talk about? The way she decided to take down her abandonment defenses at the precise moment at which she was at the greatest risk of actual abandonment? The way she was so thrilled to say "I can trust!" in the middle of a cocktail party at which she was a guest with a half dozen other women also dating the man in whom she's choosing to put all her trust? Methinks she's proven to herself that the world is untrustworthy all along by putting her trust only in sure-to-fail people and situations. Poor Ashley. I can't make fun. I'm putting about 75% probability on her being the next Bachelorette (tragic past, heartbreak, learning to love again--you can see the promotions already), but I hope not. It's time for therapy, and then for choosing one of about 10,000 men who would be thrilled to take responsibility for that trust.

Of course, the problem may have been entirely that Sean said during the opening sequence that he pictured them living together in "a little house in Dallas." Silly. There are no little houses in Dallas.

But let's back up to see how Sean arrived at his decision. He said at the beginning of the dates that "Traveling is always a test." We heard this gem as he walked along a palm-shaded path in one of the world's greatest resorts in one of the world's most beautiful tropical destinations. Is there a trick to this test? Does it only look easy? Let's see.

Lindsey's test questions:

• How will you react to dyed chicks? 
• Will you eat a bug?
• How does our relationship stack up to the ones I had in high school?
• Will you let a monkey take food out of your hand?
• Will you be endearingly embarrassed about expressing your feelings?

Pass! It's a good thing we have tests. Such a useful way to prove everlasting companionship! Sean learns that Lindsey will do/eat anything to impress him on a high-stakes date and that she has a normal human reaction to cute primates. He says he feels like he's "with my high school sweetheart," which is "just what I'm looking for in a marriage." I would be super-interested in any accounts of your most memorable high school relationship and what it would look like with both of you at, say, 40, with two teenage children who hate you and a father-in-law whose failed business has required him to move in with you and a dog that has just shredded the sofa. I think he's got it right, though, as proven by the adolescent awkwardness she has about saying how she feels (as opposed to telling him, grownup-fashion, that the situation makes it hard to behave normally). The result? A lot of uncomfortable pauses, a bizarre performance interruption, and finally, a forced blurt in the fantasy suite: "Iloveyou." Blap. There it is.

I found myself pretty much alone last week in being annoyed with Baby Lindsey. Stickin' with it, though. And I can absolutely see Sean ending up with her.

Ashley's test questions:

• How many ways can you find to compare our date experiences to your own trust "journey"? (No right answer, and it's unclear whether coming up with more or fewer results is the objective.)
• How will you react to swimming around in the dark with me through a well-known cave with a TV production crew in full knowledge of where we are every minute?
• How all-in are you, exactly, with this one-sided and extremely risky relationship?

Fail! To prove you were over your trust issues and that they would not haunt us for the entirety of our married lives you were supposed to NOT TALK ABOUT THEM ANYMORE. Oops. Surely you can see the confusion. Nice work on the cave/trust journey comparisons, though. The cave is like life! It's dark and unknown! I'm taking a risk here! I'm terrified and uncomfortable! You have to let go to fall in love! As painful as it was to watch her leave at the end of the show, I take comfort in Ashley's unwillingness to be intimate with someone while there were "still two other girls out there." In spite of all the gushing about Sean being her husband and the love of her life, it's clear that reality had a toehold in there somewhere. I've always thought the one who gets sent home right after the fantasy suites date feels worse than anyone else. Heartbreak doubled by regret. I hope Ashley has been spared the regret, at least. Now to the therapy.

Catherine's test questions:

• Can you lounge around on a boat, go for a splash and snorkel, and then out to dinner?

Pass! Well, golly. Anyone could pass that test. I have, in fact. It's super easy. Maybe the question for Catherine was whether the Fun Girl could have enough fun on a pretty routine vacation day. Catherine's a gamer. If you want adventure, this is your girl. If you want the girl to still be there in a year or two...maybe not. (P.S./A.D.D.: I do wonder how Sean's keeping his strength up with all these dinners he's not eating.)

And now, the essay question! Please, in thirty seconds or less, tell Sean everything you want him to know about how you feel. Only, don't tell Sean. Tell some dude standing behind a camera who may or may not have showered this morning, and the prompt girl, and the guy holding microphone boom, and the girl squatting on the ground with the reflector disk. Go on, now. Stare into the camera as if you're staring into Sean's baby blues. Do it.

AAAUGH!! I hate talking into cameras. The wedding videographer, popping up at dinner, asking me to extend my good wishes to the new couple? Uncle Creepy, at the family reunion, wanting to record greetings for Aunt Annoying, who couldn't be there? I'll work the fringes at a bridal shower all evening to avoid having to give video advice to the bride at all costs. And now these girls are being told to be totally natural, completely open, perfectly articulate, and that potentially everything is riding on whether they do it well. At least, that's what Chris said was at stake. And Chris never lies. I mean, has he ever tried to mess around with the rose count?

And again, Ashley failed. Her subject? Her own insecurities, still, and the way she'd laid them ALL on Sean. She handled her heartbreak with the utmost dignity, and I hope she carries it with her into her healing. And that that healing does NOT involve a turn as the Bachelorette. But we should find out next week, right? The women tell all! Look for anorexia, extensions, and shocking highlights to identify the next Bachelorette.

On the subject of casting, though, imagine my delight on finding this in my Instagram feed (a screen capture of a screen capture, I'm afraid, but you should be able to figure it out):

Kate is still technically single, and therefore eligible for The Bachelor. Hmm...is Chris recruiting? Is some Facebook network responsible for the way Bachelor/ette contestants seem to all know each other well enough to warn each other about people who are "there for the wrong reasons" or have unresolved histories with their exes? I think Kate owes it to us to get some answers.

Time to weigh in! We've all delayed long enough sticking our necks out. Who ends up with the final rose? I'm sensing some Catherine momentum. Movement the last couple of weeks has been away from intense relationships toward the fun. The most fun? Catherine. Full disclosure: I'm TERRIBLE at picking the winners. The better money is away from whatever I've picked. So call it!

Sean #8: Taking the Bad with the Good

 My friend Landee gave me a present yesterday:

She knows me quite well. She knows I don't keep up on the news the way I should if I want to be a serious gossip blogger. Honestly, though, I don't. I'm way too lazy. (And it's not the gossip I'm actually interested in, anyway.) She, therefore--a polished, disciplined, and professional blogger--does my work for me. Allow me to illustrate. This is her mantle, or it was leading into Valentine's day. I'm sure she's already cleaned it up and gotten to work on Easter:

And yes, she made everything on it. (Instructions here.) This is mine, after I put away my Christmas decorations on Saturday:

It seemed like a good place to store some cookbooks. The candles are what I call "decorating." And yes, that is pasta in a jar. It makes a good bookend.

Clearly, this is a symbiotic relationship. Or it will be, as soon as I figure out what I contribute. Which is pretty much what we have going on with The Bachelor, right? The girls say "Oh, let me be your cleaner wrasse, and I'll swim along with you on a misty princess adventure over and under the coral rainbows! I'll clean out your gills and under your fins, and you won't eat me! And you'll make sure our life stays just like this, except without the other women, and it'll last forever! Only now you have to do it without ABC's money, or helicopters, or free use of world-class resorts. K?"

But now it's time for hometown dates, and a dose of reality: "I'll be your cleaner wrasse, and I'll swim along with you on a misty princess adventure you'll provide for me but you also have to take my everyday life and almighty freaky family (taxidermy, anyone? mortuary science? volatile brothers?), any number of whom may or may not move in with us forever, K?"

But I see no reason why I, at least, should not profit from a one-sided relationship a little longer. So before we launch into this week, here's the news I've gleaned from other people:

First, as the magazine cover says, Sean is not going to (spoiler!) give it up on the fantasy suite dates. Admirable. Especially given that inside the magazine I learned that the average Bachelor has sex with three women (anonymous sources, obvs). Are we keeping a list of reasons why these relationships don't work? And yet every one of them thinks he or she will be the curve breaker. Currently single Ali, when asked whether she'd consider doing The Bachelorette again, says "Never. I think it’s a great experience, but you learn from the first time."* Really? You need a first time? I think I've got it pretty well figured out on my own.

*Original research. I'm not a complete sponge.

Second, Tierra says she's engaged. By some remarkable coincidence that she believed would make her the winner of last week's Bachelor news cycle, a man she broke up with just before the show chose the precise moment of Sean's dismissal to show up on St. Croix and declare he wanted her back. Men love her. So...she never was really into Sean. Pff. Totally not. This is the real love. (Would she have left through the bushes if he'd shown up a day or two sooner? That kind of real?) Her brother says she's known this guy for "three or four years" and that they had a bad breakup just before The Bachelor. Hmm. I recall her also saying she dated a drug addict for five years. She's 24. My math produces some disturbing results and affirms that she does need to be at the center of someone's attention every minute. But at any rate, she's probably figuring out about now that an engagement will preclude her from being on Bachelor Pad, so this inevitable breakup may have a time fuse on it.

Enough background. To the dates! First, off to Houston and AshLee. (The convenience of the geography can't be lost on the Dallas boy. Or the preacher-parent connection. Come on.) I loved her mother's shocked-eyes reaction as AshLee started to paint in details of the dates, including that she'd "rolled around on the sand" with this boy. TMI for the parents, m'dear. You want them to flip the tables and tell you what they've been up to while you were away? All those shady, grassy fields? But, showing slightly more discretion than that, Ashley's dad only asks Sean, "Do you love my daughter?" NOOO! Does he know NOTHING about the Rules? Very helpful Lindsay (reader, not Bachelorette) told me last week that the "don't yell and hold up your hand" sign means, "unemployed are prohibited," which is the Croatian way to say "staff only." Ashley's dad has strayed over the fence! Not an employee! A rule-breaker! As best I can piece together, the list of approved Bachelor phrases includes "I adore," "I'm crazy about," and "I think the world of." (Ouch.) "Love" may only be used in conjunction with actions or objects: "I love spending time with," "I love the way you,"  "I love your." These are Rules. How do I know? The "love" rule is the only one no one can say. Fake rules (traveling separately, imposing the actual penalty on a team challenge, giving out roses only at the end of the cocktail party) are announced when they're broken so we think whatever's going on is groundbreaking and downright naughty. Real rules (don't say "I love" with the direct object being a proper noun or pronoun) are so solemn they can't be spoken. That's why you get Sean awkwardly waffling around without just saying "You know I can't say that."

Finally, though, I actually am willing to be seduced by sincerity. Hearing her dad tell the story of falling in love with this frightened little girl gave me a glimpse of what it would be like to grow up with that story framing your childhood. "I chose you out of the whole world because to me, you are the most precious thing in it." Perhaps the reason she is still single at 32 is not, as Tierra suggests, because something's wrong with her, or because as she suggests, she has a fear of abandonment, but because her standard of love is so high. Would that everyone's was. I have to tell you, I got a wrong number call during this part of the show, from a child I could barely understand, but it sounded as if he thought he thought he was calling his mom, and wanted her to come home, and he was scared and couldn't sleep. Could've been the worst possible moment to have to say, "Oh, honey, you called the wrong number. You try to call your mom again." Parents, love the stuffing out of your children. That's all I have to say about that.

Catherine: Seattle has done well on TV this season. Top Chef managed to get nothing but sunny days, and now Sean shows up when--ta-da!--the sun is shining. I wonder if they were there at the same time. If The Bachelor were on NBC you can be darn sure they'd make it happen. Imagine! A Bachelor date where people actually eat the food!

Coming into the date, I didn't have much of a handle on Catherine, but at home everything snapped into focus. Catherine has clearly been less emotionally invested than the other girls, which on balance is a healthy thing, but in her case it may be that bouncing along on top of the water having fun is about as deep as she ever goes. Doing The Bachelor, going fun places and having fun adventures, has been, well, fun. Requirement #1 for a successful relationship in her book, check. The sisters painted the outline, and Mom, standing at the kitchen sink with a wadded-up paper towel as if Sean just wandered in and interrupted dish washing, filled in the color. Yeah, you're here. So what? One boy, another boy, it doesn't make any difference. "Do you  have any other questions for me?" she asks, as Sean stands there dumbfounded, wondering whether he should offer to dry. She doesn't seem worried about her daughter having her heart broken or going into a bad marriage. It says a lot that she can't stir up the slightest concern, or a show of acceptance, or rejection, or something. What would happen if Sean were to ask Catherine to marry him? Shoulder shrug. "You have to mull it over, you have three other ladies to meet, and we'll see what happens." Whatever. Fine. Propose. Catherine will say yes, the same way she says yes to an invitation to go water skiing. It doesn't mean anything.


Lindsay: I was bored with this date. What is it about little-girl women for certain men? Giggling! Eating cupcakes! Smashing frosting in each other's faces! Speaking without your lips ever meeting! At home, Generalismo Dad managed to reason himself through the idea that giving your blessing is essentially delegating authority to make a decision, so...go ahead, I guess. And Sean thinks that's awesome and really means something.

Desiree: Personally, I hate pranks. And through the whole boyfriend-barging-in thing I kept thinking "What idiot walks up to his girlfriend's house for this conversation past lights and trucks and a camera crew?" I was a lot more interested in Des's house and how it was paid for. This is the daughter of the trailer people, so it isn't Mommy & Daddy's money. And she's a "bridal stylist." Yet here's this really nice place, in expensive Los Angeles, really nicely appointed with great furniture and fixtures and appliances, this wall of unexplained certificates or diplomas, a cello in the corner...wait. This girl's story is WAY more interesting than anybody has let on. I'm intrigued. And now it's too late.

Perhaps Sean's first problem with the trashy brother (Chain tattoo. Nice.) was when he pushed back from the table and asked, "Can we talk?" Sean answered, "Yeah, buddy." Guys you can picture in a mug shot probably don't go for being called "buddy." But they DO like to make a scene on television. For me, though, it was Sean making the bigger scene. He was horrified, mortified, mortally offended to be accused of being a playboy. How DARE you!! Here's the deal: You are what you do. Sean knows himself to be a good Christian, honest, thoughtful, thrifty, brave, whatever. On the inside, that is. Sean perhaps does not see himself well from the outside, in which he's dating and making out with four girls at once. That is the DEFINITION of a playboy. Hey, you wanna play you gotta pay, buddy. And yeah, I meant buddy.

Finally, to the rose ceremony. or more accurately, the help-me-out-bro conversation with Chris Harrison, where Sean confessed he had no idea what to do. Things weren't great with Des, he said, and Catherine "has big goals with her career." What? This is the first we're hearing of a compelling career drive, and I'm a bit unclear how graphic design could threaten a relationship. Chris's helpful advice? "Well, you have a big decision to make." Unspoken? "And there's rules, so...you gotta send somebody packing before we have to pay overtime to the crew. Tough to be you, pal." Thanks a lot, Chris.

At the rose ceremony, did Des break a Rule by asking to talk to him? I think so, because 6-7 camera people had to shuffle out of the way for them to sit down. (Yes, we did back up and count.) That brief conversation accomplished, Sean made it through only the two easy roses (AshLee and Baby Lindsay) before getting stuck again, panicking, and fleeing. Send out the bat signal for Chris! Surely he can help, or suggest a way out, or something! Chris broke away from knocking back M&Ms at the craft services table to come back and offer this sage advice: "Get this right." I have to credit Sean with not shouting back "THAT'S WHAT I'M TRYING TO DO!" And with also taking the best path I've found for making tough decisions: Which decision would I regret? In his case, it's "Who will I miss the most?" Wise. Still, his decision to keep Catherine surprised me. I would've thought there was enough connection with Des (note the magazine cover, in which there's the two of them and everybody else) would've been enough to override a single bad day, but who can explain the mysterious wonders of symbiosis? I mean, who'd'a thought these two would end up together?

I'm looking forward to Sean Tells All tonight. Looks like they just had SO much Tierra footage they couldn't fit it all into the regular agenda and scheduled an extra show. Should be amusing!

P.S. And if you're wondering about the ways in which Stars! They're Just Like Us! this week, They Get Their Sugar Fix! They Suit Up to Cycle! They Deliver Healthy Treats! They Jog with Their Dogs! They Jam Out! They Get Blow-Dried! and They Visit Amusement Parks! Way to stay relevant, Us Weekly. And to find a place for otherwise throwaway paparazzi pictures.

Sean #7: Sisters Are the Most Important People in the World

I saw a study a while back that found that people with sisters are happier than people without. It doesn't matter if the subject is a man or woman, whether the sister is older or younger. The existence of the sister is the only thing that matters. I wonder if Sean appreciates how much happier he is today because he has a sister.

But there's so much more to talk about! It's not ALL about Tierra, contrary to what she thinks, and contrary to what we do actually tend to talk about. Let's start with the Bachelor "rules." What are they, exactly? Is there a book? A contract? It must be secret, because I Googled and came up with nothing. I'm used to rules being, you know, RULES. I'm a rule-follower. When I was about five, I spent a week or so at a day care center while my mom had jury duty or something. I was terrified of breaking some rule other kids knew about and I didn't, but one in particular was very clear: Eat everything on your plate. I hated peanut butter, but remember choking down a gluey peanut butter sandwich on white bread, and then miserably gnawing through a dry lettuce leaf meant to be garnish (garnish? For preschoolers? What was this place?). Clean the plate meant clean the plate. So I did it.

As an adult, I ran into this nailed to a fence in Croatia:

It bothers me that I never have figured out what it was I was not supposed to be doing.

So imagine my SHOCK when the show opens with Sean saying he wanted to "break the rules" and fly to St. Croix with all six girls. There are travel rules? They must be really important! But...what happens if you break them? Could you get ejected from the show? Get no snack service? Forfeit the bride at the end of the show? Be made to pay for your own ring? Well, what about the other rules, like that people are not supposed to crash other people's dates, or visit the lodging quarters of the Bachelor/ette uninvited, or use hide-a-beds, or overrule the reward for a date competition so that everybody's a WINNER!

I think we've just had a peek behind the Bachelor curtain and found...there are no rules. It's starting to look as if they make up rules after somebody does something unexpected so we can think it's more scandalous. Rats. I really wanted to find that book. Then I could kick up a holy fuss anytime I caught somebody breaking a Rule.

(By the way, here's a rule I'd like to see: When someone interrupts a private conversation by saying "Can I just steal him away for a minute?" the Bachelor is required to say, "Excuse me. We're having a conversation. I'll be with you in a minute." Sometimes folks need help to do the right/normal thing. Meant to mention this weeks ago.)

So...finally, the dates. I'm going to run through them without Tierra interrupting, though that's not the way the show's narrative went. First Ashley. (I'd like a still picture of Tierra's bitter face when Ashley's name was read. Oops. You see how these people manage to steal the spotlight no matter what?) I'm worried about Ashley. She's really really all in. ("I love Sean! This is my husband!") For someone who claims to have abandonment issues, I find it surprising that she's chosen the least safe, least trustworthy environment as the place to finally abandon caution. Self-sabotage? As in, if this goes south, then it proves I really can't trust anybody? I love her. She has the kind of elegance I've always only dreamed of having. And I'm afraid her heart is going to get badly, badly broken.

I'm very glad that Sean brought up the Tierra issue himself in his conversation with Ashley. (See? Again she's at the center of every other interaction.) It took the burden off the other women to bring it up themselves and risk being seen as catty, and it showed a dawning awareness that there's such a thing as character, which you judge best by figuring out what somebody's like when you're not looking. I remember a very wise thing Kirstie Alley, of all people, said along these lines: In a partner candidate, look at what their life is like without you. People have enormous capacity to reflect what they think the other person wants. But someone who claims to be spiritual without already being involved in some spiritual activity is, at best, only wanting to be what you want. At worst? Lying. Someone who actually loves animals has a pet. Someone who loves to travel has been traveling. Someone who loves people has a lot of friends. Tierra, by these markers and the sum total of her behavior, only wants to be the center of one person's attention. I hope her desk at the auto dealership is in the middle of the showroom. To her credit, Ashley didn't beat around the bush--at least in what we saw she was clear and fair about it. And Sean recognized her as someone truthful. Hope dawns.

In other news, we learned that Ashley married and divorced while still in high school. To look at her now, you'd say she appears to have done an extraordinary job of pulling herself together from a broken childhood. But has she? She's chosen a terrible time to give herself wholeheartedly to someone, which suggests that under the poised exterior she's an emotional train wreck. Even if she ends up with the final rose, there's a LOT of work to do on that relationship, you can be sure.

And finally, we have Tierra's designated moment on stage, as opposed the scene-stealing, date-interrupting, tantrum-throwing moments she's had before now. She should be thrilled! Elated! Delighted! Happy, you'd think, finally. But in her own words, "I'm so excited, however, being attacked by bugs, and the sweatiness, and my makeup dripping off, like, that's not either fun or cool." She'd hoped for boating, perhaps, being on the water. So...she finally gets what she wants but it's still not enough. Nothing ever will be. Trying to meet the unending need of someone like this is (in the words of someone who did) like trying to fill the Grand Canyon with a shovel. Except the Grand Canyon has a bottom.

At the outset of the date, she says "I'm hot and gross and thirsty." How about "I'm out with Sean"? Nope. However, on a positive note, "Shopping is definitely one of my favorite things to do." (Who didn't see that coming?) She loves to have things bought for her. (Surprised?) At one point, Sean says her energy is "off the charts." (Would you say "manic," by any chance?)

Narcissists are exceptionally good at reading others' signals in regard to themselves, and Tierra nails it when she picks up a certain "distance" in the way Sean is acting toward her. He cites the drama, and Tierra blames the other girls for being jealous ever since she got the first rose. Logical. I mean, if other people don't like you, it can't be you, can it? No, they must be jealous because you're so awesome.

And then comes Sean's lowest moment of the night, in which it appears he has collected the facts correctly and then arrived at the wrong answer when adding them up: "She's probably not nice with the other women, but she's being honest when she says she's here for me. I don't think she's a bad person, she's a sweet person. And after this week, she doesn't have to live with the other women anyway." What makes him (us?) so willing to blame a situation for someone's behavior? How you act is how you are. Period. If stress (that is, things not going your way) brings out the worst in you, well, you can't handle life very well, can you?

Despite Sean's citing of just "drama" as the reason for his distance--and Tierra quoting that from him as well--her take-away is to jump straight to "I can't believe somebody had the nerve to throw me under the bus." So the trouble's source is not the observable phenomenon of drama and her at the center of it, as they both clearly said. No, somebody must've thrown her under the bus. If things aren't going her way, somebody must be to blame. Somebody not named Tierra.

The Tierra spectacle was briefly interrupted by the group road-trip date, which Catherine described at one point as a Sean-and-Desiree date with a couple of tag-alongs. I think she read it right. From there we went to Leslie's date, where her original discomfort with eye contact proved to be her downfall. She's got my vote for next Bachelorette. She's smart and funny, and I've been longing for a funny Bachelorette. Maybe she'll do better in a setting with men in competition for her, rather than her in competition with other women.

So what rule got broken to bring in the sister ahead of the Family Final Two Take-down? A big one, I'm sure. Scandalous. I hope she gets to see her husband and children again. But if not, it was still worth it. She saved Sean from utter stupidity. It seemed that once he got inside the house and found Tierra curled up with her tears on the hide-a-bed (not just secluding herself from the other women, note, but appropriating the front room to herself and forcing all of them to hang out in the bedroom), he saw her through his sister's eyes and everything snapped into focus. It was time for Tierra to go. He did an admirable thing by saying he didn't want to "put her through all this," which was just another way of saying "It's not you, it's m...y situation." He gives proper credit in the confessional, saying "My sister told me that if a girl can't get along with other girls, that's trouble." THANK YOU. Again, if someone has a problem with everyone, the problem is never everyone. I'm sorry someone had to say it at all, but thank goodness she did.

Sisters are the most important people in the world. I wish I had one.

On her way out the door, shall we review some favorite lines from the meltdown? "Men love me." "I can't control what's on my face." "I'm so sensitive. I have such a big heart." And finally, in response to Sean's "Are you gonna be okay?" We get, "No." Oh, sweetie. It's gonna be okay. Bachelor Pad is coming!

Then we get to the car, and any effort to cover the crazy evaporates: "I can't believe they did this to me!" followed by, "I hope the girls got what they wanted." Huh. That's odd. You'd say that to mean "I hope they're sorry now." Do you actually think that? They're not. They're ecstatic. They DID get exactly what they wanted. That's not what you wanted, but of course you think the drama produces a bunch of people who are sorry for you. Miscalc, babe. Again. To continue: "I hope he knows I'm strong." (He doesn't. No one on earth does.) And finally, the poetic, "Nobody will take my sparkle away."

I love all the sparkle stuff. She doesn't know "sparkle" is a silly word for four-year-olds, and the way she takes it so seriously reveals how far her world is from the functional grownup world. During the argument (angrily): "My mom says I have sparkle. And I shouldn't let the other women take my sparkle away." In the car, (fiercely): "I told myself coming into here nobody will take my sparkle away. I'm not letting that happen." Ah. So our new code word for "narcissistic, manipulative, and volatile" is "sparkly." No, Tierra, no one is ever going to take that away. I think you're safe.

At the end of the evening, we lose Leslie and Tierra, and for hometown visits are down to Desiree ("Bangs"), Catherine ("Low-Maintenance"), AshLee ("EleGant"), and Lindsay ("Wedding Dress"). But if previews are to be believed (always iffy), we don't need Tierra around for drama. Thank you, Des's brother. Looks like he's going to make a plausible argument that it isn't just sisters that can throw a reality bomb into dumb relationships. Next week: Brothers are the most important people in the world!

Sean #5 and #6: Where There's Smoke, Expect Cookies

Do you realize that we live in a day and age when you can buy a product called "cookie butter"? It looks like this:

This is not butter FOR cookies. It's butter MADE OUT OF cookies. (And it's not just at TJ's. You can find Biscoff butter at the plain old grocery store.) Butter made out of cookies? Who's questioning Santa now, huh? But that's not all. Get yourself some of these:

Now spread cookie butter ON the cookies and make little sandwiches from heaven. Cookies filled with richer and creamier cookies. In a world where things like this are possible, what's to keep us from thinking we can ALL have everything we want? Why shouldn't we have a Monday-Tuesday double-header of The Bachelor? And what's to keep a healthy young guy, for example, from thinking that he should be able to exert no effort of his own, be offered a smorgasbord of beauties, and choose the one he's most attracted to without undesirable consequences? I mean, he wants it, right? That should be enough. 

When you can get cookies filled with cookies, it's completely reasonable for a guy like Sean to think that the hot chick who's magnetically into him must also be ideal, in spite of all evidence to the contrary. Cookies filled with cookies shouldn't be possible, but there they are. Girls at the center of trouble and drama who aren't trouble and drama themselves shouldn't be possible either, but...golly. Why not?

So let's get to the main course as quickly as possible and dispense with all the empty-calorie solo dates from both shows at once:

• Wedding-Dress Lindsey, helicopter ride, cold picnic on a windswept mountain eating cold food, snuggle by the fire, awkward conspicuous private public dancing, blah, blah, done. Lindsey won't be around long.
• Snow-Bunny Catherine has a happy energy about her. Snowday play, carriage ride, ice castle snuggle. I like her very un-bachelorette-like knee-length skirt and tights and sweater. Classy. She may not be around long, either.
• Desiree ("Bangs"), symbolic rappelling ("sometimes you just have to step out over the edge"), picnic, tree-climbing, humble-beginnings-trailer-park conversation. Des seems to have an unusually level head for this whole business.
• Date-and-a-half with Tierra and some other girl. Yeah, Tierra coming out on top of that one was a foregone conclusion. I would've been a little more interested if Jackie had seen at least ONE Western movie in her life and whipped Tierra's horse so that it bolted away with her screaming and hanging on for dear life. But even at that, no two-on-one date is ever going to top Allie leaving Casey, with his "this'll win her over" tattoo still raw on his wrist, alone on a glacier in Iceland as the helicopter lifted her away with the wrestler who ended up fleeing through the bushes. Unmatched television. That scene was what got my husband hooked.

And so we come to Tierra. To quote Lesley, "We have a Tierr-ist on our hands!" This is where things get crazy. Or as I like to put it, "worth watching." One of the girls said she could teach a master class on manipulation, and she's right. Shall we count the red flags? 

1. Intruding on a group date to which she was not invited because heaven forbid her target's attention should drift from her for any prolonged stretch of time. (And intruding on the evening part, of course, where she can pull Sean away in the dark. Didn't catch her demanding her chance to chug warm hairy goat milk.) Note: Someone who demands your attention at the expense of others is a bad bet for being thoughtful of you in the future.
2. Declaring her reason to be "I have to do what's right for me." And then afterward saying "getting that all out felt better." Of course this whole exercise revolves around what you want and what you feel, darlin'. Of course it does. Note: Someone who treats her feelings as reality is going to make real reality a living hell.
3. Saying the reason she's so intense is because she had a long relationship with an addict. Note: Stable people do not voluntarily attach themselves to addicts.
4. Walking off to sit pointedly alone by the fire during the cocktail party. Note: People who do conspicuous things cannot have their needs met by normal interaction. (And girls, if she was teaching you a master class, you failed the test. Following her and engaging with her not only starts a battle, but it places it on her turf and lets her play the victim. Duh. Sit and laugh and let her stew over there as long as she wants. Eventually she'll have to cause her scene on your terms.)
5. Frequent use of "deserve." (In fairness, Sean may not be hearing this as often as we are.) Note: Someone who believes herself entitled will never be happy. Anything that does work out, well, you were entitled to it anyway; anything that doesn't means you were robbed.
6. Getting colder than anyone else when placed in icy water. Note: Disproportionate reaction to the elements suggests a naturally cold core.

Sean, it seems, has enough of a nose to detect a whiff of smoke swirling around Tierra. He's just really bad at identifying the source. He thinks, in fact, that what he's smelling is actually cookies. Being made into butter.

Men, as a class, have ever been stupid about how to identify a mate. "Love is blind" is a cliche for a reason, right? (And not just for men, you know darn well.) For centuries, the main male requirement was that nobody else had laid hands on his chosen woman first. Other requirements were just decorations hung on the first: all the clothes, the courtship rituals, the social constraints. The standard for virtue was set so high that a woman's reputation was more valuable than her dowry. Roll back to Sunday night and then ninety years before that and we get Downton Abbey with Lord Grantham bursting in on a ladies' luncheon because he just learned his wife and daughters are eating food prepared by a former prostitute. And you know what they were eating?  Not cookie butter. No sir. Salmon mousse. And they liked it. (I ate salmon loaf as a child. Think meat loaf made with canned salmon instead of ground beef. I can only imagine that salmon mousse goes down a little smoother but no more willingly.) Those people didn't smell smoke and think it was cookie butter. If they smelled smoke they knew it meant fire. Bad women. Inedible kidney pie.

Fast-forward back to Sean. He tells Chris Harrison (who has some stories to tell, be sure) that he's frustrated that there are women there who only seem to want to talk about other women (bafflingly, Tierra is somehow excluded from that classification), but then he tells the women he's annoyed that they're being vague. His burning question when Lesley (?) or maybe Desiree (?) tries to warn him about Troublierra? "Does this have anything to do with me?"

Oh, dear. Now we understand. Why Sean Is Single. According to his logic about Tierra, a guy who holds up liquor stores but doesn't steal from you is fine. So is a woman who can't stand children in restaurants but says she can't wait to have her own. Remember he already told Tierra that he didn't care what anybody said about her. Thus, all that matters is what directly affects Sean. There's no such thing as character. I hate to say it, but it's starting to sound as if they just might be perfect for each other.

Other women, of course, went home instead. Don't underestimate the power of a damsel in distress with a twinkling sideways glance! Sarah with One Arm, poor thing, always seemed to be there to prove open-mindedness. Not on the part of producers, however, who never seemed able to come up with a group date activity that wasn't an excruciating challenge for her. Daniella was a seat filler who never seemed to pick up on that message. And Selma, poor Princess Selma with Standards, who folded her no-kiss standards like an old sweater in, of all places, a cocktail party setting where he was kissing EVERYONE, but who wouldn't fold her comfort standards to jump in a cold lake (did everybody catch her bedazzled earband?), was never a match for Mr. Ruddy and Rugged. Off  you all go, now. And with the numbers reduced to six, time to spend the money to fly everybody someplace warm! Where Sean will surely find True Love. And unlimited cookies filled with cookies, to be sure.