Man Without Woman

I have a friend who has been angry at women ever since he read about the Turkish Harem Revolt of 1132.

He talks about it quite often and says women had no right to rise up against their sultans and tear apart their seraglios.

“They had a good life,” he says. “Food, sex, seductive clothing and occasional baths in perfumed water. What more could they ask?”

I say to him, “Henry, it’s been a long time since the Harem Revolt, so why not forget it. We forgave the Japanese for World War II; it’s time to forgive our wives for the Harem Revolt.”

Henry finds that difficult to do. He isn’t crude or loud-mouthed about his resentment, but it’s there nonetheless.

While guys like Jimmy Breslin rant, Henry just grumbles, and occasionally even hints at the core of his anger. He feels the Harem Revolt is the reason his wife goes out of town and leaves him alone.

What Henry is admitting, in effect, is how much men depend on women. Their growing independence, which he traces to that 12th-Century uprising, is causing problems.

I realize that men have always gone off to conquer or make deals, leaving their women at home, but that’s different. Women are somehow more able to amuse themselves without going crazy. It has to do with the glands.

Men go bonkers in one degree or another when abandoned even temporarily by their wives. I, for instance, get this terrible urge to see horror movies when Cinelli goes out of town.

Someone once said he is never alone who is accompanied by noble thoughts. Being a newspaper columnist, I don’t have a lot of noble thoughts. If I did, I would have probably entered the priesthood.

But at least I don’t have a lot of evil thoughts either when my wife, the aforementioned Cinelli, takes off. She is in Eureka for a few days even as I write, visiting our son and his family, and I have not once worshiped the devil, established a concubine or invested a dime in martini futures.

“I’m not expecting miracles from you,” she said when she left. “Just don’t let the dog or the bird die of starvation and remember to zipper your fly.”

The dog Hoover is not likely to die. Even though I have a tendency to be forgetful, I have fallen into a fairly consistent routine of feeding him when the 6 o’clock news comes on.

It is so consistent, in fact, that every time Tawny Little appears on the screen, Hoover salivates. My wife claims I salivate too, but if I do it’s only because I realize it’s time to feed the dog.

The bird is something else. Cinelli usually feeds the cockatiel and I don’t think about it until the poor dear is lying on its back with its little feet in the air, screaming.

I am also reasonably consistent about zippering my fly, although sometimes it seems to unzipper itself, as if by magic. Cinelli suggests it might be haunted and perhaps I ought to see an exorcist.

The most I do when left alone is see the horror movies she refuses to see with me. In that respect, I am lucky to be living in L.A. with its many theaters. There is at least one such movie playing somewhere at all times.

The other night, for instance, I saw something called “The Guardian.” It was horror in every sense of the word.

I should have known it was bad when its only praise came from the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram. Any movie they love in Texas is likely to either deal with Jesus or a chain-saw massacre. “The Guardian” falls somewhat into the latter category.

Briefly, it involves a flying British nanny who sacrifices month-old babies to an oak tree that is possessed by evil spirits. OK, I can buy that.

British nannies are often known to fly, month-old babies can be a terrible bother and I have been suspicious of trees ever since a forest of them threw apples at Dorothy and Toto.

But then “The Guardian” gets silly.

I draw the line, for instance, at trees that fondle nannies. I mean, I can suspend disbelief when it comes to a giant gorilla falling in love with Fay Wray or Jessica Lange, but sex with a tree is a really sick concept.

The movie ends, by the way, with the hero chain-sawing the tree to death, which is probably the part the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram enjoyed. The tree bled profusely.

The best horror movies are ones like “Frankenstein.” True, the monster did throw a little girl in the lake, but only because he mistook her for a flower petal. It could happen to anyone.

I probably won’t see anymore horror movies while Cinelli is gone. I’ll just hang around the house with my fly half-zippered, feed the dog when we salivate and dwell with growing resentment on that damned Harem Revolt.