I bumped into a friend in a nightclub on Saturday and we sat down for a good chat. The rationale of having a good chat beside a heaving dancefloor, a six-piece swing band and speakers the size of American fridges escapes me now, but I'm sure there was one. We screamed at each other about our respective love-lives for a while before she started to stare at a man shaking his stuff on the dance floor.
Somewhere in his mid-30s, he was slightly tubby with hair that had gone on a retreat and decided that the busy world of hair growth was just not worth the hassle. He was simultaneously dancing and staring longingly at the lead singer on stage; understandably, as she was the lead singer and possessing of a marvellous voice, long dark hair and teeth that almost did that audible sparkle thing as in the toothpaste ads.
"Now how old would you say she is?" asked my friend, with a moody look in her eye. I guessed at mid-30s. She agreed and then said "What about him?" I decided he was also just west of 30 and did my best to look receptive, in case she felt like enlightening me as to what she was on about. Without any further guessing games, she came to the point. Which was that there was a lot of lies passing themselves off as truths to the effect that men just get better-looking as they get older, while women peak at the age of 25.
Think of all the articles bemoaning the advent of wrinkles and grey hair and cellulite, that usually gripe at how unfair it is that men just go grey at the temples and look distinguished. This is simply not true, or at least it's only half of the story.
Picture the people you know who are starting to show the first signs of ageing. My friend and I listed off baldness, ear hair, nasal hair, beer bellies and jowls as unfortunate male symptoms and decided they were just not equalled by female thirtyness symptoms - a few lines, and spreading hips. Colleagues are muttering rather indignantly that I have no need to be worrying about ageing yet, and that may well be true for the moment. But ageing is beginning to feel like an event more hyped and more maligned than the millennium. This is in no small part because the old chestnut about men ageing better than women is usually coupled with the one about thirtysomething men wriggling out of relationships and dating younger women.
Books such as The Rules abound, which take as a given that after a certain age, women will have to get their man with traps as ridiculous as those of Wily Coyote. Most men nod sagely and agree that on the whole the males of the species are terrible divils for not wanting to settle down.
In last Sunday's Observer, William Leith wrote an entire article entitled "Can't Commit, Won't Commit" in which he dredged up psychologists, psychotherapists and sitcoms such as Ally McBeal to explain why men are desperate to wriggle off the hook. "A lot of men won't commit, and are not planning to. They simply are Not Ready. So they sit at home and in bars, waiting, flicking through girlie magazines and looking at exposed flesh on the Internet. And sleeping around."
To be honest, I have always believed this to be true and to a certain extent, it is. There definitely comes a time when men who have not got hitched start to shadowbox with anything that resembles commitment. Unfortunately, this can be the very time when women decide that they're finally ready to settle down or maybe decide they want to have kids before it's too late.
I'll never forget the chill that went up my spine on hearing that one male acquaintance gave a slight shudder as a 30-something single woman bounced up to him with a kiss and a fine welcome. "Lordy, women like that terrify me," he reportedly muttered. "Just dying to get married." It seems curious to me now that I immediately accepted that although this was deplorable behaviour on his part, it was also representative of how all women and men in their 30s felt. I felt the first grip of panic at the thought of being in my 30s, single and seen as a man-hunter by society in particular and men in general.
The thing is, as my wise but indignant friend pointed out, it was not a state of affairs reflected in real life. In the last year or so, a huge number of my female friends have split up with medium to long-term partners. Almost without exception this was because they felt there was no point continuing if there was no long-term future to the relationship. Not one of these breakups was because the woman wanted to settle down and the man was doing a 100-metre sprint in the other direction.
In fact, one American friend has put an end to two relationships in the past year with men whom she describes as "scarily ready and willing for marriage and families". Then there's the tale of a male friend who has been engaged three times and is finally getting married next year - sure he's in love with his fiancee but he's even more in love with the idea of marriage.
There is a curious dichotomy between what is perceived to be true - that women are desperate for marriage and men are running scared - and what is actually happening. As usual there is a huge complexity, a huge variety of greys in the real life version - women and men who would do anything to get married; women and men who don't want anyone cluttering up their lives, and women and men who only want the right someone cluttering up their lives.
But what is constantly appearing in black and white is the idea that woman are sitting ducks, waiting to mate and willing but unable to find anyone to oblige. It's the most sexist, ageist lot of nonsense and it fosters a huge paranoia among women in their 30s and women in their 20s who are heading that way. None of us is quite paranoid enough to believe the theory was cooked up by fat, bald, hairy thirtysomething men contemplating a lonely middle age, but it's only a question of time.