“The great question that I have not yet been able to answer, despite my 30 years of research into the feminine soul, is, What does a woman want?” —Sigmund Freud

A century has passed and Freud’s famous query still echoes. Men ponder it in terms of what women want in a man (of course) and they’re pretty sure it’s confidence, honesty and communication.

Dell thinks women want laptops in pretty colors wrapped up with calorie counters and cooking videos masquerading as “tech tips.”

Google claims there are over 13,000,000 answers to the question, “What do women want?”

Honestly, so much ado over such a simple thing! It will take me 10 seconds to explain it all. Are you ready?

HERE'S WHAT WOMEN WANT

We want

What we want

Come on . . . you kinda knew that, right? This knowledge has been passed down since the time of the Round Table. The knights, not the pizza.

HOW KING ARTHUR DISCOVERED WHAT WOMEN WANT

One day King Arthur was riding in the forest when he was challenged by a strange knight to a fight to the death. Since the king was unarmed, the knight agreed to a different sort of challenge: King Arthur would return, unarmed, in one year to meet the knight again. The king’s life would be spared if he could answer the age-old riddle: What is the one thing women want more than anything else?

Returning home, King Arthur confided his dilemma to the handsome and chivalrous Sir Gawain, who reassured the king that the Knights of the Round Table would have the answer within a year. Each knight set out in a different direction, posing the question to each person they encountered, and the answers were compiled into a hefty volume. But King Arthur still could not divine the One True Answer.

Resigned to his fate, King Arthur set out to meet the strange knight at the designated time and place, with Sir Gawain accompanying him for part of the journey. On the way, they met a hideous hag named Dame Ragnell. Aware of the king’s dilemma, she claimed to know the One True Answer, but demanded a steep price in return. She would divulge the answer only if the king gave her Sir Gawain as her husband.

The king refused to deliver his knight into the monstrous clutches of the hag, but Sir Gawain was always ready to lay down his life for King Arthur. Accepting Dame Ragnell’s conditions, they demanded the answer: “Tell us now. What do women want more than anything?”

“Sovereignty,” replied Dame Ragnell.

The king’s life was spared and Sir Gawain gallantly met his fate. At the end of the wedding ceremony, Ragnell expectantly turned her hideous visage toward Gawain. Reminding himself that he was saving his king, Gawain closed his eyes and forced himself to kiss her, whereupon she miraculously transformed into the most beautiful and alluring woman Gawain had ever seen.

After a night of passionate lovemaking, Ragnell told Gawain that he had a choice to make. “My beauty will not last an entire day," she explained. "You can choose that I be beautiful during the daylight, when others may see me. Or you can choose that I be beautiful at night, when you alone will see me.”

Without hesitation Sir Gawain replied, “My lady, the choice is yours.”

Whereupon the spell was broken and she became beautiful all the time.

THE MORALS OF THE STORY

So what have we learned?

First, fairy tales are hopelessly sexist.

Second, chivalry and good manners will take a man everywhere he wants to go.

And third, if Freud had known his Arthurian legends, he could have saved himself a lot of tsuris.

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Photo Credit: "Delicious Ambiguity" by Michelle Brea via Flickr, used under a Creative Commons license.

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