Cougar-Squared

It's a term that has been gaining in popularity: COUGAR.  I figured I knew what it meant, but after a recent experience, I wanted to find out what the actual definition of a "cougar" is....

So, to make a long story short, a guy from one of my classes asked me to go to a concert.  I'm not sure if it was an actual "date" (are we EVER sure?  "Is it a date?" "I think it's a date..." "[He/She] asked me to go to ______ with [him/her], so I think it's a date...is it a date?"), but it sort of seemed like one.  He picked me up and as we drove to the venue, I found out that he was, in fact, about 6 or 7 years my junior.  Whoa.  I suddenly realized to myself that I had, unintentionally, become a cougar.

But just what is a cougar?
Well, according to wowOwow's article on cougars, there are many technical definitions of what a cougar is, including this one: "older women who find themselves in romantic relationships with younger men."


Ok, so I'm no Demi Moore, but I do fit the "half-your-age-plus-seven rule" (a mathematical equation for determining May-December romances).

 





And when I do find myself in cougar-esque situations, I'm usually a "socially safe" cougar, a la Jennifer Aniston.

I may be just slipping under the wire in qualifying as a cougar (at the ripe ol' of 28), and while I may not be in the same league as these ladies mentioned above, or Elizabeth Taylor, or Mrs. Robinson, I am something these women never were - a cougar-squared!  That's a cougar to the 2nd power.  What made this experience so humorous to me (besides becoming a cougar without realizing it, along with becoming one under the age of 30) is the fact that I'm a BYU student (an alum, as of late), and our mascot is a cougar, our sports teams are the cougars, and we students are known as  - you guessed it - cougars. So that's why I am (as a friend coined the phrase) a cougar-squared.

It's experiences like this that make me think my life would make an interesting TV series....maybe "Welcome to Cougar-Squared Town"? :)