The 1989 episode "Sex and the Married Detective" is one of the more unique and darker entries from Columbo's ABC revival era, specifically because of how it explores themes of identity, performance,and how men view women.

Joan Allenby is an incredibly accomplished, brilliant sex therapist, but she realizes her unfaithful partner, David, doesn't actually value her mind, he is driven entirely by visual and superficial desires. To kill him and establish an alibi, Joan constructs "Lisa."

Lisa is a literal caricature of male fantasy: a mysterious, sultry femme fatale in a dark wig, high heels, and fishnets. Joan explicitly constructs this identity because she knows it is the only thing that will completely blind David (and the other men at the bar) to who she actually is. She exploits the fact that under the male gaze, men look at the archetype of a sexy woman, but they don't actually see the individual human being behind it.

What makes the episode genuinely creepy and dark is that Joan doesn't just use Lisa as a mask; she begins to dissociate into her. During her final confession to Columbo, she admits that she wasn't frightened by the act of murder. Instead, she was terrified because she enjoyed being Lisa more than she enjoyed being herself.

The text hints at a tragic reality: Joan felt more powerful, desired, and liberated acting out a hyper-sexualized male fantasy than she did living as an accomplished, brilliant professional woman. The tragedy is that the male gaze swallowed her own identity.

The episode sets up a sharp contrast between how the victim looks at women versus how Lieutenant Columbo looks at people. While David is blinded by lust and surface-level aesthetics, Columbo is famously a man who looks past the surface entirely.

When Columbo investigates, he isn't distracted by the allure of "Lisa" or the clinical authority of Dr. Allenby. He breaks the case by analyzing the mechanics of the clothing itself—using a faceless mannequin to reconstruct the outfit. Columbo strips away the sexualized power of the disguise and reduces it to what it actually is: physical evidence.

While the episode definitely has some of that late-80s network television camp—including a notoriously long scene where Columbo plays the tuba—the core psychological breakdown of Joan/Lisa makes it a surprisingly bleak look at how women alter themselves to be "seen" by men.

 I just finished a deeply affecting novel called Anyone's Ghost by August Thompson. Thompson lists the National's song of the same name as inspiration. I still am processing what I read and even though it largely concerns the relationship and friendship between two young men I related to it far far more than I would have expected. Though it is just over 300 pages, it took me a long time to read because I would stop and start in order to handle the emotions that surged within me as I read.

Some of the passages that just resonated with me more than I could ever tell you:

I know now that there are tiers of humiliation when you are beginning to fall in love with someone. The lowest, the most forgiving, is someone saying the timing is wrong. Above that is being told that you are, have been, always will be, a friend. And then at the top are the words that make me want to turn into a soft, viscous lump that someone could then hose into a sewer grate—You’ve always been like a brother to me.

and:

 I didn’t want to fuck him because it seemed beneath what I felt for him. In the very spare moments where I allowed sex and Jake to exist in the same mental sentence, before I snuffed the thought and replaced it with placid images of dirtied drains or car parts, I felt I’d tarnished something. I wanted Jake as much as I wanted to be Jake as much as I wanted to be his friend as much as I wanted to be his brother.

Lyrics to the National's "Anyone's Ghost" and listen here

Say you stayed home
Alone with the flu
Find out from friends
That wasn't true

Go out at night
With your headphones on again
And walk through
The Manhattan valleys of the dead

Didn't wanna be your ghost
Didn't wanna be anyone's ghost
Didn't wanna be your ghost
Didn't wanna be anyone's ghost
But I don't want anybody else
I don't want anybody else

You said I came close
As anyone's come
To live underwater
For more than a month

You said it was not inside my heart, it was
You said it should tear a kid apart, it does

Didn't wanna be your ghost
Didn't wanna be anyone's ghost
Didn't wanna be your ghost
Didn't wanna be anyone's ghost
But I don't want anybody else
I don't want anybody else
I don't want anybody else
I don't want anybody else

I had a hole in the middle
Where the lightning went through it
Told my friends not to worry
I had a hole in the middle
Someone's sideshow wouldn't do it
I told my friends not to worry

Didn't wanna be your ghost
Didn't wanna be anyone's ghost
Didn't wanna be your ghost
Didn't wanna be anyone's ghost

Songwriters: Bryce David Dessner / Matthew D Berninger

Anyone’s Ghost lyrics © Val Jester Music, Hawk Ridge Songs

And though this isn't the main use of "ghost" that is in the title this part of the novel struck me like a slap to the face:

The anxiety I felt in the following weeks was consistent, manifesting in ways I would later learn were the symptoms of heartbreak. I punished my well-being by eating less and less. I stole beers from my dad’s fridge and drank alone. I spoke to no one if I could avoid it. And every few minutes, it felt as if someone was stepping on my right cheekbone with a long stiletto.

My mind swapped between three major schools of thought: The first was that Jake had died or was near death. This, while the most long-term horrifying of the three, was also the easiest to deal with on a superficial level. A damaged Jake hadn’t rejected me; he’d been rejected by life. And some of the last days of his life were spent with me, which had a kind of poetic smugness to it, tragic as it all was. It was nonsensical, but I wanted to believe it. The second was more adult and more painful. The details of Jake’s life had changed and he’d had to change with them. Maybe his dad had gotten sick and he’d had to drive overnight to Texas. Or he’d gotten signed by a record label or he’d decided to drive to Las Vegas or the Yukon. The problem with someone with a spirit as rambunctious as Jake’s was that the far-fetched became close, the improbable regular.

The third was the most brutal and made the most sense. Jake had figured me out. He understood the emotions I didn’t—I was in love with him, and only one of us really knew it. I wanted to tell him that this wasn’t true, to duel his examples of my affection with proof that I cared for him as a good friend, nothing more. That I couldn’t be in love with Jake because I didn’t love boys. My mind became a grindstone, and I sharpened my rhetoric against it over the lonely hours. In memory, the moments of tenderness between us became ugly, impulses and feelings that I wished I could erase. I wanted to tell him I’d take it all back if I thought it would do any good.

So I do not particularly care for AI like I did earlier on...one of its biggest flaws is that its writing style is very vanilla and you can spot AI right away or so it at least feels like. I do sometimes use it to get search results rather than advice or help with my writing.

Despite this I found myself feeling a bit validated when I sought out information about a decidedly distinctive variation of the male gaze would be and the below came up in results.  A neighbor in the building where I live does not care for me...it's just something I instinctively know and since we've never even had one conversation I suspect it is because of my appearance. 

I am what many people would consider "frumpy" or, really, just downright "ugly" (I despise that word as I encountered it a lot when I was bullied in middle school) I used to try much harder with my appearance, but even on my best days I wasn't particularly pretty. As I grew older I discovered I liked being invisible to people, in the sense of being any kind of attractive automatically putting a person on someone else's radar.

But I'm not so fond of the dismissive gaze, though, and certainly not the scornful one. And if you actually comment on the fact I'm not pretty (as I have been told in the past and not too long ago) don't be surprised if I say, "Gee, really?! I had no idea at all." (I do, trust me) I love being invisible, but I'm not so fond of being the object of someone's disdain unless I've given them a good reason.

Anyway, enough of my ranting. This is what I found on Google:

Yes, there are a few terms that capture this exact phenomenon. While it is a specific manifestation of the male gaze, sociological and feminist frameworks have developed distinct names for this instant dismissal based on perceived lack of attractiveness.

Here are the most accurate names for what you are witnessing:

1. The Desexualizing Gaze (or Anti-Gaze)

While the traditional male gaze objectifies women for their sexuality, the desexualizing gaze does the exact opposite. It occurs when a man looks at a woman, instantly deems her "unattractive" or not of sexual use to him, and completely strips away her social value in his eyes. It is a look of immediate irrelevance.

2. Social Invisibility (or "The Invisible Woman" Syndrome)

In a patriarchal society, a woman's social currency is frequently tethered to her youth and adherence to conventional beauty standards. When a woman does not meet those standards, she is often subjected to social invisibility. The look you are seeing is the moment a man decides a woman does not warrant his attention, respect, or basic engagement, essentially rendering her "invisible" to him.

3. Aesthetic Erasure

This term refers to the systematic wiping away of a woman's personhood because she does not fit an aesthetic ideal. The look you are describing is the visual cue for aesthetic erasure—a split-second appraisal where the man decides the woman has no "value" to offer him, leading to an immediate, often cold dismissal.

4. Lookism

On a broader level, this falls under lookism, which is prejudice or discrimination based on physical appearance. In this specific gendered context, it is the instant, non-verbal discrimination where a man withholds basic social warmth or politeness because a woman does not satisfy his visual preferences.

Dreams fascinate me, nightmares scare me and, most weird of all, I feel so much more in them than in real life….I’ve eaten the most wonderful meals, hugged the most amazing people, flown like a bird, dove like a deep sea diver, done the most amazing things, lived the way I wish I could in real world…the only problem is once a dream fades, it never feels the same again.

I haven't written lately because I don't know what to say sometimes...and it's the same with my personal journals. I think it's been a long time since I wrote in my handwritten one and I don't think it's just laziness. I think it's also fear of being found. 

Even with my dairies from my mid-20s to late 40s, I worry about discovery. There's something very vulnerable and scary about your deepest thoughts and feelings being exposed to someone else who not only wouldn't understand, but might even judge you. 

I used to only half joke with a longtime friend that I would want her to come over to my place and gut it of all my journals if anything happened to me...the thought of my parents, or anyone really, reading years' worth of words that only mean something to me leaves me feeling bad about myself, if that makes sense. My longtime friend (of twenty five years) knows everything bad there is to know about me so I guess I wouldn't worry about her as much as I would anyone else.

On the other hand, though, I think of a line from an old Three's Company where Cindy explains that her mother found her personal diary and read it from the very first page to the last. When asked what happened, Cindy says her mother fell asleep because it was the most boring thing she had ever read.

Because I struggle with nightmares so much I do keep a dedicated dream diary. It helps a little bit, but I write in that more because my dream life is so much more interesting, no matter how troubling.

 

I am finding great comfort in re-watching "The Incredible Hulk," which aired on CBS from 1977-1982. Bill Bixby, who played kind David Banner, is hypnotic and his character, despite turning into the Hulk, is one of the least toxic men I've ever seen on the tv screen. (And, really, so is Lou Ferringo's character).

During its original run I watched it almost every Friday night. Recently I discovered it on the streaming service Tubi and it amazes me how well it mostly holds up, especially emotionally. Modern technology might make the tv series' special effects seem quaint or archaic, but I much prefer it to CGI.

One of my favorite episodes is "The Beast Within," with this part being absolutely my favorite and also kind of downright adorable, especially since the cub tiger is real and it has been said that they did not want to leave Bill Bixby's lap:

"Hulk Makes Friends with a Tiger"