Dear Queenie,
I’ve been dating the same guy since we were in university, a couple of years now. Now we have both graduated and I have a good job but he hasn’t found one yet.
I would like to take things a step further and let people know that we are together, just us two, not dating anyone else, but he says he’s not ready for that yet, even though he actually is not going out with anyone else.
Queenie, should I wait for him to be “ready for that” or give up and start looking for someone else?—Can’t decide

Dear Can’t decide,
If the two of you have been “going steady”, as we used to call it, for a couple of years, you are already “in a relationship”, even if your boyfriend doesn’t want to call it that. But apparently he thinks doing so would make it somehow officially binding on him, sort of a “pre-engagement”, and is not ready to even think about anything more permanent (marriage).
Until he is ready to make some sort of commitment, you will have to decide whether – and how long – you are willing to wait for him.

Dear Queenie,
I met a man I really like. I think we are perfect for each other – interested in the same things, want to have the same kind of lives, we even have a lot of the same friends. But I am a tall woman, almost 6 feet, and this man is a few inches shorter than me.
Queenie, what will people say if we get together?—Hesitating

Dear Hesitating,
Has this man given any indication that he is interested in “getting together” with you? If so, I would say, “Go for it!”
If you would let what other people might say (or might be thinking) keep you from “getting together” with a man who seems perfect for you except for a slight (unusual) difference in height, I would say you are being rather foolish.

Dear Queenie,
My boyfriend doesn’t tell me he loves me very often, in fact hardly ever. He says that anyone can say the words and not really mean what they say and I should be able to tell that he loves me by the way he treats me and all the things he does for me.
Queenie, I don’t want to push him on this, but how often should I be able to hear the words – and how often should I say them?—Confused girlfriend

Dear Girlfriend,
Your boyfriend has a point about the difference between what someone says and how they behave. You should be able to tell how he feels about you from the way he treats you.
Also, you should be able to tell from his reaction when you say the words whether you are saying them too often for his comfort – and make sure that you treat him in a way that shows him how much you care.

Dear Queenie,
A lot of the time when we go to a special event, especially a family one, we pick up my mother-in-law on the way and take her with us. Almost always, when we go to pick her up, she is in the middle of doing some household chore, even though we have told her what time to expect us and we have come at that time, or even a few minutes later.
If we wait for her to get done with what she is doing, we are late for the event, and sometimes we have even missed one entirely because of how long we had to wait for her. She apologizes, but next time it is the same thing again.
We talked to some of her friends and they said she never does this when they come to take her somewhere.
Queenie, what is a good way to deal with this?—Always late

Dear Always late,
The fact that your mother-in-law does not do this to other people, only to you, seems to indicate that she does it on purpose as a way to control you, and as long as you let her get away with it, she will continue to behave the same way.
From now on, tell her what time you will come to pick her up and that you will only wait a few minutes (specify exactly how long you will wait) if she is not ready to go when you arrive. Then stick to that time limit. Hopefully, if she misses an event (or more than one) that she really wanted to attend, she will learn to be ready on time and stop playing the waiting game.