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Local woman embraces lifestyle that includes dating younger men.
Katie Burnside defines herself in many ways: mother, daughter, businesswoman and, lately, cougar. Burnside, 39, says there’s nothing wrong with dating a younger man.
FRED ADAMS/FOR THE TIMES LEADER
Katie Burnside by day is a serious professional, but that doesn’t mean she can’t have fun at night – in a still-wholesome way, she says.
DON CAREY/THE TIMES LEADER
After the laundry, housework and business chores are done, 39-year-old Katie Burnside sometimes will go out on the town to grab a bite to eat and have an adult beverage or two – either with her single girlfriends or her 27-year-old beau.
“Because he’s younger, he has more energy,” said Burnside, mother of two active boys under age 10. “I like him because for a younger man, he’s very career- and business-oriented.”
“He doesn’t care about my age, and I don’t care about his,” she said.
Burnside, a divorcee from Dallas, is among the growing number of women embracing a label that’s all the rage today, in pop culture and, in particular, the entertainment industry: “cougar.” All it really means? Older woman with younger man.
“Look at Demi Moore and Katie Couric,” Burnside said, noting the 47-year-old celebrity wife of 31-year-old Ashton Kutcher and the 52-year-old newswoman reportedly dating a 35-year-old entrepreneur.
With cougars the talk of so many towns, we recently went looking – unsuccessfully, it turned out — for some local examples.
A day or so later, however, Burnside found us, eager to announce she was not only a cougar but proud of it. She also was eager to tell her story, as she believes her type is about to become much more popular locally.
Burnside embraces the cougar lifestyle so much she’s developed a Web site: www.wercougars.com, set to launch soon, that will be an international online dating service.
“It’ll be elegant,” she said, noting the software program will make sure the grammar is proper and the pictures are tasteful.
As she tries to be.
“When I go out at night, I don’t go out to look for men,” Burnside said. “These women aren’t out there on a hunt. They don’t seek the attention.”
Younger men seek them and not because they want a “mother figure,” Burnside said.
Most times, she said, younger guys think, “Here’s a woman in control of her life who has life experience.”
Her significant other, a businessman she’s been dating for a short time, had been sitting next to her as she conducted a business meeting at an area bar.
He became smitten with Burnside’s handling of business affairs in such a setting, she said.
Burnside, the president of Adventure Family Trips, which helps families organize trips to Pennsylvania attractions, has many plans in the works to promote her newest venture, www.wercougars.com, some of which include competitions at local bars and restaurants to find the hottest cougar and catch in the crowd.
In fact, during a recent interview at Rodano’s on Public Square, Wilkes-Barre, she received a call from Woodlands Inn & Resort co-owner Mitch Kornfeld to confirm soon-to-be “Cougar Nights” on upcoming Wednesdays and Sundays at the Plains Township resort.
“We’ll do promotions and giveaways,” she said.
Other official “Cougar Nights” are planned at the Shanix complex in Edwardsville, the Arena Bar & Grill in Wilkes-Barre and Metro Bar & Grill in Dallas. But, again, Burnside does not want to give the impression that cougars come out at night simply to prowl the bars in search of prey.
“You feel the eyes on you, but you don’t do anything about it,” she said, mentioning it’s not uncommon for younger men, who are often attracted to the confidence and security an older woman offers, to approach her and her friends.
“I think in the end, it doesn’t come down to age; it just comes down to having a common interest,” she said.
Despite embracing the modern term “cougar,” Burnside still holds many traditional values.
“It’s their job to call. My mother would probably have a heart attack if I called a guy,” she said, noting she prefers phone calls over text messages and likes when a guy opens the door for her.
She doesn’t feel a maternal instinct toward younger guys either. Instead, she said, “I feel a maternal instinct toward younger girls,” because the life experiences of a cougar often mean they can offer sound advice.
“Cougar” should carry a classy connotation, she believes, noting everything on her Web site, from the logo to the content is “very elegant, clean-cut and classy.”
It will outshine other dating sites out there, she said, noting she finds them “a little lower-end.”