DR. WALLACE: After reading your column about the guy who was confused about his live-in girlfriend's lack of desire to get married, I felt I had to write. These two had graduated from high school, but the girl didn't want to marry right away, so they moved in together. They had been living together for several months and he wanted to get married but she didn't want to marry for two or three more years. Your advice was since they really weren't committed, the best thing to do was to split up now rather than waste those years. That's a typical old-fashioned idea!

I'm 19 and my boyfriend is 21, and we've been living together since I graduated from high school last year. We will eventually get married, but we know that there are other things we have to do to get our lives in order before we marry. Our families accepted our decision, and we have determined that we really do love each other and have throughout the years we have lived together unmarried.

Don't you think that it would be better to waste a couple of years living together than to end up in an unhappy marriage and possibly a messy divorce? — Mindy, Columbus, Ohio.

MINDY: The fact is that couples who live together as husband and wife without a marriage contract are trying to gain the benefits of marriage without accepting its responsibilities. To say that living together before marriage is a test of the couple's love for each other is nothing but a cop-out. This was true in 1915 and it's still true 100 years later.

STRIKE THREE AND YOU'RE OUT

DR. WALLACE: I'm a 17-year-old guy who has a big crush on a certain young lady that I've known since kindergarten, and we're both seniors now. We were in orchestra together, so I got to know her a little better, and I really would like to take her out. I have always hesitated because I wasn't sure if she had a steady boyfriend.

When I finally got up my nerve last week I called her and asked her for a date, but she said she had a family activity to go to and she wouldn't be able to go out. Then last night I called her again and she leveled with me and said she likes me as a friend, but she didn't want to go out with me.

My best buddy said, "The third time is the charm," and told me to just call her one more time. Do you think I should? — Nameless, Memphis, Tenn.

NAMELESS: The third time is just as likely to be "strike three, you're out!" Sorry, but I think her response to your second call was pretty clear: she likes you as a friend, but not as a date. Keep the friendship as it is and maybe, eventually, she'll change her mind and see you in a new light.

But don't just sit around waiting for that to happen. Instead, date other girls, because Ms. Right is out there somewhere still waiting for you to call her.

Dr. Robert Wallace welcomes questions from readers. Although he is unable to reply to all of them individually, he will answer as many as possible in this column. Email him at [email protected]. To find out more about Dr. Robert Wallace and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.