DR. WALLACE: I'm a 16-year-old girl, and I'm pretty popular socially. I have a lot of friends, and I'm lucky enough to have gone on a lot of dates over the past several months.

My older brother, on the other hand, has only been on a few dates ever. He's 17 and a nice guy, but for whatever reason, he's pretty shy, so he has had the same small circle of friends the past few years.

Now he wants me to introduce him to a possible girl to date each week this summer. He told me that this should be easy for me since I know many people, especially other girls my age — and many of them have older sisters, of course.

I told him that I'd think about it, but deep down I don't really want to get drawn into his social situations and be the primary driver of his social life!

What should I do about this? I love my brother, but I have a gut feeling that it wouldn't end well if I became his weekly matchmaker. — His Younger Sister, via email

HIS YOUNGER SISTER: I agree with your gut feeling. He needs to work on strategies to be more social and to speak up more often, even though it's not his first nature.

Perhaps you can tell him that you'll mention once to all of your friends that your older brother is available to date this summer if they have any friends, cousins or older sisters who might be interested. Tell them all that you vouch for him and want to help him a bit, but that you'll only bring this topic up once.

Then if anyone needs more details or an introduction later, they can contact you directly. Otherwise, you can leave it at that. This will help you to avoid being put in a tough spot every week or month.

Encourage your brother to socialize in areas such as hobbies or activities he enjoys so he might meet some like-minded people who can help him — or even girls who would have enough in common with him to engage in meaningful conversations.

WE'VE JUST DECIDED TO MOVE OUR NUPTIALS UP

DR. WALLACE: My longtime boyfriend and I are attending two separate colleges about three hours apart, and we're both doing well with our studies. We're a year apart in age, and we've been a couple for a long time, since I was a sophomore in high school.

We had originally planned to marry after we both graduated from college, but we're now thinking of moving things up to later this summer!

My concern is that one of us is going to have to switch colleges or switch majors so that we can both live together and attend the same university. Do you have advice on a reasonable way to make this decision that will absolutely affect one of us more than the other? I'm excited to get married but am concerned about changing one or both of our life plans regarding school and future careers. — We Face a Delicate Challenge, via email

WE FACE A DELICATE CHALLENGE: Your letter did not mention your particular fields of study nor how the two of you plan to fund your new life together, so that might be at least a starting point for consideration. If one or the other of you has the ability, due to your likely future career field, to earn a wage large enough to support the other, that may make sense.

Also look into whether one of you can take remote college courses easily in your field. This could cut either way, so check it out. Also sit down and formulate a long-term plan for your respective careers and juxtapose it against what happens if you start a family soon. This might factor in as well. Either one of you or both may wish to work fewer hours when the children (if you plan to have any!) are younger.

If you do not plan to start a family, go through that scenario and make your future plans accordingly. No matter what you the two of you opt to do, make open, honest, ongoing communications and a desire to compromise your hallmarks of making these decisions. If you can do this, I trust the two of you will be happy not only during this process, but over your lifetimes as well. Good luck to each of you individually, and the two of you as a unit, especially.

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 rwallace@thegreatestgift.com. 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.

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