My wife and I had a conversation last night which shows why I sometimes feel clueless. You may find it helpful when talking across the gender gap. Or not. Either way, there are a couple of things you need to know before you read this.
First, our next door neighbor Mrs. H. recently moved into a condo type of place after living next to us for over 10 years.
Second when you read this, the lines in "quotes" are what my wife said and the lines in (parentheses) are what I thought after she said it. Okay, here we go:
Wife said, "Honey, when I let the dog into the backyard tonight, I smelled a skunk smell outside."
Wife said, "Honey, when I let the dog into the backyard tonight, I smelled a skunk smell outside."
I think: (Did the dog kill a skunk? Do we have a skunk problem? Did something get sprayed?)
"It's more like it was coming from near the garbage cans, so I went over there to look."
(Do I need to lock the garbage cans? Do we need new garbage cans? Was there a skunk in the garbage cans?)
"When I went over there, I saw Mrs. H's rake on the side of the house."
(Did Mrs. H leave her rake behind? Do we need to return the rake? Did the skunk spray the rake?)
"Mrs. H loved that rake. It used to belong to her father. I used to see her raking with it in the front yard. She said it reminded her of her dad."
(Okay! So this rake is really important, We probably should get it back to her before the new people move in and keep it. But why would she need a rake in a condo? WAIT!! IS THAT THE RAKE NEXT TO OUR FRIDGE? Nice rake! Did my wife TAKE the rake?? It doesn't smell skunky?)
I said "Where exactly was the rake?"
Wife said "It was leaning on the side of our house "
(A-HA! I have an idea!) I said, "Do you think she wanted us to keep the rake?"
Wife said "Maybe. So I came inside and I was going to send Mrs. H an email to tell her we had the rake when I saw that she had sent us an email! And when I I opened the email I saw that she sent us the most wonderful Christmas letter. it was just so sweet! and so kind of her to send it.
I said "So this is about a Christmas letter?!?"
Wife said "Yes!! Isn't she sweet! We were so lucky to have had her as a neighbor."
What I thought: (What on earth does this have to do with a skunk, the garbage cans and the rake?)
What I said: "Yes dear. We were."
Women multi task; multi relationships. Men single task; single relationships. Brains are wired different. Same species, different mind sets. You are NEVER going to understand them! And that is what makes them beautiful and special. The complete YOU (Ya big lumox! [and all such men]) so quit trying to analyse her; tell her she's beautiful and buy her two bunches of flower and really help out over Christmas! Happy Jesus' Birthday to ya!
ReplyDelete'Scuse the spelling mistakes - too much Christmas cheer! (hic!)
ReplyDeleteWhen three of them speak to me simultaneously, which pretty much describes any time we're together in the same place, my brain melts.
ReplyDeleteI have these conversations with just about everyone sometimes! Happy holidays to you and yours!
ReplyDeleteDD
As long as it ends with a yes dear. Its all good. ;) Happy Holidays,
DeleteI've heard women's brains described as a ball of wire with electricity flowing through it. Everything is connected to everything else. It isn't possible to look at a thing in isolation. In turn, men's brains are described as a series of drawers. A man pulls open a drawer and looks at everything in it, but none of the items in the other drawers. Isn't life grand? :)
ReplyDeleteI like the image of the ball of wire and the drawers. I am a ball of wires brain.
ReplyDelete