Hey all…

I wonder how many relationships could be saved in this country if people talked to one another? I think the main woman gripe about men is that “He doesn’t communicate. He won’t talk to me” and the main man gripe about women is “She won’t shut the f**k up! Why won’t she shut the f**k up?!” How much gets lost in what’s not said and what’s ignored? Probably enough to drop the divorce rate in this country about 10% if you ask me.

I’m guilty. I’m not much of a talker, I don’t argue unless aggressively prodded, and I’ve made the mistake of assuming that my love interest automatically knows what it is that I’m thinking. I know, not incredibly smart and probably no small wonder that I spent the cold winter months on my couch alone. I never really considered the reasons why I, and men in general, don’t really express our feelings in the open, I mean if you can’t talk to your significant other that has seen you at least partially naked and that you’ve probably farted in front of at least twice who can you talk to? I always chalked my reason up to genetics; I come from a long line of men that spoke when only absolutely necessary, my dad and his father before him and probably his father too, so it’s not like I was going to be a chatterbox out the gate. Shoot, I’m looking at 4 handwritten letters in a binder now that likely would have saved one relationship, words flowing and heartfelt on the paper, but I didn’t give them to her; even the written word ain’t safe. But whatever our reasons it’s safe to say that we really don’t do the open forum thing and I wonder why that is.

First of all, I think women give us too much credit, 75% of the time if you really knew what it was we were thinking about you would no longer see fit to have us around. But it might be because men don’t think all things are worth talking about but women deem most things a matter to openly discuss. Maybe it’s because we forfeit a bit of the bravado and façade that we have steadily built up over the course of the relationship if we start going all sensitive like Ralph Tresvant. Or perhaps it’s because women are like elephants that remember everything and pick just the right time to throw something back in your face or, worse, tell their girls all about it during a martini filled happy hour downtown.

Are we men are protecting our pride and manhood? Are we hoarding information just to save ourselves from being after work “Waiting To Exhale” fodder? And are we doing so at the sake of the relationships that we have, and that we like? (We can’t tell women that, though, because it then becomes ammunition)

Men: What about your feelings, man? Do you and your woman talk stuff out? Do you voluntarily sit down and say “this is who I am and this is how I feel” or are you like me where it takes hungry lions and threat of 30 lashes via bullwhip to get you to say something as simple as where you’d like to have dinner?

Women: Is everything so serious or is it just some integral things that matter? Is it a deal breaker to have a man that won’t or is reluctant to open up to you? And why is it that you remember everything and throw it back in our faces? (Joking! I kid, I kid…)

I guess I’m just being nosy today is all. Feel free to share or say nothing at all, which is what I fully expect from my fellow men that read this selection.

~thanks for reading

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