PMS Series (2) - In the Face of Male Passivity

I find it slightly amusing how everyone seems to have read the first post in the PMS Series (In the face of male insensitivity) but have also refused to make a comment on it. It's like they are almost afraid to open a can of worms - very funny. I don't care about can of worms. Don't know if you know but where I come from there are some edible worms. I eat worms for fun! Yum Yum. So, ladies and gentlemen (sweeping gesture accompanied by pomp and pageantry) dig in with me as I dish up the second course in our worm fiesta.

Male passivity – what do I mean? (btw, I hate it when people speak or write like this, it reminds me of school, you know how professors talk as if the rest of us are retards. So I type “Male passivity – what do I mean?” with my tongue in my cheek and a huge grin”). To understand my thinking we should think of the closest antonym for passive and that’s ‘proactive’. The word proactive to me suggests being practical, hands on, and even pre-empting solutions before challenges occur. How come a normally active man, especially when the required activity is supposed to occur somewhere in the midst of four posts, suddenly becomes inactive just when you need him.

Here are some scenarios:

1. You’ve got your screaming one year old slung over one arm, your usually angelic three year old yanking at your skirts, putting you in danger of toppling over, amidst all these you are trying to stir a pot of steaming bubbling soup and hoping you don’t get any of the hot soup on the three of you. The man in your life is sitting in front of the TV watching sports and drinking beer.
2. You’ve both driven in three hours of terrible traffic after a hard day at the office. All you can think of is a long soak in the bathtub with that new aroma-therapy stress relieving foam bath you just purchased and the moment you walk in the door, dude starts demanding dinner knowing fully well there’s nothing remotely instantly microwavable. I mean, he ate everything the night before and all you got for your troubles was a loud burp!

Okay, I know what you are thinking now, you think I have painted unflattering and exaggerated pictures of man’s passivity. Well, don’t get me wrong, this is the same man who’ll bring you breakfast in bed, who’ll scrub your back when you can’t reach it, who’ll carry the shopping bags after you hectically picked out the groceries…! I know your next question is - then what are you complaining about?

These men pick the most inopportune moment to become what they know best “men”. Why do you think he brings you breakfast in bed? Because he needs you to stay in bed for the next hour or two and doesn’t want the fact that you need to make breakfast distract you. Why does he scrub your back? D’uh. Okay now you think you’ve got me, why does he carry the shopping bags?? Because what better way to show the world what a great guy he is!!! Notice how he dumps them on the kitchen table for you to unpack the moment you both walk through the door.

I know women are biologically enabled to bear children. That’s the one thing men never let us forget. If they can look past that one fact for a moment, maybe they’ll notice that women are not especially endowed biologically to maybe hold kitchen spoons or change diapers and stuff. You know I look at my hands again and notice that it’s not as if it is curved in a special way for these tasks. So what’s up dudes? Pull your own weight if you please.

Why do I hear approaching cries of “crucify her, crucify her”?

Emptiness

The mahogany trees of my heart

Have been felled

And the birds

Taken to flight

The seams of my being

Have been undone

I am not the same person

I used to be



It is a blind spot

What my eyes used to see

There are no more tears

My rivers refuse to flow

No more dreams

Not even in black and white



I poke at the ashes

Searching for a glow

I dig up the shrub-less soil

And there are no corpses to bury

No cold and soothing hugs

From the withered arms

No kisses

From the lips of the dead



There is nothing to live for

No passion to die for

My vacant eyes stare

Unoccupied for nobody lives here

I stare at yards and yards

Of empty space

Years and years

Of nothingness



Yes I can see the future

Not for me the fortune teller’s lies

My heart is not in it anymore

My heart is not in

My heart is just not

And I don’t know what to do

And I don’t know if to do

PMS Series - In The Face of Male Insensitivity

This will be the first in the PMS series, dedicated to all soul sisters out there. There will also be:

• In the face of male passivity
• In the face of male smugness
• In the face of male loving

I read an excerpt from a book some years back that went something like this,
“men and women are two sides of a coin, one cannot exist without the other, there will be conflicts, but we need to meet at some point in order to foster social order

…or something like that.

The only verse in the bible that my fiancé likes to quote is “Husbands, LEARN to live with your wives…” of course with the emphasis on “learn”.

As far as he is concerned, to live a successful and conflict free life with the female specie you require some kind of specialized training. Maybe Harvard should offer that course and make a man the Dean of studies and let’s see just how far that gets them.

I used to say that maybe the world would be better if we women found a way to exterminate all the men, became lesbians and cloned each other for posterity. You’ll see we will stop worrying about nuclear threats, wars, global warming, energy distribution and gender discrimination (obviously). But I guess, I lost my rights to making such frightfully incensing statements since I got engaged – to a man (thought I’d clear that up).

Male insensitivity. What does a woman really want? Tough question yeah? You know why it’s tough my dear brothers? It is because different women want different things. How come that never occurred to anyone? All those people writing books and giving lectures on how to treat a woman. All those people telling how women are from one end of Venus and Men from another galaxy altogether! Who told you we want the same things? Who told you we… I am beginning to foam in the mouth.

(Deep Breath) Now the one thing all women seem to want in equal amounts is for a man to magically be able to tell what it is they actually want. There’s a name for it, sensitivity.
Why is it such a big deal to see a grown man cry? Why do we not expect men to outwardly express grief and love?

One school of thought attributes this to nurture. Let me explain, all their lives men are more or less beaten into shape to attain exemplary male attributes. If you don’t know what I am talking about please watch the movie “300” and you’ll understand clearly. Men are taught to suppress emotions, tears and any such signs of weakness from a very early age. Imagine a group of boys playing soccer, if one of them gets hurt, he isn’t allowed to start shedding tears. What kind of silly girl would he look like? Over the years all these training crystallize and turn them into the men you and I eventually get married to. How do you expect men like these to be remotely in touch with their emotions?

There is another school of thought which stipulates that men are actually too sensitive and that’s why they keep their sensitivity under wraps so they don’t get hurt! You see, they have to be completely insensitive in order to survive. A bit convoluted but it gives me some sort of perverse pleasure to be told I am stronger than a man. They say it’s been scientifically proven that men have higher levels of stress hormones than women! Aha! If I catch a man make fun of PMS ever again…!

Sadly, my better sense tells me that men are whatever they wish to be. Men know what their women need. Trust me, they know. They hide under the cloak of insensitivity. Well, you see it’s not their fault, you think they are insensitive and you call them insensitive so they will be insensitive to please you. You got a problem with that?

You see that beautiful dress you were eyeing at the shop and going on about how beautiful it was and how you can’t afford it because it was a bit too expensive and how you’ve been trying to keep your spending in check. How you kept saying that knowing he’s just been paid a huge unexpected allowance. Trust me, he knew what you were driving at but being insensitive made more sense at the time.

So if you are female, don’t be buying it okay? He knows he just doesn’t want you to know he knows.

Panting for more

These thoughts of mine they come and go
Like massive waves they ebb and flow
Sharing it all
Baring it all
Leave you panting for more
Till we float to shore
I was going to blog about something extremely exciting today. Aim – to have you coming back to this page everyday, but something changed all that. I found out a very close friend had passed on and all those things I was going to write about just seemed mega-frivolous compared to this. You know, like writing about pet-peeves right now just seems so inconceivable. Forgive me but this is going to be one of those tributes to someone who touched my life in ways I didn’t know was possible and seem to have affected me even more in death. So here goes...

B,

Soul Sis, I met you by chance at that totally whacked out fashion show, remember? By a stroke of fate I found myself sharing a table with you and your dreadlocks (after I’d changed tables like four times). You remember how we made fun of the level of mediocrity at that show. Whilst I got upset I’d spent all that money to watch people misbehave, you kept laughing and at a point I couldn’t help it I had to see the funny side and let you infect me with your fun-loving spirit. Strangely, for that was maybe the first time in my life I warmed up to a total stranger almost instantly. Eventually B, it turned out to be money well spent. For now I know I was priviledged to have met you that night, seeing as you had very little time left.

All those times you visited, the parties, kept at me, kept telling me you loved me. I used to wonder how it was that being affectionate was second nature for you. There were times I wished I was that way and I told you as much. I knew you had your pain but you never let them keep you down. How did you do it? I don’t know. It would have been so easy for you to be bitter but you chose not to be. You chose to live your life to the fullest. I am glad you did for some people will live to be 90 but will never know the joy you knew in just two decades.

I am sorry I wasn’t the kind of friend I could have been. I am sorry I chose to be the other kind. The kind who assumes her friends will always be there. Forgive me sweetie, I am sure you have for that was your nature.

You have left me panting for more sweetie. My heart is so broken right now. A lump of pain and regret. Yes B, regret.

Stay warm. 'Love you.

Me.

Let's begin again

Okay everyone... by now una for don tire for me, I am certain of that.

Seriously.

lemme explain. The problem was this, too much was going on in my life at the time and I found out I couldn't possibly blog about all that. Plus I was depressed and feeling really bad so the blogging thing had to take a back seat.

A lot has happened oh, and a lot has changed since the day i wrote the first blog.
So I'll give you a quick update and we'll go from there.

1. Not single anymore, got engaged, will let you know when I finally tie the knot... and about that... material from that should make up a blog site all by itself.

2. Have changed jobs. I don't in a consulting firm anymore, I now work in a bank. Competency and Knowledge Management. I think I am the head of my unit but since I am the only one in that unit, not so sure it counts.

So what will this blog be about?

It's going to be mostly about the world through my eyes and whatever catches my fancy. I write poetry, so every now and then I will post some of them. Feel free to read them and comment on them. Note that i have a fragile ego, don't crush it with your comments but again i also have a bad mouth or in this case bad fingers and can give back as much as I get.

Mwah, let's do this...

This time f'real.

Welcome to my world.

Honestly...

Truly

I mean it...

lol.