House of Eratosthenes

I’ll tell you how this grabbed my attention. I always saw these “my wife doesn’t pay me as much attention now that the baby’s here” guys as spoiled wimps, to be honest. After all, being a real man is about taking care of people weaker than you, isn’t it? Soldiering on in spite of lost sleep, dentist bills, skin taken off your knuckles when the wrench slipped, etc. Certainly you shouldn’t be belly-aching that people aren’t paying attention to you all the time.

Except that last frame looks just like so many of my failed relationships from the past. Ouch.

Maybe now that I’m in something a whole lot better, I’ve accumulated the wisdom necessary to speak on this. Not solve all the world’s problems, but just say a thing or two about it. To the fellas. After all, all those times I was down on my hands & knees getting milkshake spilled on my head, I thought I was alone. Clearly, I wasn’t. How many other guys out there with milkshake in their hair think they’re alone? Lean forward and follow my words, guys, here comes wisdom. I’m not saying here comes perfection…I’m not even saying it will solve anything. But it needs to be said.

You know how we all think the nice guys finish last? And how the ladies deny it, deny it, deny it some more? And yet…guys who get laid pretty much whenever they want, they certainly aren’t what you call “nice.” I don’t know that many nice guys who say “please” and “thank you” and never have time for themselves, because they’re constantly juggling girlfriends. I don’t know of too many evil bastards who steal from tip jars and leave gum on bus seats, who are crying in their beers because they can’t get dates.

Having failed and succeeded, I’ve come to a conclusion.

Women don’t like guys who are dicks. They don’t like men who are nice, either. They say they like men who are “assertive, but not cocky.” This is a lie. They don’t like assertive men at all. They like cocky men more than they say they do, but they’re not extremely fond of that, either.

They like men who have preferences for things, and stand up for those preferences. Definite men.

It tells them that if they build a household with this guy, someone in that household will have a preference about things, at all times, twenty-four-seven. The woman, then, can be decisive when she feels like it, or veg out and let things be however they are, when she feels like it. The man will go right on, making wise decisions about things, until she wakes up and is ready to grab the wheel again.

That’s actually kind of silly — men have downtime, just like women do. And if a normal man has to keep making decisions, whether he wants to or not, and answer for them later, just so his better-half can space out, there will be no peaceful relinquishing-of-the-wheel at the end of his shift. In a man’s world, a ship has one captain. In a woman’s world, that stuff is based on feelings. And nobody likes to have their feelings subordinated to somebody else’s feelings.

Lately, I’ve gotten in the habit of just being definite, and it’s improved my relationships with women by leaps and bounds. I like this. I don’t like that. There’s a third answer: I don’t care, but at least I definitely don’t care. Be passionate about your apathy, in other words. Just those three answers, for anything that comes up. “I don’t know” is what’s poisonous. You’re practically breaking up with her, or divorcing her, right there & then if you tell her that.

And it’s funny, because the way guys are raised, “chivalry” is all about letting her decide everything, imposing your will only when it’s absolutely necessary, and completely off her radar, like, should your car be filled with 87 or 91 octane. Leave EVERYTHING else…up to her. And good heavens, don’t express a preference one way or the other. That might make her feel “pressured,” and we can’t have that, can we.

It’s a recipe for disaster.

What this all boils down to, is that guy in the comic strip up there, he’s already divorced. It’s a man’s patriarchal duty to stop that scenario from developing before it develops — climbing out of that hole once you’re in it, is futile. How do you avoid becoming furniture? By saying “no” sometimes. Yeah, that’s right. If you’re a married guy, and your living room is chock full of ceramic angels, candles, frilly things, and your toilet seat lid has a fuzzy cover on it that makes it impossible to leave it up…you’re divorced already.

Women can, contrary to popular belief, be told no. In fact, women love hearing no. What they can’t stand, is being told “I don’t know” about something, and then later, having an argument about something that had been left to their judgment earlier.

That’s weak. Indecisive. Womanly. There are valid evolutionary reasons why women don’t find it attractive. If you’ve got the balls to knock her up, you’ve got the balls to make up your mind about things.

Finally I think a guy has it figured out…I totally agree. While I might not enjoy being told “no”, or something else I don’t want to hear, all it amounts to is a minor annoyance. I can’t stand indecisiveness. I can’t stand much passiveness of any variety in a man. THAT is a relationship killer. A woman has enough on her plate in life, especially with children, to have to play mommy to her husband as well. Bravo dude. You got it right this time!
- nyc_rep | 09/26/2005 @ 12:52

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Not AloneMonday, September 26th, 2005

Not Alone
Monday, September 26th, 2005