From a female perspective

I'm sure by now you've all read Kim du Toit's rant on the Pussification of the Western Male. If not, go read it. I'll be here when you get back.

Well, Mrs. du Toit has her take on it as well. I'm not going to go all over her post, you can go read it as well and form your own opinions. But one of the points she makes resonated with me.

Men curse. They rant. They are louder than women. When they’re on one of these tirades after seeing or hearing something that appalls them, often women shut off. They stop listening, when this is exactly when they should be listening (if they really do want to know what the men around them think and want to hear about their innermost thoughts). They’ll think he’s just angry (and in a sort of condescending way) will decide that she won’t worry her pretty little head about his pretty little tantrum. When a woman rolls her eyes at her husband I want to slap her!

Noooooooooooo!

That is when you have to listen the hardest.

Anyone who knows me knows that I have a temper (No, really Dave? YOU? I don't believe it!) Granted, it's better now than it was years ago, but it's still there. And there are plenty of occasions where I pop a cork and just vent.

And my wife stands back and lets me vent. She knows that I'm not pissed at her, but she knows that I'm pissed, and doing nothing but bottling it up and keeping it under wraps does nothing but cause a slow boil that will explode in due time. It's better for me to let out some pressure than hold it in. But the wife does more than just let me vent - she listens to why I'm blowing a fuse. Maybe I'm dealing with a clueless fuckstick in my unit, or higher HQ. Maybe I'm dealing with San Juan traffic. Maybe I'm dealing with a million things at once, and nothing has gone right because other people keep screwing up. But I vent, and she listens.

And once my blood pressure has gone back down to human levels, she looks me dead in the eye and says "OK Dave, but what can you do about it?" That's not a sarcastic question, by the way. That's an honest query about what possibilities are out there. And she'll offer up suggestions. "Have you tried this? What about X, Y, or Z?"

I joke sometimes that I married her because she was the only woman in the world who could put up with my bullshit. But sometimes I think that's only half a joke. With my background and my past, there are times when I just need to decompress. My wife allows me to do that. She understands that I'm not upset with her. She doesn't get her feelings hurt. She just listens. Sometimes she'll go pour a glass of scotch, and once I'm done ranting and raving she'll set it down in front of me and again ask me "So, what can you do that you haven't tried yet?"

She's a real woman. Thank god she's my wife.