Men, Just Act Like You Care...The Gatekeeper

Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.

Call you up in the middle of the night...

(Passing Through a Towne, in the middle of my life)

Like a firefly without a light...

(True Reunions, faces in a book, classmates, and the like)
Soul Asylum~~~Runaway Train; with a slant.

Hey Men: Just act like...
...You Care About Us

No matter how the man feels; how impacted-to-the-core he may be, the woman is the gatekeeper; she has the key to open~~~and shut, at-will. I'm not sure that the woman understands this. How a man that craves the affections of a woman, must wait for the woman to decide the verdict; the willingness to embrace and open the gate, or turn away and shut everything down.



An open letter to men: We love you, we really do. We know you're different than we are, and we like it that way.

It's true we often ask you to act more like we do. But if we're honest, we know and you know that our differences make things more interesting and exciting.


No matter how the man feels; how impacted-to-the-core he may be, the woman is the gatekeeper; she has the key to open~~~and shut, at-will. I'm not sure that the woman understands this. How a man that craves the affections of a woman, must wait for the woman to decide the verdict; the willingness to embrace and open the gate, or turn away and shut everything down.

People often assume that we're more complicated than you are. Our whirling, swirling thoughts and emotions probably feel like an ever-changing cocktail of both nuance and volatility. But there's one thing almost all of us want from you, and it's the exact same thing you want from us. We want you to be happy.

When you're not happy, we feel unappreciated and unloved. It's true: Just as our mood affects you, your moods affect us. But what makes us feel loved is different than what makes you feel loved.


On the one hand,there is a man that realizes that he has committed transgressions. These transgressions are of the bedroom variety where adventure and erotica might have been taken to the point where the woman found the excesses hurtful. Being a sensitive man, he has always been regretful of these actions. This man admits that he finds this erotica enjoyable. But admittedly, it is not for everybody. In recognizing this, this man commits the rest of his life to redressing those transgressions. He commits to this course of action because he firmly believes in staying married to his 'true-love' all the days of his life. He believes in staying married till death due us part; for better or for worse.

If you don't care what makes women happy or you're sick of trying to figure out female emotions, you can quit reading now. But if you're like most men, you've probably spent the better part of your life frustrated by females, and if you knew there was one simple thing that would make your woman happy, you would do it.

Well, there is. I've been listening to women talk and reading their letters for more than a decade, and when you cut through all the clutter, a single theme has emerged. Women want men to care. We don't want you to merely be willing to engage in the activities that are important to us, we want you to want to, especially when it comes to the kids. We don't just want you to watch your children; we want you to want to watch them.

Sadly though, throughout this life-long discourse he begrudgingly realizes that because it is not forgotten, it, in effect, cannot be forgiven. There is also this metaphysical mind-set that is beginning to take place. Until recently, this man deeply, deeply felt that if he had lost his wife, the Love-of-His Life, he would be Crushed. Then a metaphysical transformation took place. And the Love-of-His-Life was...

We don't want you to begrudgingly take the family to the fair; we want you to be delighted. We don't want you to complain about going shopping for a washing machine; we want you to take it in stride as part of running the family.

It may seem like telling us how inconvenienced you are or how much effort you had to putin would make us appreciate you even more for participating. But it doesn't. We don't expect you to be enthusiastic about playing Scrabble with Aunt Verna, but when you grumble about how hard it is to get home from work in time to tuck your children in, we interpret it to mean that you don¿t really want to do it in the first place, and that hurts.

In the time period where the recognition that these actions of years ago are still not forgiven and forgotten, something else, slowly-but-surely, becomes realized.

This man encounters another gatekeeper. And since this gatekeeper had to return...
'to greet the roses...left behind', this man is left...standing in the midnight air.

You may think we're angry when we nag you to spend more time with your family, but we're actually sad. After talking with literally thousands of women, especially mothers, I can tell you every time a woman has to badger a man to become more engaged, a little piece of her heart breaks. When a man complains or seems to begrudge his own participation, the woman feels unloved.

To us, reluctance to engage equals I don't care.

I know I'm just presenting one side of this, but that's kind of the point. I'll leave to a man to explain the other side.


A heart so weighted, so burdened.

One Love Lost. Another forbidden to be claimed. --{-=@

Here's the bottom line: Women want men to be happy, and we desperately want participating in your family to be the thing that puts a big old smile on your face.

Lisa Earle McLeod(Buffalo News Columnist)
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise