Valentine’s Day is upon us. May I offer two pieces of advice?

Ok, men, first of all, never tell her to “Calm down.” Bad move. Something has obviously upset her enough to make her this emotional, and I know you know that it just makes her angrier, and makes her feel like you are invalidating her feelings. If you tell her to “calm down,” you will most likely get a response somewhere in the terrain of “Oh, you want me to calm down?” She will smile at you as if she is mulling over where she plans to bury your body, and then she’ll end with “I’ll show you calm.” It is at this point that hell-fire will rain down on you. For whatever reason that she is upset, by telling her to “calm down,” you are calling her a psycho-hose beast. And that’s never good. Ever throw gasoline on a fire? Tell her to “calm down,” and welcome to the burn unit, buddy.

And ladies, never say any form of the following to a man: “Whatever. It’s fine. Do what you want.” Because even though he knows perfectly well that you don’t think it’s fine, he will take your advice and go out and do what he wants. I mean, you TOLD him to. How can you blame him? You tell him he never listens, so you should be proud of him! He knows perfectly well that the undertone of that message is, “I actually have very strong opinions about this matter, but I will not divulge them because I prefer that you read my mind. And if you leave despite knowing that I am hurt, I will enact revenge on you when you get back.” Then he’ll go anyway. Why? Because playing 18-holes, going out on the fishing boat with his buddies, or gambling late into the night followed by a quick visit to the strip club is a hell of a lot more appealing than standing in the living room and getting bitched at. Men like their pain late, not early. They figure if they’re going to get bitched at anyway, they might as well go out and have fun first and earn it. Right?

Yeah, I was married for 25 years.

So men and women aren’t always the best communicators with each other. Which is odd, because in other parts of our lives, we manage to communicate just fine.

Talking to pets: (“Now Marley, chewing the throw rug was wrong. That was a bad dog. But I forgive you, buddy, I know you just missed me. Let’s make-up. Come here and give me a big, wet, sloppy kiss. Wanna go to the park later?”). Ok, so they can’t talk back. And they’re fluffy.

Talking to toddlers: (“Jimmy, say you’re sorry to the little girl for throwing that dump truck at her head. We don’t throw, do we? And Annabel is our friend, so we want to be kind. That’s a good boy.”) Fine, you’re much bigger than they are, and they have not yet figured out how to harness their verbal power.

Talking to bosses (“Of course, sir, I apologize. It was wrong of me not to check in with you before leaving the office for the day. Next time I will be sure to do that. It was unprofessional of me. Thank you for bringing it to my attention.”) Yeah, so your paycheck lays in the balance.

But men speaking to women and vice versa? Sometimes it goes well, but sometimes it’s like men are speaking Shyriiwook and women are speaking Klingon. Sometimes it feels like we come from different planets.

Quite a disconnect.

John Gray’s book tells us: Women like to talk, men want to hide in their caves. Men are rubber bands, women are waves. Fascinating reading. But summarizing this book is not my point, and I’m fairly certain that I have no point. But since I have things to do, and I am not here to analyze you or your significant other, let me leave you for the weekend with one last tidbit.

It’s Valentine’s Day weekend. For God’s sake, just settle it in bed.

Xxxooooo