Battle of the Sensesless

Men and women have, over the centuries, developed many survival-essential skills and instincts in order to peacefully co-exist. Yet despite our pop culture fanaticism led by John Gray and the like to deconstruct, analyze and interpret each other, our capabilities in dealing with the opposite sex have actually degenerated. We have developed, often to our own detriment, a severe case of selective senses.

“Tomorrow is my birthday,” a wife reminds her husband at dinner the night before, casually brandishing a carving knife for emphasis.

“Yes, yes!” her husband nods emphatically. Yes, it’s her birthday tomorrow! Must remember her birthday tomorrow or no sex for the next sixty-two months! Birthday! Tomorrow! Hey…check out the two dogs humping in the front yard!

And then the next day, when she bursts into hysterical tears because she did not receive so much as a card, he will appear completely baffled by this reaction and protest in complete honesty that he didn’t know she wanted any big deal made of her birthday.

“Are you BLIND!” she’ll shriek, pointing at her favorite restaurant’s phone number circled in red by the phone and the date MARCH 19^TH written next to it, and the photograph on the refrigerator of the bracelet she subtly mentioned twenty-five times in the past week, and the words written in lipstick on the mirror: “CALL FLORIST.”

But he’s not blind, or deaf. He has selective senses. This would be extremely interesting from a psychological standpoint if we weren’t so consumed by mind-numbing exasperation. Do we choose to see and hear only what we want to as a means of self-preservation, or is this a subconscious mass-suicide pact?

For centuries women have honed their nagging skills to perfection, exhibiting a hairpin accuracy in determining the absolute worst possible moment to bring their nagging to a fevered pitch indicating that if the task in question does not get done that instant then the world as we know it will come to a violent, fiery end. So men have had to adapt to this behavior by carefully positioning themselves in advance of a big event that must, at all costs, be uninterrupted.

“Saturday is the big game,” a guy will announce for the seventeenth time that week.

“I know,” his mate will say, smiling indulgently.

“That means I’ll be hanging out with the guys,” he’ll state in no uncertain terms. “I will not be able to mow the lawn, or take you and your mom out to lunch. I’ll be with the guys. Watching the game. All day.”

“Okay,” she’ll smile.

Then on Saturday, he’ll wake up, pull on his team’s jersey, and settle himself into that little depression he’s created directly in the center of the couch. She will wait for the perfect moment after he has made himself comfortable and his eyes have gotten that pre-game gleam, to stand in front of the television screen and rattle off a list of chores that she has spent roughly three years storing up in her head for just this moment.

“But honey,” he’ll say in an I’m-trying-very-hard-to-restrain-myself-from-leaping-over-the-coffee-table-to-strangle-you tone, “I told you I would be watching the game all day today!”

“Well, not all day,” she’ll respond angrily. “You didn’t say ALL day! How long can a game possibly last? Besides, we’re having lunch with my mother today!”

This is another good example of selective hearing. Possibly also selective memory and certainly a propensity for putting oneself in dangerous situations, which is an entirely different type of disorder but not one to be taken lightly.

Given the fact that a male and female have, at best, three actively working senses between them in regard to each other, it’s surprising that we’ve survived as a species. I don’t claim to understand how we’ve managed this long, and yet I can promise you that the next time my boyfriend declares himself unavailable, every neuron in my brain will fire off warning sirens that if he does not pick up his dirty laundry from the floor RIGHT THAT SECOND the entire planet will self-destruct.

And when he starts violently slamming his fists into the wall, insisting he reminded me that today was his league’s basketball tournament, I will have no idea what he is talking about. But I won’t really be listening anyway. I’ll be too busy circling choice items in the jewelry catalogue in preparation for Valentine’s Day.