Why men can’t make women happy:

1. We don’t know what we want 
• Gail’s comment on yesterday’s post reminded me of this.  She admitted that she struggles to appreciate DeWayne’s help sometimes because it makes her feel like she failed to get something done that was her responsibility to do. 
• I have been in the same place.  In fact, Eric commented recently that he hasn’t helped more because he was afraid I’d take it to mean I wasn’t doing a good enough job.  I had to admit that it was possible I would react that way.  And I’ve even seen my mom do this with ironing my dad’s shirts.
• So, I guess, if women complain when men don’t help out and then take it wrong when they do, it’s no wonder a man can’t figure out how to make us happy…we don’t even know what will work!
2. We don’t communicate the same way 
• When we were engaged or newly married, I asked Eric what was one thing women really need to know about men.  His answer: Men say exactly what they mean.  He explained that whatever words come out of a man’s mouth are exactly the words that he meant to say (no more, no less) and that they will also assume that the words coming out of a woman’s mouth are exactly what she meant.
• Of course, the problem here is obvious.  Women almost never mean exactly and only the words that come out of their mouths.  We have multiple layers of subtext for every sentence, every word, every noise we make.  Sometimes I think we don’t even know everything we’re trying to communicate!
• Thus, if a man says, “Where do you want to go for dinner?” and the woman replies, “I don’t care,” he’s going to assume she really doesn’t care.  And we all know, that is rarely true!  We really do have a preference, but we want him to just know us so well that he can choose the restaurant we really want.  Uh…fat chance! 

Poor men…it’s a good thing they love us anyway!