Note to Self: Men

I can't go into all the details of what happened yesterday. I wish I could. I had wanted, in the beginning of the day (which started for me at about noon), to blog all about the details of going to hang out at a park with some friends and stick fight and generally have fun. We DID do that! I had wanted to post pics with their permission, but instead of asking first like I should have (note 1), I just whipped out my trusty camera and started snapping away, only to have the guys I was hanging with insist that I delete some AWSOME shots! "I might join the government one day, and um, well, I don't want any photos to ever get used against me!" (He WASN'T doing anything in the pics that could be misconstrued to my knowledge, but anywho.) What's a blog without pics? So, I won't write on that too much, excepting to say that I ALMOST kicked Mike's butt, and I DID get one (tap) in with my big stick (when he thought we were done fighting and had turned his back, heh). But alas, yesterday's stick fighting, on top of being quite entertaining, was for my own physical AND Spiritual education, though at the time, I just thought we were having fun. LOL - I should have known that there was a REASON that Erik all the sudden called me up out of the blue (this is SO NOT his custom, in fact, it was the 3rd time he'd ever called me). Erik wouldn't do something like that unless he knew God wanted him to, and when God wants something, um, USUALLY it's a Spiritually related thing ;) (Note 2).

Ok, so now that I've written a little bit on our day at the park yesterday, I'd like to make some notes to myself about the lessons I learned from hanging out with a grand total of 7 college-aged guys, 1 man, and just 1 of me, a 31 year old woman. I'll say here that there was no more than between 4 and 6 males to my 1 femaleness at a time. Had I had to deal with all 8 of them at one time, I think I might have smelled the cofee and headed for the hills! But, with fewer around at a time, somehow, my "straight black" was easier to swallow. Yes, you guys can be "asses" too ;) :p I do want to say here, THANK YOU for not coddling me, and from even being interested in actually LEARNING from me!

Why's that a big deal? I've been just friends with some, and dated other, guys before. I was even engaged once, and might as well have been engaged to another guy, though the subject only came up once when he just wanted sex and I said no. You'd think I'd have this "being one of the guys" thing WAY down by now, right? Well, I'll ask the WWW this: how can a woman really get it all down flat when the men in her life either are coddling her (because it's gentil (sp) or good manners or whatever) or they just aren't being real with her on any level, but instead are just being what they think she wants them to be in order to get what they want from her in return?

Last night, in particulary, I got a HUGE dose of (at least 90%) raw maleness, though I do suspect that toward the end, they did coddle me somewhat, when they realized that I'd genuinely had more than I could take for one evening but was still doing my best to just accept their maleness and just deal with it. Erik is my Spiritual Sibbling, my partner under God, and is a totally AWSOME brother to me! He's there with me through everything, fun and not so fun. Yet I had an epiphony yesterday that there's a specific reason for why he's in my life, beyond the friendship and all the Spiritual stuff. He isn't just anybody. He's a man. And he has very real, very MALE friends who have been and will in the future periodically pop in and out of my life, sometimes not so periodically, who are like my brothers. Yes, I have a genetic brother, age 27, who is autistic and really is unable to be there for me the way normal brothers at least CAN be (if they choose to be) there for their sisters (if they have sisters, of course ;D). Those of you women who have brothers who are really there for you, I can only ask you to imagine what it would be like if your brother were badly injured in some chemical accident that left his brain fried and his body only somewhat under his own control. For my brother, that's autism. For me, it essentially means not having a "brother" in the sense that you experience that relationship. Yes, Jeff does reach out in the few ways he knows how. But really, he can't BE THERE for me in the brotherly, ULTRA MALE way that Erik and the guys I spent yesterday with are able to be. Autism has stripped him of that.

So, on to my notes to self:

1. Ask before taking pictures and expect to be told no by most of the guys. Why this is I'm not sure, but I think it may have to do with how little boys and girls are treated when having their photos taken "Oh, you're so CUTE! Now, stand like this, and pose like that. Awwe, how ADORABLE!!!" Etc. Guys just seem to have it engraned into them that photo = steeling part of my soul. So, ok, just expect not to have too many pics/videos of my guy friends.
2. Assume that they will inherantly only want to do traditionally "male" things. If they write poetry, they'll only admit it on a date with some girl so they can see how far they can get with her, because of their "sensative" side. If they do photography themselves, it's only to make a buck. It's not because they have any real passion for photo-ops (see #1). If they sew, it's only to darn their socks after having learned to do so in WWII. (Go GRANDPA!)
3. Never say "He seems so INNOCENT!" about a guy in front of his male friends. Or in front of him. Just say it to my girl-friends who don't know him if I'm going to say it at all. Somehow, "innocent" equals "not as much of a man." It equals "that guy's gonna get beat up tomorrow by us, his guy friends." They don't get it that this means "eligable batchelor" to some women (though women really shouldn't judge, either).
4. It's ok to burp, fart, and sneeze funny in front of them. It's really just no big deal. Honestly, they DON'T care. Seriousely. Got it? Just lett'r rip ;D
   
5. Tell them to go to hell if they make some negative remark about me as a person. Oh, wait, that's not right. Ask them if they meant to hurt me... Ok, got it.
6. Know that when they are making negative jokes about others, they are doing this because they think that's what a joke is. It's a joke to them. Something that causes them to smile and make funny sounds (laughter). It's not like they really think all those bad things about people. They do it because they think others ought to be able to laugh at themselves. They don't inherantly get it that it's up to others to crack their jokes about themselves - it's not up to them to make the jokes for those people. They don't understand that they might be losing points with the opposite sex by making those jokes. They don't stick to the rule "if you can't say something nice..." To them, "nice" = "pussy-wimp-sissy." They don't do "nice." Not even to the women in their lives, even though they love those women dearly. They just don't do it. They consider "nice" to be a purely feminine trait. They don't apparently consider it to be a quality that applies to all human beings.
   
7. Men run at the sight of tears in a woman. Even if she really IS trying to hold it back for their sakes, they still run like the wind. They are afraid to show their sensative side if sex isn't the payoff. A woman has a LOT of power over them in this arena. Yet they aren't stupid. Tears aren't a weapon. Only let them happen if they really are unavoidable and genuine.
8. Everything you say will be held against you if they don't agree with it or if they are in a different mood than you are in (which will be a lot of the time). Either they will argue with it along with personal insults, or they'll ignore you. This is just their way. Again, it has to do with being "macho" or "tough" or "not too sensative."
9. They won't notice your bruises, and they'll thank you not to notice theirs. They have to be tough, remember?
10. They aren't afraid to treat you like one of the guys if you aren't afraid to act like one. Yet they still have a thing about not hitting a woman too hard with their big sticks - they understand what it means to not cause those bruises themselves. This translates to other sports, not just stick fighting. They'll always be a tad more reasonable with you than they are with each other. If they aren't physically reasonable with you, (period, not just compared to each other), if they aren't gaurding you from physical abuse, then there's something seriously wrong with them and they are a waste of your time.
11. It's ALL about ego and fear man! Ego and fear. They MUST be macho in order to be men. They MUST overcome both ;)
    

I think I'll become a Lesbian now ;) Oh, wait, convents don't take lesbians, right? Darn.