Fundamental Differences

There are times when the fundamental differences between men and women rear their heads. What follows is a story of one of those times.

Five of us sat together at a round table in a restaurant. My infant son was surrounded by my wife and mother while my father and I sat next to each other on the far side. We had just ordered dinner and were settling in for a wait.

My son can be a bit of a clown and a flirt, and today he was going all out for the ladies. He was throwing his head back and forth in his best head banger impression. After hammering for a while, he would stop to watch the women’s reaction. Smiles and little claps induced him to greater and greater efforts. My mom even did a little head bang herself which made him giggle. My father and I looked at each other, eyes rolling. The little fellow was messing with one of the universal laws of guydom: Showing out for women generally has one result, pain.

Sure enough, it happened. My son threw his head extra far back, chin pointing to the roof. He accelerated forward and slammed his forehead into the table with a smack, a loud, wood wounding sound that resonated throughout the restaurant. In that instant the universe split. Masculine and feminine perspectives came into such dire conflict that they stood out for all to see, like lightening in the night sky.

The ladies seemed to be in a coordinated dance as near simultaneous gasps were accompanied by a synchronized turn toward the little one. Faces knitted with concern. Murmurs of comfort and gentle hands surrounded his head and back depositing kisses to draw away the sting. My son sat in that haze of sympathy and comfort. His eyes welled with tears.

On the other side of the table the men had a very different and yet similarly synchronized reaction. Hands raised and fingers pointed with military precision. Eyebrows popped up in surprise. Mouths opened and out came torrents of laughter accompanied by knee and table slapping. No sympathy was here, only the common humor of men who laugh at their friends when they bring misery upon themselves permeated this side of the table. If the boy had not been so intent on the girls attention, he wouldn’t have wacked his head. He had received his just reward and that reward was to be laughed at by other men.

It is one of those fundamental differences in men and women, I think. For instance, women have “frenemies”, a concept so unnatural to men that we simply attribute it to that brand of feminine mystery that we choose not to explore. Men laugh at each other’s stupidity, and most women don’t understand that either.

Why do we laugh? Men appreciate strength. If we are mature we don’t care for blind, stupid, macho strength. We do, however, appreciate calm, powerful, masculine leadership. Why do we laugh? We laugh because we have all been there. We laugh because by laughing we let those in pain know that it’s not serious enough for them to worry about; they will survive. We laugh because they knew better, or at least they do now. For men, pain is sometimes the only road to wisdom.

The brotherhood of men is a funny thing. As we get older we understand when the pain is beyond normal enduring. True brothers, those who have matured, will stand beside a truly hurt man quietly enduring the pain with him. They will enfold him in prayer. God help any poor demon that tries to break through that covering of calm, powerful, masculine leadership. However, those same men will laugh at you when you deserve it and when you need it. The ultimate lesson is when you learn to laugh at yourself. When you can reach back and bring up that pain, turn it on its head, and lead others in laughter, you are teaching. In the shared pain and laughter we learn and we grow, and thus wisdom is passed on.

I thank God for the women in my life who comfort us when we fail and for the men in my life who laugh at me when I deserve it.

Hobbies

My friend leaned across the table and said, “I’m going to find a hobby. At our age a man needs a hobby.”

I was not really sure what was significant about our age which wasn’t so aged after all.
“Really? So what are you thinking of taking up?” I asked.

“I don’t know.” He paused and said, “I kind of like to cut grass.”

I smiled, “Well I hope you have a big yard.”

He frowned at me. “I mean cut grass, trim the hedges, gardening. You know what I mean.”

I do know what he meant. I come from a long line of gardening hobbyists. My mother and my grandmother both find digging in the dirt soothing. I spent two summers and more working for the grounds department of Wake Forest University. Still gardening does not suit me. I just don’t appreciate the results enough to offset the toil in the soil.

This brings a question to mind. Do we really need hobbies? I know men who play sports, sail boats, and work on those same boats. Some fish, hunt, and hike. Others, who have a more indoor bent, play music, paint, sing, work wood, or play board or computer games. My wife knits. As for me, I write.

What drives us into these pursuits? They are often solitary, taking us away from our families. They rarely produce lasting gains. Yet we spend countless hours pursuing them. Somehow they feed the soul and drive energy into the rest of our lives.

A hobby is something we pursue for the pure joy of doing it. Pure joy is a rare thing indeed. Perhaps, that is what is so energizing about hobbies. They are things we pursue on our own without the tyrant of bread or money beating our backs for results. The greatest result is the joy of the pursuit itself.

Joy, I have heard, means grace placed within us. Perhaps it is the grace to face a tough workplace. It might be the grace to deal with a home filled with sickness or strife. Perhaps it is simply the grace to keep going in this dark world. The neat thing about hobbies is that they seem to let us mimic God’s ability to place grace within our souls. These pursuits are gifts to us that take our life and make it more abundant.

There is danger as well. Like any of our gifts from God hobbies can be abused. Ultimately our Joy must come from the Lord. No hobby has the capacity to fill the bottomless void in the human soul. I think this is why so often the boat or the computer or some other avocation breaks people. The poor soul pours more and more into a hobby hoping to fill up their emptiness and neglects their family, their job, or their health. In the end something fails and divorce, poverty, or sickness is the result.

Am I out of balance? The question is simple when I think about it. If I realized tomorrow that I needed to give up my hobby for my faith or my family, would I? If my answer is no or a hesitant, “but that is what keeps me sane” then I’ve missed the point. The hobby has become my God. Thankfully I can answer unequivocally that anything that gets between me and the Lord has to go. My family is next. No activity will come between me and those I love. Any hesitation at all in my answer would mean my hobby would have to go.

Nighttime Surprise

Parenting is tough. It often leads to frustration, pain, and tears. It brings the ogre creeping forth in the best of us. In the end we hope that we can do enough right to counteract what we did wrong.

Case-in-point, when my son was about 2 and a half, we were having problems with him getting up in the middle of the night. We would put him to bed and about 15 minutes later he would get up. He would slip down the stairs and pad over to where we sat in the living room. Giving his sweetest grin, he would say, “Can I have some water?”

Attempting to curb this behavior, we said, “No! You must stay in bed.” Then one of us firmly marched him up the stairs and deposited him onto his mattress. A few moments later we’d again hear the patter of little feet on the stairs.

After this had gone on for a while, it was time for us to go to bed. We reached the hallway between our bedrooms and heard our little one fumbling with his doorknob. I waved my wife towards our sleeping chamber indicating that I would take care of the problem.

I had an idea. It wasn’t a very good idea, but it seemed to make sense at the time. I crept up to the door and waited. Finally the boy managed to twist open the door. An impish face poked forth. Bright blue eyes over an ear to ear grin scanned the semi-lit hallway. I pounced.

I can only imagine what flew through his mind as the Daddy-Ogre jumped from the shadows with a loud “RAHR!” Yes, I literally said “RAHR!” My son’s eyes went from smile slits to huge terror filled orbs. His smile instantly flipped to a comic strip frown. Then his lips popped open and he screamed, “AHHHH” and sprinted directly into the doorknob. Covering his face and screeching an even more distressed “AHHHH” he disappeared into his room.

I stood stunned for a moment. I wasn’t sure what I had expected but that was definitely not it.

My wife darted from our room and said, “What happened?”

“I did something stupid”, I muttered as I pushed into my son’s room and flipped on the light.

In the middle of the mattress was a quivering lump. My wife ran over and scooped up the lump while peeling back the covers. When my shivering son was revealed, he stuffed his face into her shoulder and wept. She hugged him tightly. “What happened?” She asked me again this time with emphasis.

I explained my poorly planned solution, as she was trying to smooth away our little one’s sobbing. It took us nearly an hour to calm him and get him back to sleep. My wife contemplated his red face and quickly blackening eye. She then looked at me, shook her head, and returned to our room. So that is how, at the cost of a black eye and possible future therapy sessions, my son was cured of getting out of bed for a long time.

I smile every time I think of this story, even as I shake my head at my poor judgment. Parenting is tough, but rewarding. I thank God for my little ones each day. He is the perfect father and has entrusted these little ones to my imperfect care. I also thank Him for not jumping out at me with his best ogre impression (which I imagine is pretty good) and scaring me into running into a door when I’m bad. At least he’s not done that so far…

A little past SuckerVille

The plane jerked again as the wind pushed us suddenly downward. Behind me and to my right, a little girl screeched in pure terror. Glancing back I saw wide glistening blue eyes peering over clenched fists. She rocked and shuddered. Her father had his arms wrapped around the little one trying to comfort her, but her whimpers were spiraling up into an all out wail. Across the aisle, the girl’s mother leaned forward whispering, “Do you want a sucker honey?” The little one’s eyes flicked right and then she buried her face in her lap. Rolling his eyes, Dad muttered, “I think we’re a little past SuckerVille.”

What a phrase for immature, childish fear. How often do we find ourselves “A little past SuckerVille?” We ball up our fists and squeal in displeasure. God tries to comfort us, but we won’t listen. We insist on following our fear out into the dry wilderness. Once there God generally leaves us alone until we’re ready to come back. Like any good Father, he realizes that an emotionally strung out child has to calm down before they can be reasoned with.

Part of this has to do with our blatant miss-interpretation of our role with God. He is our Father, and like any good parent, He is more concerned with getting us to our destination than our happiness. When we ignore this and let our emotions run away with us, he waits until we calm down. When we are calm, He pulls us along on our journey. Sometimes we even think to ask and He reveals why we couldn’t have the thing we wanted. Then there are the times when He says, “Wait, you will understand someday.”

The other day my family was out walking when it began raining. I mean it, as we say in the south, “Came up a bad cloud.” The storm quickly deteriorated from spring sprinkle to a frog strangling deluge complete with crashing thunder and blinding lightning. My son, seven years old, and thus wise enough to doubt his father, was worrying. I asked him what had him concerned.

“I’m afraid of dying.” He cried with all the melodrama he could muster.

I smiled and replied, “What exactly are you afraid of?”

Gripping his throat he shouted, “Running out of oxygen.” He worried and fretted all the way to the car.

Now my daughter, 18 months and a bit of an adventurer, reacted quite differently. I was intentionally whooping and laughing, and she got the picture. So long as we kept Mom close, she giggled and shouted all the way to the car.

Both were in the same storm, but saw it in a very different way. My son’s big memory was “It was so wet I couldn’t see out of one eye.” I imagine my daughter will giggle next time she gets caught in the rain.

I want to shout and giggle through life’s storms. People may think I’m mad, but I think I will have quite a bit more fun shouting than worrying. What’s more, I hope it will keep me on this side of SuckerVille, where I am focused on God instead of my fear.