I’M TALKIN’ DONUTS AND TATER TOTS

Lately I seem to get a lot of correspondence pointing out the inability of those of us sporting an X-chromosome, to communicate. Which is a damn lie. Well, awright… maybe some of us do find it harder than others. Let me give you an example. I spent last weekend with two of my nephews. It has been an amazing experience for me to watch my nephew Blake, learn to talk. He will turn five in May, and until fairly recently his determination to express himself far exceeded his ability to do so. (He’s been talking a blue streak for years, it wasn’t until a year or so ago that any of us had any idea what was talking about.) Now that he’s capable of getting his point across, he has set his sights on letting people know how important these points are. He gets annoyed with anything less than total silence in his audience, so he now prefaces everything with, “Can I haaaaaave… your attention… pleeeease…?” It usually works. Saturday morning at breakfast he said, “Attention, Ladies and Gentleman… I only like donuts with jelly on the inside.” I was the only other person in the room, but my attention was, indeed, undivided.

His little brother, Justin (almost three), prefers non-verbal communication. He points and gestures and throws donuts at the server when he discovers no jelly on the inside. If he does have to talk, he takes the same approach as most Americans, when dealing with someone that doesn’t speak the language. He will say the same thing over and over again, thinking that if he says it loud enough and slow enough, the listener will figure it out. Like an American traveling overseas. I’ve always thought this was funny. And I wonder if we’re the only people who do this? “DO… YOU… HAVE… TAAAATER… TOTS?” Would a Frenchman have the patience to keep trying? “C’EST… TUUUUU… LA… POTAT… WEEE WEEE?”

So, I guess some means of communication are more effective than others. If you’re having trouble finding common ground with the man in your life, don’t assume he’s unable to communicate. We’re all just at varying degrees on the learning curve. For most of us, when women feel it’s necessary to narrate a novel… we want the cliff-notes. I think this is why there aren’t more female sports referees. They tried it in the NBA, but the games were starting to take too long. Sorry, couldn’t help myself. Drop me an email… and we’ll talk about it.