A couple of weeks ago Hall of Fame inductee Nina Mock (one of my former youth from Wesley Memorial UMC-Tampa) joined us at our regular Taco Tuesdaze dinner at Tijuana Flats. Nina is a beautiful, intelligent, sweet and funny 26 year old who has never been afraid to tell me what she thinks- about most everything. At one point on this particular evening the conversation turned to dating and relationships issues, and Nina weighed in quickly. "I don't understand," she said, "why guys put up with girls. Girls are crazy. If I was guy I'd just give up!" She then suggested that if indeed she was a guy, she was not certain what her sexual preference might be...
In those few words Nina captured the feelings of so many of the males I worked with in student ministries over the years. I cannot tell you the number of hours I spent consoling confused young men who, for reasons they could not begin to understand, had just been dumped. In fairness, I talked to a lot of hurting females too. My response to Nina's comment about girls being crazy was to point out that guys are often idiots. But the teenage guys were always so clueless as to what they had done wrong. It seemed that they very things that had made their girlfriends happy yesterday were the the very reasons were cut loose today. I would try to explain that guys and girls think differently sometimes. We are often motivated by different things. As my old senior pastor Max Rees used to say when confused by the response of his wife or his 5 daughters, "Carl- women are not our kind of people!" I have often said that trying to understand females is like predicting the weather. You will be right on occasion, but face it- that's more luck than knowledge! And when the males and females in question are teenagers and young adults, the odds of getting it right go way down.
In 2003 the great band Relient K proposed a solution to this issue from the male point of view. What if we could just convince every female to wear a Mood Ring? Perhaps then guys might have a chance of not succumbing to our basic instincts and saying something stupid at the wrong time. When you are a teenager, nothing in life seems more important than dating and relationships. It can be so overwhelming. This song captures that struggle from the male perspective better than anything I have seen or heard before or since. Please understand, this is not about women and moodiness. It is about guys and their often complete and utter failure to understand what is going on in the hearts and minds of the fairer gender. And even though I am 52, I have to admit there are days when it still holds very true. So guys- I am with you! And ladies- please know that most guys are trying really hard. It is just that we can't quite " understand the complex infrastructure known as the female mind..." Enjoy!
Because of Jesus,
Oh Carl....you're so right. And half the time I wish I had a mood ring to figure out my OWN emotions. :)
ReplyDeleteTeresa, I will go shopping for a mood ring for you this afternoon! :)
Delete