by Sheila Moeschen

Created on: April 07, 2010

There is a revealing moment between actors Woody Harrelson and Rosie Perez in the 1992 film White Men Can’t Jump where Perez’s character, Gloria, asks Harrelson to get her a glass of water. When he complies, she becomes annoyed explaining that “get me a glass of water” means “I love you.” He replies, in typical male fashion, “When I say get me a glass of water, it’s cause I’m thirsty.” Men are glasses half full of water and women are glasses half full of metaphor.  The art of understanding gender communication means recognizing, embracing, and in most cases decoding our differences.

Men and women express themselves differently simply because, in most cases, our drives differ. The domestic space is the best place to witness these drives in action.  Exhibit A: Dish Mountain.  Dish Mountain refers to that overflowing mound of china, metal, and indistinguishable microwavable plastic that seems to exponentially increase in the sink as the week drags on and life takes precedent over small matters like grocery shopping and cleanliness.   A woman launches an unofficial Mexican stand-off between herself, Dish Mountain, and inevitably her partner, silently willing her partner to see Dish Mountain for what it is: not the remains of Pad Thai and lasagna, but a symbol of their relationship.  She wants him to take an interest in Dish Mountain the way he should be taking an interest in date night and who got booted off of Dancing with the Stars.  Instead of taking him aside and talking openly and plainly about her feelings, she says the equivalent of “get me a glass of water,” which is usually something mumbled between gritted teeth about cleaning the filth in the sink (this may or may not be followed up by door slamming and stress eating).

A man, on the other hand, doesn’t pay too much attention to Dish Mountain for the simple fact that they are dirty dishes.  If you’ve had this discussion with your partner, you’ll note a typical recurring mantra: “Relax, they’ll get done.”  A man is responding to the actual issue at hand (dirty dishes) whereas a woman responds to the issue she has transferred from herself or from her relationship onto the dirty dishes. Sidenote, Men: Saying “Relax, they’ll get done” is the equivalent of saying “Those jeans make you look fat.”

Men and women do communicate in different ways and this, I believe, is a very fine thing as it not only enables us to grow, change, and relate better as humans, but it also means moving closer to having our respective drives and needs met.  Dancing with the Stars can peacefully co-exist with fantasy football leagues.  The key is not diminishing those differences or casting those differences in negative terms.  Rather, the trick is to start listening in different ways, using a new set of skills in order to hear what men and women are saying to one another. Relax, the dishes will get done.

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