and another thing

men and women are not the same. there's no doubt that the edges blur for some, but for the most part - men and women are equal and opposite versions of the human animal.
i know how a woman thinks. at some level, i instinctively understand a woman's emotional landscape - whether her personality chooses to make theater of it or whether she tightens her emotions under her bonnet and deals with them in private - i can find a resonance in the fact of them.
funny therefore, to watch a young woman emote - to see vitriolic scrawls across a page painted with pain; to see her requests; her need for assurance; her confusion and her resolution to give not an inch. i perfectly comprehend her suffering and yet i remain unmoved because she's got it all wrong. if we were closer i might tell her, but i probably wouldn't.
this is of great interest to me, as i routinely get it all wrong. i cause myself angst which i create by illogical assumptions (assumptions in general, really), projections and my particular version of creative thinking - the thought experiment. he doesn't do this. he is a 'just the facts, ma'am', man.
i'm teaching myself the catch and release method of processing, now. i tug items from my bonnet one by one and if they really exist - i acknowledge them; if i've created them from emotional play dough, i let 'em go.

eh - i'm working on it.