(1) She knows I am writing this...we even discussed the contents...and no she did not write it...and we actually had a good laugh about it...afterwards...
(2) This is my view of the discussion and I totally and freely admit it! But I am not really arguing it...more recounting it...
So it started out about her blog. Now keep in mind we met through our blogs. Sure we actually started talking in Twitter, but our initial introductions to each other was through our blogs. Mandy has a great blog that I highly recommend. She does a better job balancing the serious with the funny and whimsical then I ever could. I would get bored with my own blog sometimes if I weren't so passionate about the subjects I write. But I acknowledge it is a lot of rhetoric, opinions, politics, religion and well just plain out serious stuff with the occasional humurous blog. But Mandy balances it out nicely.
Now she and I have had a lot of heated discussions since we met. What do you expect? I am a liberal leaning Democrat and she is a right leaning Independant. I am an atheist and she is a Methodist. We have discussed every subject imaginable: politics, religion, social science, culture, movies, music...and the list goes on and on. That is what I admire the most about her. She is intelligent and does not mind putting the (theoretical or metaphorical) gloves on and hopping in to a serious discussion. It is so different from any other person I have dated. They usually would avoid the subjects I am so passionate about, simply because they disagree with me. She disagrees and hops right in to the discussion. I love and admire that. We can disagree...hell..it is more fun if we DO disagree! but in the end we respect each other...and look forward to the next opportunity to discuss it again.
Point is...I really do admire and respect her for intellignece and wit...yeah...and sarcasm...did I mention the sarcasm? Ok...that is for another post! We are both stubborn...which is why any discussion we have has two consistent attributes; first, it WILL get heated at some point and, second, it will last forever, sometimes for days. Now the last one is kind of funny since the "to be continued..." moments can occur at any moment and in the middle of ANY discussion. She challenges me, and I love that.
Now before anyone gets too curious, Mandy and I have met, we feel this relationship really has some star potential to it, but we are both adults and are in no rush, in a manner of speaking. We both have situations to deal with in our lives now, and will take the time to be sure this lasts for a lifetime. So we are in the beginnings of what is already...a wonderful journey.
Now...back to this little scuffle of ours. She was saying something very serious, and of the three to four paragraphs she said, one sentence in particular caught my attention and I made the mistake of using the c-word. No...NOT THAT C-WORD...I said the apparantly VERY offensive word...."cute". Yes, ladies and gentlemen...I called her cute. Now I was unaware that the wrong usage of this word will earn you a week's pass (if you are lucky) to sensitivity training...but apparantly that is the case. As it turns out, there are appropriate uses for the word "cute". It can be interpreted as condescending or patronizing (I knew I was in trouble when she next asked me if I was going to "pat her on the head"!) Now on some level I already knew this. I mean, seriously, last thing I would want to do is drop my pants in the presence of my girlfriend and her snicker and say..."how cute"...yeah..terrible timing for that word.
But as is the case with us guys, we sometimes miss the point and say the wrong thing and then we are playing catch up...oh come on..you know what the hell I am talking about. Oh...and a word of advice? Telling her she is overreacting is not a good strategy...take my word for it. Now I argued that since I didn't mean it that way (which I really didn't) then I cannot be judged for saying something and it being taken that way. Furthermore, I argued, I cannot control how she interprets something.
Well, as you might imagine those arguments went over like a lead ballon. So she turned to her friends in Twitter and asked them, and then reported to me that the vote was overwhelming...it is considered condescending to say "cute" when your significant other is talking about something serious. (I later found out that this overwhelming vote was 2-0...'nuff said lol)
The point is that I am in a new kind of relationship...I am with somebody I admire, respect and care deeply for, that is extremely intelligent and reads between the lines and my choice of words is becoming more and more important. And while I would never condescend to her because I know there is no room for patronizing a woman I admire so much, I can understand the confusion. So Baby I owe you that apology still...grins...I may actually give it one day! bwahahahahaha Although I do have to say...I have thus far discovered that "prolly" (the texting abbreviation of "probably") is a bad habit (which I knew..but had not quite put it on the level of..oh...say...heroin), "brat" will bring down fire from heaven, and well..."cute" is the coming of the apocalypse!
I do not know where it leads from here but I game to find out
Wonderful Journey
