The difference between men and women?10:13:17 AMLeaving my house this morning, I stopped for a moment to talk to my neighbor, Ron, who was headed the other direction. Windows down, we said hi then he, with a big grin on his face, said, "I'm living in the Fortress of Solitude this week."
He needn't have uttered another word as I knew exactly what he meant, but he continued anyway: "Diane and Michael are in North Carolina and Peter is off at basketball camp for the week." I thought, "how nice," and was actually quite happy for him.
Wow. A whole week alone.
He said, "my buddy says it's just like being single again, to which I said, 'yeah, except I don't have to go out.'"
What struck me about it were several things. First, Ron thought it was a great thing to have been abandoned for a week or so.
Second, he didn't feel the need to party, or bar-hop, or re-live his youth or, well, compensate for this "hole" in his life with anything else. He was simply looking forward to the quiet, for a little while, in his own house.
Third, that his buddy and I completely understood and, I dare say, agreed. I'm not saying I'm envious but, on the other hand, I'm not exactly saying I'm not a little envious, either. Some quiet time alone sounds pretty good.
But I started wondering, was this a guy thing?
I know that whenever I leave town on business, Sarah (a) has one (or sometimes more) "hen parties," where she invites a lot of female friends over, and (b) spends a lot of time having dinner with neighbor/friends.
And, when the men in our close friends' families travel, more often than not, Sarah feels the need to have the "left-behind" women and children over for dinner at our place.
I'm rather certain that if the kids and I left Sarah alone at home for a week she would either be (a) resentful, (b) having lots of hen parties, (c) eating over at friends' houses every night, or (d), most likely, all of the above.
I, on the other hand, would be a lot more like Ron and look for a good book or a re-run of The Matrix to amuse myself with.
To each his (or her) own, I suppose.
