"For a woman, complete candor on the part of a man is erotic. For most of us, men often seem to live undercover lives, hiding or dissembling their feelings. Men will often say they mistrust intimate conversations. They're invasive, a kind of probing into their brains. Women will say that, when falling in love, men suddenly open up, and are able to be vulnerable.
"But there are warnings to be heeded by both sexes here. Sometimes something else entirely is going on.
"The fact is, a man will often unconsciously seduce a woman with the narrative of his own loneliness. And a young woman often misconstrues these confessions as an expression of sensitivity. His willingness to tell her of his loneliness is a gift. She feels unique in her capacity to understand him.
". . . What's important to a woman about that first conversation is not that the man is confessing but that he is confessing to her alone. A woman doesn't fall in love with a man's need. She falls in love with his need for her."
from Labyrinth of Desire, Rosemary Sullivan
Posted by ghetto monk at February 12, 2005 01:07 PM | TrackBackit took liam and i years (we've been married 17) to navigate these waters. there is a way, but it involves much time, intention and trust. i fear most couples will not have all three at once, and what is left is so far less satisfying that most times it's not worth staying around for. sad really.
Posted by: bobbie at February 12, 2005 01:49 PMThanks, Bobbie. It makes me feel a little less like beating myself up when I don't have this stuff solved before I'm even married.
Posted by: jeremy at February 12, 2005 01:58 PMDang, our minds are creepy.
Posted by: Justin at February 12, 2005 04:19 PMWow, that all makes so much sense, but I've never even considered that. Now I feel so much more informed---even armed. ;-)
Posted by: April at February 12, 2005 06:22 PMFrom somewhere in the past, I recall hearing this:
Every woman wants to be the last woman her man ever loved. Every man wants to be the first man his woman ever loved.
Just thought I'd toss that out there.
Posted by: Joshua Gibbs at February 12, 2005 09:06 PMwhile these seem like true words, for some reason i don't like hearing, or rather, reading things like this. i think it's because i don't want to discover that i'm just another representative woman interacting with representative men.
i'd rather believe (naively) that you can't just say "men are ______" or "women want _____." when i find out that it IS possible to accurately fill in those blanks, it's disappointing, somehow.
Posted by: amys at February 14, 2005 10:03 AMamys, i understand that hesitation. to be fair, there's obviously a larger context for the words (the book is specifically about obsessive love, or what we connote by "falling in love." and, more specifically, i put these words out as something i struggle with and figured at least one or two people would offer rebuttal or corroboration or challenge to give me a new lens. so thank you.
Posted by: jeremy at February 14, 2005 10:11 AM