My wife decided to drive on the way to church this morning, it’s a trip that we have made countless times.  She failed to turn at the proper street and when I began to yell at her, I learned it was my fault because I failed to tell her where to turn.  I explained that typically, I don’t tell people where to turn if they have been to a particular destination more than ten times.  (Once again we were running behind – for an 11:00 a.m. service.  No matter how much time you give yourself, your kids will keep you from being punctual.)

I could have been blindfolded and thrown in the bed of my pickup truck every time we went to church and still would have known the shortest route.  “Well, I just don’t pay attention when you are driving, and this is the street I take.”  This is a fundamental difference between my wife and I.  When I’m the passenger I still pay attention to where we are going just in case I need to get their on my own someday.  When my wife is not at the wheel, she pays just about as much attention to what is going on around her as I do when I am watching a football game.

While my wife is a good driver, when she is lost she becomes the only person on the road and the safety and wellbeing of others (including mine and my children’s) becomes secondary to her way finding.  I’ve seen this happen to others.  They drive erratically, slow down, speed up, and turn wherever they feel like it without signaling because they are so singularly focused on getting back on track that they disregard everything else that is occurring around them.  If I am driving and I am not sure where we are going I will ask where I should turn.  My wife on the other hand expects me to know when she may or may need my assistance in arriving at our regularly frequented location.

Perhaps my superior directional prowess and ability to navigate a motor vehicle is just one example of a common difference between men and women.   (Although Shirley and my two very young children will maintain that she is the far superior driver.)  Another marked difference between my wife and I, and I will submit all men and women, is the locker room.  Men are void of any modesty in the locker room.  Men will soak in the hot tub, stretch and do sit ups in the steam room, and shave their face in the middle of the locker room, completely in the nude.  One time, a guy was walking around the locker room in nothing but socks and dress shoes.  Never in my life, have I put on shoes and socks before I was completely dressed.  I was tempted to tell him if he was concerned about athletes foot they have invented a new type of footwear called flip-flops.

The locker rooms I have encountered typically have a hair dryer.  I have no use for these as it’s been over a decade since I have combed my hair, but one particular gentleman (who was as follicle challenged as me) apparently didn’t want to be left out of the hair dryer experience.  As I walked past him, he had his leg up on a bench and was using the hair dryer on his balls.  What do you say to that?  What do you say to a guy who is wearing nothing but wing tips and dress socks pulled half way up to his knees?

Women on the other hand, so I’ve been told, operate under an entirely different protocol.  I’ve always envisioned the women’s locker room as teeming with extremely attractive, fit women walking around as free and proud as men do in the locker room.  The only difference in my mind is that men wear flip flops while women wear high heels.  My wife tells me that this is not the case. The hot tub is often empty because women don’t go in there naked (men do).  Furthermore, women keep to themselves and for the most part always have a towel covering up their naughty parts.

A final difference between my wife and I (and I imagine many other husbands and wives) is that she is fully aware of the ludicrous and meaningless nature of sports.  My brother, dad, and I were watching the Valero Alamo Bowl between Oregon and TCU.  Shirley asked if the bowl games were the last of the college football games, I explained that there was still the national championship game.  She responded “so this game really doesn’t mean anything?”  I responded by saying “no, but…”  however, there was really no point in trying to justify why we were watching the game because it was entirely meaningless but for the fact that someone a long time ago invented sports gambling which can make any game meaningful from a preseason NFL game all the way to the Super Bowl.  I’m pretty sure most sports fan’s couldn’t tell me who won Super Bowl 21, 25, or 37 and if you break it down and really think about it, as depressing as it may seem, sports really have no impact on anyone’s every day life.

The harsh reality is that overall, being a sports fan is as excruciating and often times terrible an experience as having to change in a men’s locker room.  So, directional challenges aside –and not being able to pee standing up, wouldn’t it be great to be a woman?  GIRL POWER!