For All My Married Girlfriends

This post is to (hopefully) make you laugh out loud, or at least chuckle or grin. I've been reading Emily Watts' book "I Hate It When Exercise is the Answer: A Fitness Program for the Soul." In it she gives thirty-one simple exercises to strengthen our emotional and spiritual core. When I read the chapter about understanding men I laughed out loud. (I love when things make me laugh out loud unexpectedly, but that's another post for another day)

Here's a short summary of the chapter. She begins with talking about how men and women's brains are different and so they see the world in different ways. She quotes a scene in Harry Potter 5--the part where Harry and Cho have just shared their first kiss, but Cho was crying the whole time. Hermione tries to explain to Harry and Ron what Cho must be feeling. (It's all very complicated, of course) Ron's response is "One person can't feel all that at once, they'd explode." She writes how she laughed when she read this--and I remember having the same response. Watts goes on to give the example of Mother's Day in her ward. She talks about the difficulties the bishopric has in deciding on a "gift" and how to present that gift to the women in the ward and then states that the men just don't want to offend anyone.

Now here's the part that made me laugh out loud:
"Contrast this with Father's Day. For many years, we didn't even observe Father's Day in our ward, and no one ever complained. (That should be a clue right there as to the differences between men and women.) Now we have a tradition that during the last ten minutes of priesthood meeting, they gather all the classes from deacons to high priests together in the multi-purpose room and present them with FatBoy ice-cream sandwiches. Everyone is happy. No one tries to probe for subliminal meaning in the choice of FatBoys. They eat their ice cream and yuk it up and go home happy.
What would happen in your ward if they tried to give FatBoys to the women on Mother's Day? Almost too horrible to contemplate, isn't it?" (page 41)

Oh, I'm smiling even as I type this. Thanks Emily Watts!