My New Roving Reporter!

I am proud to be able to announce that Ever Embellished has acquired a Roving Reporter!! The articles by my Roving Reporter will only appear periodically. The actual publishing of these articles comes under the aegis of "everyone's life should have a bit of embellishment", meaning something new, different, or neat (or any other adjectives) that adds a bit of something special to their lives.

So here is the Roving Reporter's first contribution:

For some time now, I have known that men are curious creatures. Now, you ask, how can I make such an outlandish statement as that? Let me preface my remarks by saying that I really do like men, so this little essay is not an attack, but rather some observations.

First of all, men cannot, and I repeat, cannot multi-task. They can do one thing at a time, thinking only of that one thing until it is time to move on to the next one thing. They cannot be distracted, or they totally will lose their concentration, an essential ingredient in accomplishing the one thing that is pressing, at the moment. I guess you'd say that men have to mentally pace themselves.

I'm not sure that women have totally superior minds, but they are good at multi-tasking. While working on something, they are usually doing a running account of all the other things on their "to do" list. Alternately, they may be on the phone while driving a car (downright scary thought!), or they may be keeping track of how much longer the brownies have to bake, and at the same time, be watching television, and doing some mending. If you are thirty years old or younger, you may have to look up the word, "mending." -- Sorry!

Another point about men is that if they realize they have taken a wrong road, they will never turn around. They will go miles out of the way. They will never stop to ask directions, and it is only when they have gone miles out of the way, will they drag out a map to get themselves "oriented" again. I don't know about you ladies reading this, but if I'm driving and make a wrong turn, I back into someone's driveway and head back in the other direction. Problem instantly solved!

A comment that I have heard from a certain male member of my family, whose name shall go unmentioned, is that if a woman has a question, she asks other people for the answer. If a man has a question, he looks it up in a book. I suppose both systems are not to be discounted, and I equally guess that women consider others of their gender to be repositories of knowledge (sort of comprising a Collective Goddess).

There are lots of things that I have learned about men over the years, the most important of which is when to break news; and how to remain silent at crucial times, times in which he really doesn't want to hear about your mother...or his. Yes, that was a somewhat snide insuation. I'm sure you get my drift. Silence is golden.

All in all, I have liked mostly all of the men I've ever known. Like women, some are silly, some too serious, some are good-time Charlies and devil-may-care types. Some are dedicated to a particular religion and that fills their lives. Some are pacifists and some are war veterans, or are currently serving as active members of the military. Some are quilters. In this life, it takes all kinds.

Men are curious to me because I am not a man and never will be. I'll never totally fathom the biological aspects of being a man, and it's doubtful that I will ever have a true grip of man's psyche. Yet, I try to understand men, and in so doing, I triumph at the little bits of wisdom about them that I glean from time to time. Yep, men are curious creatures.