Are We Focusing On What Really Matters?

Last week I had a little birthday party for Number 5.

Actually, I didn’t have much to do with it.

Number 4 and 5 planned it together.

Then on Tuesday I had a party for Number 3. It was his tenth birthday, and seeing as it was the first double digit birthday, I told him he could have a big party.

A big party for him meant more than five people. He ended up with sixteen guests.

I just want to share some observations I made from those two parties.

But to summarize, it was the second time my children showed me that there is for sure an inherent difference between boys and girls.

When girls think of a party, they think about decorations and crafts and activities.

They think about plates and tablecloths and colors.

They think about the details.

When boys think about a party, they think about, well.

partying.

They just want to hang with their friends.

Sure, they would enjoy planned activities.

But they don’t need them.

Give them a ball, and they are fine.

Girls want to make things pretty and tend to complicate things.

Boys just need a little open space and their buddies.

They just want to throw shit at each other and run around.

They will eat pizza straight from the box. They don’t give a rat’s ass about matching plates and napkins.

Or any plates and napkins.

They don’t sweat the small stuff.

And they roll with the punches.

They will come up with ten different ways to play with one ball.

They will find ways to make it work.

If a kid eats too much and pukes on the deck, they walk around the puke without a second thought, without pointing or gasping or whispering, and they keep on playing.

Boys focus on the fun.

And if they get pissed for some reason, it lasts for approximately 47 seconds.

But the girls often focus on the things that don’t really matter.

And when they get pissed, well, you’re screwed for hours. Or days. Or forever.

We often hear the expression “He is in touch with his feminine side.”

But you know what we don’t hear?

She is in touch with her masculine side.

We ladies freak out over details all the time, and many of them don’t matter.

It doesn’t matter if your kid doesn’t use the flat sheet that comes with the sheet set.

It doesn’t matter if your kid’s socks don’t match.

It doesn’t matter if your kid wears a swim shirt when she’s not actually swimming.

We ladies tend to worry about this stuff.

And we get pissed at our husbands when they don’t pay attention to all these little details.

We shake our heads and say to our girlfriends, “Can you believe he did that?”

We post pictures of the outfits our daughters wear or what their hair looks like when their father gets them dressed for the day.

But the reality is, most of those things don’t matter.

And rather than rolling our eyes at the men for allowing our kids out of the house looking less than perfect, maybe we should be taking a page out of their book and not sweating the stuff that really isn’t important.

Maybe rather than focusing on the details, we ladies should take a page out of our husband’s books, get in touch with our masculine side, and spend a little bit more time focusing on the fun.