These Damn Women!

My father's mother was argumentative, abrasive, and patronizing.  The woman intimated everyone by consistently settling on a modus operandi that was as such.  Her position within the Turner family fueled this behavior, and that made sense to me, but when I began to encounter these same traits within much younger woman when I was in college, this is when I truly began to scratch my head in confusion.

Eventually though, I did start making attempts to put 2 + 2 together in my head by asking the question, why?  Why define yourself this way as a young (or older) woman, particularly within an environment where you're essentially forced to live, recreate, and be educated together?  In other words, why wouldn't you just want to get along?

Amy was the first college student I encountered as such.  I was a freshman, she was a senior.  Brilliant young woman.  She was in the veterinary program at MSU, but man did she intimidate with her attitude / persona.  I remember vividly watching her verbally assault a fellow student (male), cursing and screaming all the way during a Bulldog pep rally one Friday afternoon.  It was intensely awkward to witness yet riveting to behold.  I had never been party to anything like it.  She was fearless in her attack.  Literally like a pit bulldog tearing its prey limb from limb.

There's a bumper sticker that reads "Well-Behaved Women Rarely Make History".  Where did this come from, and why would any woman gloat their chutzpah as such by adorning the rear of her truck with such a phrase?

Do you remember the Bible character whose wife kept leaving him in order to prostitute herself?  She did this over and over again, and yet, he'd go after her prior to bringing her back home.  As a Sunday School lesson, this is often seen as analogous to Christ and his Church (being his stubborn, yet relentlessly pursued bride).  But I believe there are other lessons here too, of a more pragmatic nature.

I believe some women are set on self-destruct just as certain men are, but their form of self-destruction is characterized by an overpowering urge to isolate themselves from everyone, every institution, every demand that's thrown at them.  And the most effective means of isolating is via their argumentative, abrasive, and patronizing approach.

What are we as men to do with these damn women?

Not yield.  That's for sure.  No, we must demand they care for themselves firstly by no longer isolating / using methodology to garner an isolated state.

My grandmother died alone.  She was in her late 80s, full of bitterness and rage, even going so far as attempting suicide over familial "threats" to put her in a nursing home.  (She did this by slicing open her wrists with kitchen knives).

My mother in-law is headed down the exact same road, and she's in her early 80s.

Isolation kills, my friend.  Male or female.  I believe this is one of the most effective deceptions Satan uses on mankind.