We Really Are That Stupid

            Sometimes my wife says she can’t believe how stupid men are. Of course, she is basing this generalization on the example of the one she is married to. But all kidding aside, she literally can’t believe it, so she logically thinks that I must be pretending to be stupid in order to avoid responsibility. Well, I’m here to proudly proclaim that she is mistaken – I really am as stupid as she can’t believe I am. Probably most men are – if you can believe the words of a stupid person. And no, I did not leave the spilled water on the floor in front of the refrigerator because I’m making a point that “Wifey” will clean up after me. I stupidly thought it would evaporate before she stepped in it.

            Take the other day, for example. Am I so stupid that I can’t see the cookie jar on the shelf at eye level in the pantry, or am I asking her to come help me “find” it to teach her some obscure lesson? Am I simply stupid, or did I deliberately place the garbage cans in the garage so I would block her access to her gardening tools? Do I confuse weeds and flowers in order to avoid the dubious pleasures of gardening? How can I misunderstand when she asks, “Get me that red thing in the basement, would you please?” And I go down there and grope around for half an hour until she comes down herself to get it the jar with the red lid for the bacon grease.

            Sometimes my stupidity is misinterpreted as a stupid joke attempt. But no, I did not make the bed “wrong” in an attempt to be funny. It looked OK to me – or at least it would have looked OK had I bothered to look.

            Sometimes my stupidity is misinterpreted as a deliberate attempt to drive her insane. That’s why, she thinks, I never return the furniture to the proper spots after I vacuum the rugs or mop the floor. No, I do so out of stupidity, and if I did do it on purpose, it would be to remind her that I did do the vacuuming, plus it helps remind me what rooms I did. Or why I can’t remember whether the new toilet paper should be inserted with the roll feeding over the top and down the front or down the back and out the bottom. The truth is, I don’t need to deliberately try to do anything in order to drive her insane because I appear to be doing it without any special effort on my part. No, I did not mess with the thermostat – again.

            OK – I confess that sometimes I do pretend to be dumb. Dumb as in selectively hard of hearing. Sometimes I only half hear something she says from the next room because I am busily figuring out how to solve global warming, the threat of terrorism and the Medicare crisis while at the same time devising a way to reroute noisy gravel trucks away from our bedroom window. And all that comes through is “. . . would you please . . . for me . . . garage . . . the red one?” Well, I have a choice: I can pause in my deep thoughts to walk in and ask her to repeat what she said, only to be told, “Why should I? You never listen anyway.” Or I can choose to pretend I heard nothing at all and resume saving the planet. It’s a tough choice for me, but sometimes the planet wins.

            Other than that, though, it really is stupidity. And I think I should be given credit for it.