Larryzb commented on my post: Of course, the question arises: Do women even know how to love men these days? Have you taken that one up previously?

And I responded with: My experience recently is that they can and do, just not in ways that we as Men want or expect.

Now that I think about it, I haven’t taken this one up previously. So I’m going to give my two cents on it now.

My response is what I have seen, and yes, I’m ripping off Rollo. Why? Because he’s right. Women can’t love men the way we as men want them to. For a lot of years, most of my life even, I’ve wanted women to love me the way that I love them. Idealistically. Passionately. Even fatalistically. I wanted them to take a bullet for me. I wanted them to cry to me their undying love for me. I wanted them to kill themselves for me. Because at least for me, back in the day, I would have done all of that for them. And more.

Pathetic? Yes. Sad? Yes. Sad but true. And then I woke up.

Women will never be able to love us the way that we want them to. That doesn’t mean that they can’t love us. They can only love us how they love us. That’s a shitty answer, I know. It’s not what you want to hear, but it’s the truth. And I know that it’s a kind of circular answer too. They can only love us how they love us. Guys, I’m not a woman, and I can’t read their minds. I don’t know “how” they love us per se, only that they do.

For me, I’m big on affection. I like to touch and be touched. I’m sure there’s a “system,” or a book somewhere that will happily label whatever that means. Oh! Well Rob, that means you’re…

I don’t give a fuck. I just know that I like to touch and be touched. That’s one of the ways that I know that I’m being loved. When a woman fixes me a meal. That’s another way that I know she loves me. It shows me she cares and that she cares about my well-being. It really shows up when she takes the time to make something that I really like. It shows that she put thought into it.

Oh, and time. She may not have a fuckton of it, but if she makes it a point to spend time with me, that shows me that she loves me.

Of course, terms of endearment and words of affection are nice too. Calling me baby, is one. Calling me Daddy is even better, but that’s for another post at another time.

Sometimes when she either puts her head in my lap and puts her arms around my waist, or curls up on me, like a cat, that’s a good one. Even when she puts one or both of my legs to sleep.

Do women even know how to love these days? Yes, I believe so.

I see it in their eyes when they look at me. The sparkle, the shine, the shimmer. Whatever you want to call it.

I hear it in her voice when she answers the phone when I call her. All breathless and whatnot, like she just ran a marathon to grab the phone. And of course, she answered it on the first ring.

Sometimes she’ll send me YouTube videos of some sappy love song with a comment of, “Read the lyrics.”

Or she’ll just text me out of nowhere, “Thinking of You.” With the little kissy emojicons of course.

Or she’ll shave my head for me. Because that pleases me and I like that shit. Or she’ll shower with me and wash my back and the rest of my body. Or she’ll give me a full body massage, even though I know she’s dead tired from a long day at work. And she won’t even bitch, not once.

Or she’ll bring me a beer while we are sitting on the couch, watching a movie. Without me even asking her to do it. Or she’ll whip me up a mudslide.

Sometimes it shows up in her urgency to fuck the living shit out of me. Or the blowjobs. Goddamn..The blowjobs. But Rob! That’s not love! That’s lust! Fuck off, I don’t care.

There’s all sorts of ways that women love us men. It’s just not the way that we want or expect, or even hope for sometimes. She just does it her way, the only way that she knows how.

When we can let go of our expectations that they will love us the way that we love them, life gets interesting. You get to see that they can, and do, love us. You just have to drop the expectations and let them show and tell you in their own ways.

That’s all I’ve got for you on that one. I just know the one’s that show up in my world love me, in their own ways, even if it’s not what I wished for, hoped for, or expected. I guess I just roll with it and assume that they do. That’s enough for me at least.

I guess I could do worse. I could tell myself that they don’t love me, that they don’t know how to love me, and that they are incapable of loving me. But what good is that? Where’s that going to get me? Masochistic, I tell you.

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