Racecars vs Pickup Trucks

Author's Note: This is intended as a satirical look at the differences in communicative abilities of men and women.

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It was a little before 8:00 in the morning when the doorbell started ringing repeatedly. When Susan opened the door she saw that her daughter Kelly was standing outside the door crying. She immediately hugged her.

"Sweetheart, what's wrong?" Susan asked.

"Everything." Kelly said.

"Everything...well that sounds like it will take a while to fix so let's go sit down and talk about it." Susan said.

They went into the living room and sat down. Kelly was still crying.

"Okay sweetheart, what's the matter?" Susan asked.

"It's John." Kelly said.

"Okay...what's the matter with John?" Susan asked.

"EVERYTHING." Kelly said.

"Well you didn't think anything was wrong with him when you married him 3 years ago." Susan said.

"Mom, don't make fun of me. This is serious." Kelly said.

"I'm not trying to make fun of you sweetheart. Tell me...what did John do that set you off like this?" Susan asked.

"Nothing...he didn't do anything...that's what's wrong." Kelly said.

"Okay...what didn't he do?" Susan asked.

"He didn't get us tickets to the concert last night." Kelly said.

"He didn't get you tickets to a concert and now suddenly everything is wrong with him?" Susan asked.

"Mom, a few weeks ago we talked for more than 2 hours about the concert, but he didn't get us tickets." Kelly said.

"Oh...now I see what the problem is. Kelly, you can't blame John for not getting the tickets. The only one you have to blame is yourself." Susan said.

Kelly looked at her mother.

"I came over here thinking you'd understand mom. I didn't come over here for you to take his side and blame me for what John didn't do." Kelly said.

"I do understand Kelly, but it seems that you don't." Susan said.

"What...what do you mean?" Kelly asked.

"Well...basically men are stupid." Susan said.

"You'll get no argument from me after what John did." Kelly said.

"That's not what I mean sweetheart." Susan said.

"Then what do you mean mom?" Kelly asked.

"If you'd talked to me for two hours about the concert I'd have gotten the tickets, but by talking to John that way you pretty much ruled out any chance that he'd get them." Susan said.

"He'd keep us from going to the concert because he was upset at me for talking to him that long?" Kelly asked.

"No sweetheart. That's not it at all." Susan said.

"Then what is it mom because you aren't making any sense." Kelly said.

"Men are very simple creatures Kelly. While women evolved as emotional caregivers that relied on communication men evolved as hunters that would silently stalk their prey for days at a time. They had one simple goal...one simple task...find an animal and kill it. They had to keep quiet to keep the animal from hearing them approach." Susan said.

"So?" Kelly asked.

"Don't you see Kelly...thousands of years may have passed, but the primal instincts and characteristics still survive. When it comes to communication men work on a much simpler level." Susan said.

"I don't understand." Kelly said.

"It's really very simple Kelly. Here...watch. Robert, could you come here for a minute?" Susan asked.

Robert, Kelly's dad walked in.

"What do you want sweetie? Oh hi Kelly, are you okay princess?" Robert asked.

"She's fine...we're just having a little mother daughter talk. Instead of cooking I want to go out for dinner tonight." Susan said.

"Okay. I'll call later to see if I can get us a reservation at Antonio's." Robert said.

He left the room.

"Do you see how easy that was?" Susan asked.

"What? What did you do?" Kelly asked.

"I made dinner plans for tonight." Susan said.

"Okay, but what does that have to do with what John did?" Kelly asked.

"Kelly, if you and I were talking about going to dinner tonight we would talk back and forth about where to go, when to go, what to wear, and all the while we'd throw in other gossip and things. It could take us two hours to make our dinner plans." Susan said.

"Yeah...we've sure done that before...we were making lunch plans that turned into dinner plans because we talked right through lunch." Kelly said.

"Exactly. I could have talked to your dad for an hour and ended up cooking dinner tonight. Instead I had a 30 second conversation with him, told him that I wanted to go out for dinner, and now he's going to get us dinner reservations." Susan said.

"I can see the results, but I don't understand it." Kelly said.

"It goes back to what I said at the start. Men are stupid...at least when it comes to communication. They don't handle long detailed conversations well. If you want something from a man tell him in as few words as possible. Simple inputs equal successful outputs. Complex inputs equal bad or no outputs at all. If you had simply told John 'I want to go to the concert' he'd have gotten tickets...probably very good tickets. Instead you spent two hours jumbling his head with so much information that he couldn't comprehend what you really wanted." Susan said.

"So it's better to talk to a man as if he were a child?" Kelly asked.

"Well you don't have to treat him like a child, that would be insulting...but direct language is the key to talking to men and getting the results that you want. I've been married to your father for 35 years. It took me the first 10 years to figure that out and it was really frustrating until I did. Once I figured it out though things have been much easier." Susan said.

"Okay, but what about the important things like talking about our feelings and stuff?" Kelly asked.

"You can still have those conversations; in fact they're much easier since he can actually participate. You just have to dumb things down to their level. Your dad and I had a nice long conversation Friday night. We were up half the night talking." Susan said.

"I thought you said men didn't do well in long conversations." Kelly said.

"They don't. If I'd had the conversation that I had with your father with you or some other woman it would have taken 15 or 16 hours to cover all of the things we talked about. We had the entire conversation between 9:00 and 1:00 in the morning. That's just 4 hours Kelly. We can't decide what our next hairstyle should be in 4 hours, but your dad and I talked about a lot of things and made a lot of decisions in that time." Susan said.

"Why do we have to lower ourselves to their level...can't they come up to ours?" Kelly asked.

"They can come up a little, but you can't expect them to come all the way up to our level." Susan said.

"Why not?" Kelly asked.

"Well...let me think...oh I know. We live here in Indianapolis and we've gone to the Indy 500 pretty much every year right?" Susan asked.

"Of course. What does the Indy 500 have to do with this though?" Kelly asked.

"Well when it comes to communication women are like the cars in the Indy 500 and men are more like pickup trucks. Asking a pickup truck to compete in the Indy 500 isn't realistic. Taking a racecar into city traffic is a waste of speed and power, but you can still get where you want to go. Do you understand sweetheart?" Susan asked.

"I think so." Kelly said.

"Okay. Now go home and try talking to John in short direct terms and see just how far you get." Susan said.

"Okay...thanks mom." Kelly said.

"Anytime sweetheart." Susan said.

Kelly drove home and walked into the house. She walked over in front of John and sat down on the coffee table blocking his view of the TV.

"John, we need to talk." Kelly said.

Kelly saw John roll his eyes, but he did shut the TV off.

"Okay...what is it?" John asked.

"I was upset that you didn't get us tickets to the concert last night, but I went over and talked to my mom. She explained to me how it wasn't your fault...it was mine." Kelly said.

"What are you talking about?" John asked.

"Did you even know there was a concert last night?" Kelly asked.

"I think I heard about it somewhere, but I didn't have any idea that you wanted to go." John said.

Kelly nodded.

"Well I did want to go, and I talked to you about going." Kelly said.

"When?" John asked.

"A few weeks ago." Kelly said.

"I sure don't remember that." John said.

"I know, and now I understand why. It's because you're a pickup truck and I was asking you to run the Indy 500." Kelly said.

John's expression was one of total confusion.

"What?" John asked.

"It's a metaphor for communication." Kelly said.

"You're going to have to explain that." John said.

"What my mom helped me realize is that when it comes to communication women are like racecars and men are like pickup trucks. They're both vehicles, but they have very little in common." Kelly said.

"Why am I a pickup?" John asked.

"You're steady, dependable, and relatively simple. A racecar...me in this case...is fast paced and complex." Kelly said.

"I'm still not following you. What was that about the Indy 500?" John asked.

"Take a pickup truck and put it in the Indy 500...how would it do?" Kelly asked.

"It wouldn't stand a chance." John said.

"Exactly. It is unfair to expect a pickup truck to perform at the level of a racecar in the Indy 500." Kelly said.

"Not to mention that it wouldn't comply with any of the rules they have." John said.

"Exactly. Now take a racecar and put it in normal city traffic. Could it survive? Could it handle city traffic?" Kelly asked.

"Probably...if it didn't have to carry a load or anything. It would be a waste of power and speed, but it could do it." John said.

"What if the racecar loved the pickup with all its heart and wanted to be with and understand the pickup?" Kelly asked.

"Well then since the truck couldn't keep up with the racecar the racecar would have to slow things down to be with the truck." John said.

"Okay...this was a communications metaphor where I was the racecar and you were the truck. Do you understand what I was trying to say?" Kelly asked.

"I think so. You're saying that I'm a lousy communicator compared to you." John said.

Kelly started to say something, but John raised his hand to stop her.

"I'm a lousy communicator compared to you, but now that you realize that you're going to dumb things down to my level so that I'll know what you want and what the hell you're saying right?" John asked.

Kelly smiled weakly.

"Yes." Kelly said.

"Hallelujah!" John said.

He lunged forward pushing Kelly back onto the coffee table and kissing her. Kelly did not protest, but she was highly confused. When John finally moved back off of her she sat up and looked at him.

"John?" Kelly asked.

"Kelly, I've been hesitant to say anything to keep from hurting your feelings or making myself look stupid, but half the time I have no idea what you're talking about...especially when we spend two hours talking about something. If you're going to talk to me directly and tell me what the hell it is you want from now on it will be a lot easier for both of us." John said.

"Okay then my beloved pickup truck this racecar wants to go upstairs and make love." Kelly said.

"See how easy that is? Short and direct to the point." John said.

John moved forward, grabbed under Kelly's ass, she put her arms around his neck, and he carried her up to the bedroom.