That's Not What I Said

I recently re-learned something that I had forgotten. It was indeed a crucial mistake on my part to have forgotten such a thing, but I am happy to have been reminded of it in a joking manner as oppose to a potentially serious one. What I re-learned, was that anything, absolutely anything you say, can, if they feel so inclined, be turned around by a woman. It is almost always in a jokingly sort of manner, but the fact remains that they have an uncanny ability to twist words into insults with what seems like effortlessness.

I will start by giving you the innocent example that reminded me of this fact of life.

Me: Hey, I really like your painting, there are a lot of layers on it, you can totally tell.
Girl: Is that a bad thing that you can tell there are lots of layers?
Me: No not at all, it looks good, I was just saying you could tell it is very layered.
Girl: Are you saying my painting is bulky?
Me: Wait? What. . . No. . I just. . .
Girl: You just called my painting fat!

It was all in good fun and I knew she was just giving me a hard time, but such a series of events can easily turn on you in an instant if you do not recognize that they are simply playing, or worse yet, you assume they are, but they are actually serious.

Usually you can gauge this by how far a leap must be made to go from what you actually said, to what the woman has decided you now meant. In the above example, it took several steps to go from complimentary to insulting, which is a good indicator that the whole thing was in good fun. The most important thing however, when using this strategy, is to remember exactly what it is YOU said. If you can't recall, verbatim, what you said to initiate this string of events, you are at the mercy of said events from there on out. Now I know that as dudes, we never see these things coming so we often pay little mind to the things we say in an effort to be kind or offer opinions, but it is absolutely imperative that as men, we pay attention to the things we say.

If we can start remembering the things we say and why we said them, this amazing power women have would almost assuredly be only useful in a playful setting, which is honestly where it should be all of the time, but really nobody is perfect.

If you can remember exactly what you said, and you find yourself in one of these scenarios, make sure to repeat and explain exactly what you said, if the woman still gives you a hard time about it, or you hear sarcasm, you can pretty much safely assume the whole thing was a joke. If your reiteration then sparks an actual conversation, or serious emotion, then you know that what you said was either taken wrong or you may have actually hurt feelings. In which case, even if you don't fully understand, apologies would be in order.

As long as you see it through to the end, these situation do not usually have negative affects, but if you ignore it, or panic, or just stop the game in the middle, then problems could arise. It is all part of how people interact and if you simply don't play along and offer no explanation as to why, you can then open up a whole new can of worms. Yes, women have a special knack for twisting words and yes men often pay little attention to the things they say, but for most reasonable people, such interaction are all in good fun. If you find yourself in the word twisting game, don't panic, it is mostly harmless.