There was an article in the Sunday Post about these two books, The Bitch in the House and The Bastard on the Couch.

Women today have more choices than at any time in history, yet many smart, ambitious, contemporary women are finding themselves angry, dissatisfied, stressed out. Why are they dissatisfied? And what do they really want? These questions form the premise of this passionate, provocative, funny, searingly honest collection of original essays in which twenty-six women writers—ranging in age from twenty-four to sixty-five, single and childless or married with children or four times divorced—invite readers into their lives, minds, and bedrooms to talk about the choices they’ve made, what’s working, and what’s not.

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Last year's much-ballyhooed The Bitch in the House, edited by Hanauer, collated essays by women on their frustration and rage. Now Jones (Hanauer's husband and a novelist and journalist) offers the male version, wherein guys discuss how they feel about their standing in today’s shifting cultural landscape (that is, if they care at all). As Jones notes, “The fact that women are in charge of their own birth control and reproduction may be a gigantic cultural shift, but I've yet to hear a single man complain about it.”

It was interesting synchronicity running across the article today. I had awoken contemplating my own current bachelordom and the experiences of several friends who are married. One described waking up in the middle of the night to find his wife sobbing woefully, another described his wife’s ennui and the unease it causes him daily, still a third described his wife’s conflict with her own parents. Then, I was also thinking about an old flame who indicated she was separating after 20 years with her mate, a series of comings and goings in and out of her life for two decades.

Numbering among ‘the bastards,’ I was trying to think about what we do... we men.

The phrase blessed ignorance is what came to mind. It’s not that we don’t know or aren’t aware of our mates. It isn’t that we’re so cavalier as not to care about their feelings either. We just lack the capacity and the tools.

Men like to fix things, if they can’t fix something it frustrates them and quite plainly, women can’t be ‘fixed’ to men’s satisfaction. It’s like asking someone for the solution to the equation 3 plus 2 and getting the answer ‘BLUE!’ Just like one of those robots in an old sci-fi film, a man’s brain more often than not short circuits (if it could, you’d see sparks flying out of our ears).

I’m in my 40’s now and have less of a clue about women than I did as a young man. Well, maybe I should qualify that, I’ve gone into the blessed ignorance phase of life I think. Like a doctor, the approach can best be summed up as ‘just do no harm.’ Of course, men probably have about as much of a grasp of what motivates women as doctors have an understanding of the human body - some things can be fixed but by and large we don’t truly understand the inner workings of the complicated machine.

So, probably the only thing I can offer up for myself and the rest of the bastards of my gender ladies, is to beg for your patience and indulgence while we try to make our way through this morass that is life.