Groan Men

Somehow it’s only funny when the joke is on someone else. Grown men - I always liked that oxymoron. That is, until I actually owned an oxymoron.

Liberated, I was too smart to think I could change one. Tame a wild mustang? You bet. Mend a barbed wire fence with my teeth and some macaroni? Piece of cake. Get Gustaf the Hairy to put his dirty clothes somewhere near the hamper? What am I, a miracle worker?

Liberated – from what? From laundry, dish washing, vacuuming, ironing, dusting, grocery shopping, floor scrubbing??? Stop me if you see a chore that has recently become a bastion of male tradition. Bastion being a good thing. Somebody, stop me.

As a secondary option, I was able to train the dog to put “Hairy’s” stinky clothes in the hamper. The only downside was when Hairy was still wearing the clothes. And it became a real issue when any of his sweaty friends visited. On the bright side, visits were kept to a minimum, since smelly guests would usually be forced to leave scratched and naked.

In our early days, possessing a male of the species was considered by most women to be a status symbol. We all just had to have one. “Isn’t he cute?” we’d giggle, like it was a hamster. But a 200 pound hamster quickly becomes a B-movie nightmare - “The Man Who Wouldn’t Leave” starring Gustaf the Hairy and uh, me.

Why didn’t I listen to my mother? “Don’t feed it – it’ll follow you home and you’ll have to keep it. Now excuse me while I get a bib for your Dad.”