In my continuing efforts to inform the general reading public of new, interesting, exciting developments – or at least, things that I sometimes think of during moments of lucidity – I feel I should inform you of an interesting discovery I have made:

Men and women are different!

Oh, sure, I noticed some of the more obvious differences already.  Things such as the fact that women are required by some amendment to natural law to remove the hair from their legs in order to wear semi-transparent leggings, whereas if they didn’t remove the hair they would already have semi-transparent leg covering.  Or that men have difficulty in communicating unless using aggressive sporting terminology such as “shoot”, “take-down”, “tackle” or “slam-dunk”, and then they get all the leadership positions promoting peace.

The difference I noticed this time has to do with memory.  It seems that men and women remember things differently.  I’m not saying they can’t agree on the things they remember.  I believe there are documented instances of this actually happening, though I’ve never personally seen it.  And, at this point I would like to state that the fault for that is largely mine.  (That disclaimer should help shield me from any argumentative backlash.)

This should not be a surprise to persons who have been in a relationship…or been around people in a relationship…or read about..; well, you get it.  Anyone who has spent enough time with another person to move past the “whatever you say, dear” stage knows that men and women recall things differently.  As an example of this, let’s look back on a winter Sunday morning after a freezing rain.  My wife and I were standing on the church steps as an older widow lady was having trouble making it up the icy sidewalk.  Naturally, I moved to the bottom of the steps to help the woman to the handrail. After she reached the stabilizing fixture and had regained her balance I removed my steadying hold and turned away.  At this point she apparently slipped on a patch of ice and fell into a snowbank.  As she fell she bumped me and I, becoming deprived of the necessary traction to remain upright, was forced to cushion my fall in the snow rather than strike the ice-covered concrete.  These are the events exactly as they transpired.

My wife, however, remembers that I imprudently bounded down the steps to help a pretty young woman who was doing quite well on her own, thank you.  In her story, I landed on a patch of ice, slid across the sidewalk and careened off the girl, depositing both of us in the snow bank.  This is definitely not the true version of this particular occurrence.

Those of you who are inexperienced in matters of gender-selective memory are probably wondering why I am not upset by such a blatant misrepresentation.  To be honest, I was surprised that, in my wife’s version, I was given the benefit of slipping on the ice rather than falling due to my own clumsiness.  Besides, what she recalls did happen, it just happened on another occasion.

The real memory difference I am here to discuss is the process of memory – the variations in the way women and men tie together the memories they have.

Psychologically the process is generally similar.  People of all genders (meaning two) relate memories to other important events which occur in the same time period.  A person may hear a certain song and automatically recall a specific dance they went to or a special date they had.  This is quite normal, especially in the memories of adolescence or young adulthood.

Beyond these years, male and female memory structures diverge.  Both men and women will still recall an occurrence and place in a certain time period by associating it with an important personal event.  Women usually use deep, sentimental moments:  engagement, marriage and, mostly…children.

“That was in 1986,” she may say, “because we already had Bobby and Sarah.  I was still pregnant with Mikey, though, and he was born in July.  I recall the weather was nice, so it must have been June.”

As far as memory associations go, this is about as accurate as any if you don’t have an eidetic memory, in which case you’re probably too insufferable to be in a relationship with anyone, anyway.  Short of keeping a calendar or journal of such things as when Karen quit seeing Tom and started going out with Mark, that is.

Men would not remember when this type of incident occurred by associating the event with their children (actually, they may not remember it at all)…unless maybe one of his children threw up on Tom causing him to question family-life, commitment and his relationship with Karen and running off without looking back, thereby leaving Karen open to have a meaningful relationship with Mark.  And men probably wouldn’t even remember this unless it happened during a big game or maybe on Super Bowl Sunday.

To remember the time-frame of an event of substantial importance, a male will recall:

“We drove there in that ’81 Buick…we had that before the big Chrysler.  The carburetor was already starting to give me trouble so it must have been in the summer of ’86 sometime ‘cause the kids were out of school.  I remember ‘cause they were drivin’ me nuts.”

You may think, compared to the importance of the events used by women to associate memories, that this method is cold and heartless, lacking sentiment of any sort.  Nothing could be further from the truth…

I had a lot of warm feelings for that car.