THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, February 2, 1996 TAG: 9602020031
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MICHELLE MIZAL, CAMPUS CORRESPONDENT
LENGTH: Long : 116 lines
GOING TOGETHER. Breaking up. The game. Being whipped. Kicked to the curb. This is the vocabulary of high school relationships.
It's hard enough dealing with parents and teachers who seem only remotely connected to this planet, but when dealing with the opposite sex, it seems like girls and guys exist in different galaxies.
It's little wonder that a panel of local teens agreed with the title of John Gray's best-selling book ``Men Are From Mars - Women Are From Venus.'' It's a guide to improving communication and understanding between the sexes. Although Gray refers to married couples in his book, guys and girls of the younger generation might just find his relationship remedies helpful.
VENUSIAN LANGUAGE
Holly: ``Girls express themselves a lot more than guys do. You could be like, `Oh God, I missed you today,' and they say, `Oh, thanks.' ''
Michelle: ``How about when girls say, `We never go out and nothing is working?' ''
Jeremias: ``They're bored with you and they want more.''
Tami: ``When I say those things, it means I just want more attention.''
Tillman: ``I think they just want a change.''
Gray's remedy here is to understand the different way guys and girls use words. Chapter 5, titled ``Speaking Different Languages,'' says women use more words than men do to express themselves.
Women, whom Gray refers to as Venusians, sometimes say ``we never go out'' or ``nothing is working.''
Gray says that guys, or Martians, take these expressions literally and think that they are accused of being lazy, boring or unromantic.
But what a female means by expressions like ``we never go out'' is that she wants to go out and spend some time with her man. When she says ``nothing is working,'' she means that she is stressed and needs reassurance.
THE CAVE
The biggest complaint the girls had about guys is that sometimes they hide. Gray calls it ``the cave'' - an endless hole of silence.
Holly: ``You have to wait, you can't get them to talk to you. . . .'' She looks at Robby, her ex, who is slowly sinking into his seat. ``We were so close when we were going out, and so what happened? We should have a good friendship. He doesn't speak to me. I want to be his friend and he just ignores me. And when I go to speak to him, it's like he wants me to go away.''
Robby: ``I need to work out the problem.''
Tami: ``There was this one time when Jeremias had a problem and I kept asking him, `What's wrong?' and he was like `whatever,' and so I got aggravated, and by the time he told me, I didn't care anymore.''
Gray says: ``Never go into a man's cave, or you will be burned by the dragon.''
Females can ``misinterpret a man's silence,'' thinking that he doesn't love her and wants to leave her. Gray says that women need to understand that the cave is a place where men work out their problems alone. Just like Robby said.
Gray also says that females try to make guys feel better by asking ``how-are-you-feeling'' and ``what's-wrong'' questions. Big mistake.
These questions only make guys even more upset, Gray says. Girls need to understand that when men say, ``I'm OK,'' they mean they don't need help dealing with their problems. When a male says, ``It's all right,'' he's not blaming the female; he just wants to resolve the problem on his own - with no interruptions.
Gray says the best thing a female can do when guys go into the cave is to focus on anything except him. When guys finally come out, girls should trust that the problem is solved.
RUBBER BANDS
Holly: ``Yeah, that's what they (guys) do, they play little games to see if you'll come back to them. This guy would break up with me and then he'd go back out with me.''
Robby: ``If a girl likes you, you don't want her to bother you, so you leave her alone for a little bit, and you come back to them again and they like you again. That's how you keep getting them.''
In Chapter 6, titled ``Men Are Like Rubber Bands,'' Gray explains that guys battle with their need for independence and their need for intimacy. Once a male fulfills his need for intimacy, he pulls away because he wants to feel independent. In time, the intimate need returns and the male comes ``springing'' back - like a rubber band. Gray says that girls just need to understand this.
But what happens when the rubber band breaks?
CALLING IT QUITS
Michelle: ``What are the reasons people break up?''
Jackie: ``When there are too many differences to keep you together and you fight a lot.''
Robby: ``When you don't feel the same.''
Michelle: ``How about you, Holly?''
Holly: ``Why I think we broke up?''
Michelle: ``Yeah.''
Holly: ``I think we broke up because he never really told me how he felt. So I'd always tell him how I felt, and I think the more I told him how I felt, the more I pushed him away. (Holding back tears.) I should have let him figure it out on his own.''
Michelle: ``Is there any hope for reconciliation here?''
Robby: ``No.'' (He says this quietly.)
There is the silence and heartbreak in the room, and for this, Gray has no cure. MEMO: Michelle Mizal is a campus correspondent from Tidewater Community
College. ILLUSTRATION: SAM HUNDLEY/The Virginian-Pilot
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