For this installment of the guide, an excellent group of guest editors sat down at Nini’s House of Tapas in New Haven for some lovely wine, delicious tapas and of course, great conversation. Why do women live longer than men?  Why do today’s children feel such a sense of entitlement and how do you put an end to it? What do it yourself projects should you take on?  What is Munchausen by Facebook? All of these questions and more are answered for you, so open up five or six bottles of wine, roll up a slice of Mortadella and pretend you’re sitting with us at Nini’s. Just save me a slice of Pizza, it looked really good and these other guys ate it all.

Coming out of the gate, Mary Elliot mentioned a study that said women live longer than men because they have more nurturing and emotional friendships than men do. Katie Gerhard and Mary both commented that they feel sorry for men for not being able to experience the closeness and emotional availability that female friendships possess. Katie also said that she likes a man who cries. Bruce noted that if this is the case he should be right up her alley. Jon Crane validated what Mary said and relayed that his daughters have sensitized him and that he has noticed that they possess a nurturing element to their friendships that men don’t possess. Being a contrarian by nature and a male by birth I stuck up for my tribe and called, “shenanigans” on this study. I’m no scientist, but my childhood chemistry set taught me to be skeptical of “scientific” studies that come to conclusions based on over simplified data based on stereotyped gender behavior. It was a very good chemistry set. I have always believed that for every mother of the year there is a Medea and for every Father Knows Best family, there is a Manson family. But do women live longer because of their friendships?  It could definitely be a factor or maybe men just die younger because they agree with Neil young, “It’s better to burn out than to fade away.”

The conversation moved from friendship to parenthood. Katie Gerhard mentioned the seeming epidemic of entitled young people and asked how can you put an end to it? Where do you draw the line? Bruce gave a mea culpa for what he sees as his own infractions within the entitled children penal code. Jon spoke about his daughter working through college and called it a “Life changer” that has taught her to become self sufficient. Barbie Douglas mentioned that the onslaught of media hasn’t helped by ceaselessly pushing marketing onto kids telling them what they want and need. Mary and Bruce both agreed that teaching your children to be empathetic goes a long way toward eliminating selfishness that leads to a sense of entitlement. I come from Irish catholic stock where there was no sense of entitlement. In between novenas my mom would wake me up in July just to tell me the answer was still, “No!” to something I had wanted the previous Christmas, then she would hand me a boiled potato. I also have my own issues with trying to keep my children from expecting everything to be just handed to them. My wife believes in saying, “Yes,” while I believe in saying, “No” this has confused my children so they are too bewildered to feel entitled.

After hating on the entitled punks of America we segued into the world of doing for yourself. Jon Crane discovered the overwhelming joy of cleaning out a clogged drain without the help and cost of a plumber and Mary tore out a dirty rug that had worn out its usefulness when Taft was still President. Bruce mentioned that all the DIY home improvement shows have probably cost home owners millions while I said that people should know their limitations. I just had a DIY fiasco. I put a new faucet in my bathroom and it leaked, I told my wife it was broken, she said, “Get a second opinion.” My neighbor had a plumber at their house so I went over and asked him if he could stop by and take a look. He took a quick look, came out from underneath the sink and said, “It’s broken.” I had already thrown out the box and can’t find the receipt. I will soon be eating one broken faucet.

The next topic of conversation brought us into the world of boundaries. Robert Frost said, “Good fences make good neighbors” but in today’s, on line, social media world, it’s much harder to maintain a healthy sense of distance from friends and neighbors. I complained about whiners on Facebook and have named their syndrome, Munchausen by Facebook.  This is when people tell sob stories in order to receive attention and sympathy. Bruce mentioned there should be a shut up button. I give a Facebook “Like” and thumbs up, to this idea. Mary believes you should keep Facebook posts light and not “suck the life out of the room.” I also give this a, “Like.”

We finished up the day on the cheerful topic of how to navigate a career during hard economic times. Felix, the owner of Nini’s, explained how diversification has kept him afloat during the downturn while Jon has had to fight harder for accounts and works another broadcasting job on top of his public relations work. Barbie described how difficult it has been even for someone who “followed all the rules”, got multiple degrees and after losing her job is still only offered ten bucks an hour at a garden nursery that she could run herself.  Katie debunked the mantra of working, “Smarter not harder” that management types say as they pile more and more work upon fewer and fewer employees. Mary, a stay at home mom, thinks that the whole notion of what success is, needs to be redefined. Does staying home to raise children make someone less of a success than someone with a career? Is being successful simply accumulating money and goods or is true success having less but being happy with what you do?  Alas, we didn’t get to answer all of life’s questions but give us a table, a little wine and some time and who knows?  Ciao.

Episode 45 of The Real Life Survival Guide took place at The Annie Mame Boutique at Venetucci Home in Westbrook and just like the one of a kind decorating and gift items found there, the conversations focused on each of us as unique individuals.  The vintage dolls lining the store’s shelves might be rare and singular, but they just get to sit there and stare off into space while we have to figure out who we really are and scratch out a few square feet for our own personal space.  And even though we are all individuals, we still have to navigate a world filled with others; some call them, “people.” This means raising kids, keeping them safe, instilling a healthy sense of self and if you want to keep the people you know happy, you sometimes have to buy them things.  Sadly, another part of being a wonderful and unique person is having to associate with, and be nice to some of the not so wonderful people who inhabit your world. So browse around this episode, pick out something nice for yourself but remember; if you break it, you bought it!

The first topic for conversation was, “How do you create a personal space for yourself in your home?  Tony Venetucci said, “It’s all about comfort.”  He explained how people have downsized and moved away from cavernous McMansions for smaller, more “comfortable and human scale” houses.  Eileen Kaplan has a den that she calls her “Cave” which she created as a refuge when she was recovering from breast cancer surgery.  So if you want to find her she’s, “wrapped up like a cigar” on the couch in her cave.  Ann Nyberg saw the move to more intimate spaces as a reaction to 9/11 and the recession.  She says, “People started to nest” and that they figured out that happiness lies more in relationships than in big houses and accumulating unnecessary stuff.  Francine Piscitelli uses her bedroom to get away from it all; she can read, write and watch TV while Bruce wants a bat cave to hang upside down in.  I have a personal space to get away to, I call it, “going out to buy milk” but it’s really called, “Lenny’s” and its got two dollar domestic drafts, nice.

The next topic brought us into the world of Socrates and his maxim, “Know thyself.”  The question was, “How do you make an honest assessment of yourselves and others?   To help answer this, Bruce brought up the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator assessment, which, according to Wikipedia …”is a psychometric questionnaire designed to measure psychological preferences in how people perceive the world and make decisions”.  Bruce divulged that his Myers-Briggs evaluation labeled him, ENFJ or Extroverted, Intuitive, Feeling and Judging. My test indicated that I was, FUBAR (if you don’t know what that means, it’s Army slang, Google it.)  When it comes to knowing others Ann said that she goes with her intuition while Eileen senses negative karma and since her illness finds it important to avoid negative people.  Tony made the point that as we grow older our tolerance for what we don’t like is greatly diminished.  Adding to what Tony said, Duo pointed out that with age he has become better at understanding the “clue words” that people use on job sites that indicate what they really want.  I’ve notice with increasing age I tell kids to get off my lawn more often.

During the “Know thyself” segment, Duo pointed out that in Brazil women are judged almost solely on a “booty” scale. With this sort of body judgment in mind, Bruce asked the question, “How do you communicate a healthy body image to your children?”  Francine, whose daughter is Miss Connecticut USA, said that she stressed with her children the need for inner beauty, Eileen said that there are much more important things than beauty and Duo thinks exposing kids to sports, music and other activities will make them less obsessed with body image. I told my children that their red hair is beautiful but that the world is a cruel place for ginger kids and that’s why I make them wear Moe from the Three Stooges wigs every day.

The conversation then turned to the question, “How do you deal with a friends’ spouse or significant other that you don’t get along with?  The group pretty much agreed that if a wife hates her husband’s friend’s wife, the best answer is avoidance. There will be no double dates or dinner parties, but what do you do when your spouse hates a member of your family?  Again, the group came to a unanimous conclusion; they have to suck it up, go to the family function and just deal with it.  My wife hasn’t had dinner with her friends in twenty years. Is it me?

In the end, what did everyone learn?  What was the episode all about?  Eileen said it was about being an “Open person.” Tony said, “surround yourself with people you like and respect…you don’t know how long you’re at the party so enjoy yourself.” Ann said, “It’s about the art of conversation.” Francine found the show to be about taking time away from the world and finding your “happy place.”  Duo said the episode was about time and the wisdom that comes with its passing and the relationships that its fleeting nature makes us appreciate all the more.  Then he broke open a 40oz bottle of eloquence with the summation that, “Time… distills who you are; it is a crucible of your emotional core that allows you to reach out”.

What did I learn?  I learned my authentic self needs a lot of help in every possible way and that if I want to speechify all purty like Duo does, then someone better help me Cyrano de Bergerac style by quoting Robert Frost and Thoreau through an earpiece until the day I die. Until then, I write stuff on the blog for show.

The He-Man woman hater’s club can now come to order!  Episode 44 was all about men and the stuff men hate; like feelings and words. Down in the basement of New Haven’s Olde School Saloon and Bistro, five men got together to eat, drink and mock stupid stuff. The basement’s stone walls were the perfect setting for the stony cold hearts within the chests of the men sitting down there. Wait, did I say the men were sitting?  Nonsense!  This was a man show, they recorded it standing up.

There was no hugging, no sympathizing, no empathizing, no talk of childbirth or sexy vampires. The only hint of an actual emotion was when the food came and someone grunted the words, “good” and “more.”  No one talked about love, either lost or found and no one besides Bruce had a purse. You want to know what men talk about when there are no women around to spray estrogen on everything, you want to peer into darkness of the man cave? Then read this. And just so you know; you might think writing is less than manly but you’d be wrong. I’m not typing out these words with my fingers like a woman, Hell no!  I’m violently stabbing each key with a broken bottle of Jack Daniels; like a man!

Being already in a basement the men decided to talk about the obvious: basements. They all agreed, basements are good and manly. Like men, basements have funky smells, they sometimes release dangerous gas and they don’t put on airs, like fancy bathrooms or kitchens. Duo being a man of science, explained the history of the modern basement and why they get mold. Joe Amarante mentioned that his wife was concerned about Radon gas but Duo said that a true man cave should have low levels of Radon but high levels of man stank. The men all reminisced about basement days of yore when they were young bucks using these subterranean playgrounds for their true purpose; Boozing. Every man should have at least one good basement tale. I once got into a fistfight in a basement. Some kid said Captain Kirk could beat Fonzie in a fight. Being a young man of 8, I told him he was wrong the way men are supposed to; with fists. I gave him a roundhouse Happy Days right to his Enterprise. We’re all grown up now and he might still think Captain Kirk is stronger than Fonzie but at least now he damn well keeps it to himself.

From the very masculine world of basements the discussion moved to the less manly act of grooming. In this case, the problem wasn’t so much the grooming, but where it is done. Rob Oliver, while doing his commute to New York, once sat next to a man that decided Metro North was the proper place to clip his toenails. Now men might like to revel in their own caveman-ness but even a man raised by wolves would have more decorum than to clip his toenails on a train. He would know enough to chew them off with his teeth in private. Joe also brought up the uncomfortable truth about the strange breed of man known as the, Naked Gym Guy. This is a man who while naked in a locker room feels free to parade around buffing, rubbing, scrubbing, bending, stretching, flexing, plucking, shaving and examining all areas of his body. This man makes other men feel uncomfortable and in most cases, nauseous.

Next up was the manly rite of passage known as endangering your children. Look, to show a child something interesting or to get a good picture, you sometimes have to prop a baby up on something precarious or expose them to something possibly life threatening. Moms hate this rite but men know what we are doing. When my first son was born my father-in-law took him to visit a bee hive. I had my 2nd son take a joyride on a feral hog, it’s what we do, and all of our fathers did it to us. The fact that we are all still alive shows that this is a good system and that it should continue.

As the men talked, topics came and went quickly, spring cleaning, taxes, giant ticks, and the new scourge of all things manly; family decals. These are the stickers where each family member is represented with a decal on the family minivan, Mom, Dad, girl, boy and Dog. Instead of decals I just cut to chase and got a bumper sticker that reads, “I have procreated.”

The men had spoken for hours without a scintilla of kindness, caring or sentiment when Duo sniffed the air and sounded the alarm of a double x chromosomal intrusion. The man cave had been breached. Marriane O’Hare came in late and like Hurricane Oprah obliterated the room with a topic soaked with emotion. Marriane wanted to talk about her now empty nest and the loneliness of seeing her daughter move away to New York. Like kryptonite, her evil foreign ways and love for her daughter melted the men into sacks of spineless goo.

This taught me a valuable lesson; emotions, though strange and icky, do not necessarily make you weak. Now when I watch Field of Dreams I will proudly cry out loud when Kevin Costner has a catch with his ghost dad. But I will probably be holding a beer or a hockey stick when I cry, just to make it more manly.