DANA:  Okay, well I never really got it until lately, about men being shit. I don’t think all men are, of course. There are some truly amazing ones out there, and I’ve had some great male bosses. But I do think that the average man that we’ve allowed to dominate things is generally pretty shitty. They really have no clue how hard women have had to work to raise children and keep things glued together. In fact, I still have this urge to let my dad know how much running around and thankless work my mom did just to raise us kids. I mean, she would literally go to the grocery store at least three times a week with three crazy kids in the car. That kind of stuff is not fun, and my dad never did any of that.

Generally speaking, I’d say that men are getting better at communicating with women, but my dad has always been pretty weak in that department. I actually lived with him for a period of time after I graduated from college. My parents had split up for a year and Daddy had taken a job in southeast Kansas, so I decided to go live with him and do some substitute teaching to get my footing. But that only lasted two months. Sadly, I couldn’t stand the endless silence with my dad, day after day. I just needed some form of communication from him, like, “Hey, how are you? What did you do today?” These are basic conversational things that people say to each other, even as acquaintances. But my dad has never developed these skills in common courtesy. Honestly, I think he’s way more insecure than I ever realized.