Sometimes, you just have to wash the dishes.

Of the greatest mysteries of the universe, none has been as perplexing as how to bridge the huge void between the different ways men and women communicate.

Enough books to fill a hundred libraries have been written on how to communicate, the way to communicate, body language etc etc etc.

The problem is, at the end of the day, whether you are from Mars or from Venus, a waffle or spaghetti, a husband is still going to communicate like a man, and a wife is still going to communicate like a woman. So how do you address the widening communication gap that is becoming more and more prevalent in our society to day? It is my sneaking suspicion that one of the biggest reasons that a lot of marriages are breaking down in this day and age, is a failure to communicate. Scratch that. It is my sneaking suspicion that marriages are breaking down today due to a failure to communicate productively.

It is not a big secret that people communicate in different ways. Vocal intonation (which guys are naturally not very good at interpreting, ladies), body gestures, and prolonged silences, speak volumes in ways words can never express. However the secret to productive communication is knowing that a glottal stop does not necessarily indicate an "uh oh", that sitting back on the couch does not necessarily mean boredom, and silence does not necessarily mean something is wrong.

So what is my revolutionary approach to bridging the communication gap?

Doing the dishes.

No, that is not a euphemism for trying to catch up with the Duggars.

Let me explain, but first a primer:

Ladies, men generally bond shoulder to shoulder, working side by side towards a common goal. You would be surprised at how much guys talk when they are working together on a project, like building a deck, or changing the oil in the car.

Men, women generally bond by talking to each other, often spending hours and hours talking about problems that could easily be resolved with a hammer and some sandpaper.....but here is the kicker....a lot of the time they don't actually want us to to solve them....they just want to know that someone is listening to them.

So where does the palmolive come in?

Washing dishes by hand allows for the best of both worlds. It allows us men to work shoulder to shoulder with the love of our life, and many a heartfelt conversation can happen while rinsing greasy spoons and forks.

Here are the rules:

Who ever wants to wash gets to wash and who ever wants to dry gets to dry. It has been my experience that each person has their own particular way of washing and drying dishes, soooo, who ever is doing what, gets to do it according to their own way. Remember, the objective is to get clean dishes into the cabinets....so it does not matter if you wash the forks before the spoons, or the plates before the cups.

What does matter is that both of you get to work together towards a common goal. And actually washing dishes by hand every once in a while is kinda fun. Not to mention that when the kids see you washing dishes together, they learn what it means to work as a husband and wife team.

TiPSI Dad