Friend #12

I don't like being told where to sit in meetings.
Usually I choose a seat near the front so that I'm not distracted by other people's off-task BS like whispering, doing Sudoku, or texting. I do this not because I get mad at these people. I sit in the front so that I'm not the one being seduced into whispering, Sudoku or texting. Call it "fear of being called on and not being prepared" or "wanting to seem perfect and knowledgeable."
Today's meeting had assigned seating. I was seated in the back, right next to a co-worker of my bff Wendy. This made me nervous. Nervous because I knew I would be temped to talk/learn about each other/gossip with this woman, and because I knew that the leader of the meeting likes to call on people. A LOT. Besides, in the end, there was NO reason why they needed to have assigned seating at all.
LuAnn is my new friend. I've met her briefly before because we hold the same Curriculum Coach positions at our schools. She oversees three elementary schools and I only have my one, but I also teach. This makes us equally busy (ok, she's actually a ton busier than I am.)
LuAnn has two kids, ages 5 and 8. Last night when she came home at 7pm, her husband announced, "Look, kids! There's a stranger in our house!" We talked about how it's perfectly acceptable for fathers to work until after dinner hours, but when a woman does it, we're being selfish and bad mothers. Dinner usually ends up consisting of lollipops, cold pizza, cereal, and pieces of bread on those nights because either that's what the dads make, the kids make for themselves, or what the mother makes after being too tired to make a decent meal. Sigh.
LuAnn also brought up the fact that her husband has the habit of leaving doors unlocked and windows open. On any given day she may come home to an unlocked front door. Both LuAnn and her husband are from the Midwest, but they're very intelligent people who have lived in Arizona long enough (it seems to take about 8 minutes to learn this) to understand that if you leave your home open to bad things, bad things will happen to it. Evidence: The home invasion that happened yesterday in the neighborhood of my school. Door unlocked, bad guys invade.
I'm not sure what it is that divides the genders SO MUCH, but one would think that after thousands of years through evolution, we'd have each other figured out by now.
I'd like to fast-forward 1000 years (if anyone is still around) and just peek at the gender differences. I wonder if we will still be sacrificing balanced dinners for our families in order to get ahead in our careers.