I felt peaceful. Calm. Regulated.
Satisfied as I hit “post” this morning.
And right on cue —
from the other room —
swearing. Sharp words. Declarations of war.
Perfect timing.
My wife was experiencing reality in a very different way than I was.
And there it was — the moment:
Do I save her?
Do I ignore her?
Or do I do something else entirely?
I walked into the bathroom.
She was standing there in full jewelry chaos — necklaces tangled into an impossible knot, the bracelet she wanted buried somewhere in the middle. Her whole system was lit up.
I didn’t ask “what’s wrong?”
I didn’t say “calm down.”
I didn’t explain why it wasn’t that big of a deal.
I breathed.
I stood there.
I stayed.
Then I asked, simply:
“What are you challenged with?”
She had it together enough to tell me.
The bracelet. The tangle. The mess.
“Can I untangle it for you?”
She said yes.
So I took the whole impossible knot, walked out of the room — sweetly cooing to Lucy, one of our cats — and sat down at my desk where the light is good.
And I untangled it.
Slowly.
Calmly.
No rush.
Just presence and task.
She came out, took her bracelet, and announced — with absolute certainty — that she was going to throw most of this jewelry away because “I can’t live this way.”
Very dramatic.
I didn’t correct her.
I didn’t predict how she’d feel in an hour.
I just let her have it.
By the time she reached the bottom of the stairs, I heard it:
“Thank you.”
Here’s what landed for me this morning:
The feminine isn’t asking to be fixed.
She’s asking: Are you still solid? Can I move through this and you won’t collapse or disappear?
My job wasn’t to regulate her.
It was to stay regulated myself —
and fix the thing, not the person.
When I walked her out to the car, I thanked her.
For letting me be the man.
For letting me fix something.
Because here’s something women don’t always know:
When men are told “don’t fix it, just listen” for years on end, something essential gets denied.
Fixing is one of the deepest ways many of us know how to love.
We fix things.
That’s how we serve.
That’s how we show up.
And when Jennie let me untangle that necklace instead of insisting she’d “figure it out herself,” she gave me a gift.
She let me be useful.
Present.
Of service.
This is what regulation gets you.
Not a life without chaos.
Not a partner who never melts down.
But the capacity to stand in the middle of someone else’s storm —
calm, present, useful —
and let the field reorganize around that presence.
The feminine tests.
The masculine holds.
The thank you comes
at the bottom of the stairs.