“Women are so forgiving”

—“Tell me the rest of your story,” ***** said.
“No, you go swim,” I said to *****, who was gonna swim laps in Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool, which she lifeguards.
“No, I wanna hear the rest of your story,” ***** said.
“***** wants to hear the rest of your story before she swims her laps?”
So said the little voice in the back of my head, except this time it was the ghost of Hilda Q. Walton, my hyper-religious Sunday-School superintendent neighbor who would be glad to tell me “never in a million years will ***** wanna hear the rest of your story!”
That headline is a repeat of a comment an old college friend made when she heard about ***** being so turned off by my “zinger” suggesting she join me for dinner.
Yet ***** reappeared a day-or-two later like my muck-up never occurred.
Another zinger recently, although not as bad as the first. But again I thought ***** and I were done forever.
I only meet ***** one day a week — my aquatic balance class in that swimming-pool.
“Be positive!” I said to myself. “Let ‘er know you’re happy to see her.”
I knocked on the wall-glass separating the pool from the YMCA lobby.
Yrs Trly learned that knocking-trick at Thompson Hospital’s Physical-Therapy lobby, where I knock on the wall-glass from outside.
“Let ‘em know;” my two pretty lady friends, the so-called “temperature-ladies” in the PT lobby per COVID-19.
“Don’t be scared, DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!” Don’t avoid her. Let ‘er know! “Happy-to-see-ya” is contagious.
We waved at each other after I knocked. Starting out on the right foot I guess.
“I’m hoping we can talk sometime today,” I said to her poolside. “Not right now, but sometime.”
Yr Fthfl Srvnt has learned a few things about how to deal with women. One being to not hit ‘em with one complete topic in one fell swoop.
***** and I are still strangers: we’re not married; we don’t finish each other’s sentences, or “I was just thinking the same thing.”
Hit the average person with a complete topic and you’ll lose ‘em with the first sentence, which you’re probably gonna hafta repeat.
So give her a chance to cogitate: develop anticipation for what you’re gonna say. “I wonder what’s on his mind; what’s he gonna say to me?”
Finally, after 45 minutes of staggering around, balance class finished, I talked to *****. And she was ready to listen to me. I wasn’t hitting her with a completely unknown topic outta the clear blue sky.
Women love to talk; and we were talking.
I wasn’t verbally staggering all over having to repeat every single phrase, boring poor *****.
And much to the angry dismay of Faire Hilda, ***** wanted me to finish what I said before she swam her laps.

• I do aquatic balance training in Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool, currently one class per week — 45 minutes — less than usual due to COVID-19.