KIRK: Men remain the master bluffers

• Amy Kirk

Amy Kirk

Talk about it

Contrary to some young people’s assumption, pop singer Lady GaGa did not come up with the expression “Poker Face.”

The term is actually a derivative of men’s ability to bluff with adeptness.

The fine art of bluffing, scamming, or con artistry goes hand-in-hand with men’s need for challenges to figure out problems, skills, or tasks. There may be a little self-doubt internally, but men will always appear confident externally and figure things out as they go until they feel masterfully skilled.

They don’t want anyone to know if there’s something they’re not good at and will admit to knowing how to do something even if they don’t have a clue. Bluffing is a life skill men learn early on to avoid being “found out” that they might not know what they’re doing.

The skill with which men can pretend may explain why women tend to give a random guy, such as a car dealer, the benefit of the doubt more than her husband. Men are skeptical of each other; they know the other guy’s probably bluffing too.

That’s why women rely on (and for some, heavily) makeup instead bluffing.

Ladies prefer using makeup, concealer sticks, and clothes to cover up their insecurities.

I’ve always been in awe of my husband’s ability to bluff a cow or bull when sorting them off or getting them in.

He moves quickly and appears fearless using daredevil-like skills to get the job done, making the task look so easy.

When I try to bluff a cow or bull, there seems to be a much higher record of them getting past me.

I can never tell if my husband’s putting up a front or if he really does know how to fix the toilet, a sink leak, or unthaw frozen pipes.

Either way, I don’t doubt his abilities because he’s always managed to get things back on track.

When that happens, I never hesitate to tell him that he is the smarter one of the two of us (or at least he’s good at pretending he is). Our kids and I joke around that my husband is a “jack-of-all-trades, master-of-MANY” because he always resolves our household and ranch-related problems no matter what it is, making us believe he is a master at many things.

If he is bluffing in order to resolve such problems I don’t care because it frees me up to resume doing what I appear to be good at: laundry, cooking, tending to the ruthless mail pile, refereeing sibling quarrels, guidance counseling, and managing all home and family matters.

But just to keep me guessing whether or not he’s bluffing, my husband has intentionally admitted his lack of expertise over the years regarding certain challenges: operating the washing machine (even though he washed his own clothes until he was 30 when he met me), loading and running the dishwasher, finding anything in the house, and changing dirty diapers.

My husband and I affectionately tease each other that the biggest scam he’s ever pulled off was conning me into marrying him. Whether he scammed me or not I’ll never know but the day he married me, he landed himself a lifetime of man’s ultimate challenge to figure out.

Amy Kirk and her husband raise their two kids on a fourth-generation cow/calf operation near Pringle. She blogs at ranchwifeslant.areavoices.com.

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