No, It Is Not Fine!

One of the most vile four letter words for most women is the word ‘fine.’ This is not just my opinion; I do not know any woman that likes to hear something is ‘fine.’ Dinner is not fine. Her hair is not fine. You get the point.

I remember being in high school when I first realized this was an issue. My little mother, quite frustrated at the dreaded ‘fine’ response to inquiries as to whether the family enjoyed dinner, blew a gasket. Guess she heard that reply one time too many! She stormed out of the dining room shouting, “I’d rather you tell me it tasted like %#@* than to say it was fine!” My eyes were open to the not so fine situation with the word fine.

There are all kinds of application and uses of the word fine, such as having fine hair; meaning hair that is thin in texture or fine small grained sand. Those uses do not generally incur wrath. A man saying a woman looks “FINE” drawing his word out in a tone an obvious admiration is acceptable. Any other use beyond that is a slippery slope of potential problems. Wise is the man that resolves not to use fine as a description for anything else when it comes to relational harmony.

A good case in point is a recent situation concerning my precious son-in-law. He is a good man. I’m very proud of him and how he takes care of his family. Typically, I would say he was an intelligent man. This is a story of how that intelligent man slid down the slippery slope of ‘fine’ and into a quagmire of hostility. Preparing for a big night of dinner with his new bosses, my daughter wanted to represent her husband well and groomed meticulously for the event. As every woman knows, this involves time and effort; a labor of love to make her man proud. Sadly, my son-in-law carelessly neglected to make note of said effort and told his wife she looked fine. Where is all that intelligence now? This caused an immediate reaction from the bathed, shaved, moisturized, coiffed and perfumed woman standing across from him in full make-up and best flattering outfit. Can you hear the shovel hitting the dirt as he digs his own grave?

My daughter, in a very similar scene to her grandmother all those years ago, replied she was so thankful she spent the whole day working and primping just to make herself look fine for dinner with HIS bosses. Her choice of words was a bit more colorful than mine but you get the point. Now as if this was not bad enough (and don’t you think it should be), my poor misguided (kinder word than stupid) son-in-law told his now deflated wife that the next time they have an event she could go out and spend whatever it took to make herself look better than fine. Bring in the backhoe, the boy is a goner! I’ll miss that boy!

Relationships 101 – never tell a woman she looks fine. This is an insult of huge proportion.

We do not want to look fine. We want to look lovely. We want to look ravishing, breath-taking and/or beautiful. We want to know our efforts are noted and appreciated. This is not restricted to how we look either; it applies to life in general.

Life is full of adjectives, Mister; use them!

Assuming my son-in-law comes out of the coma, I plan to buy him a Thesaurus.