Milk & Marriage

My husband disappointed me quite a bit throughout our marriage, especially during our first years as husband and wife. He was not the mindreader I needed him to be. He, just like me, had envisioned how married life would be, and as so often, some of our dreams were shattered by reality.

I remember my first birthday as a young wife. We had made a short road trip and had spent a couple of nights at a friend’s house, housesitting while he was out of town.

“I almost bought you flowers for your birthday,” the love of my life told me when he came back from the store, “but then I thought they would just go bad during our drive back, so I didn’t.”

All I heard was what an unromantic Klutz he was. No Flowers?

Birthdays with the man you love, shouldn’t that include a flower bouquet, a cake, perhaps even one of the oversized helium balloons? What was wrong with my husband? We were still newlyweds and quickly in my mind we were heading toward divorce already. No Flowers!

I was a young woman in love and my Prince Charming was a total failure in terms of being romantic, which actually wasn’t true at all, but that day I refused to see all the little special things he did for me.

I noticed very early that my husband often felt overwhelmed and really didn’t know what to do when we had to bring a gift, or we needed to choose a present for a loved one. Holidays downright frightened him.

“What do you want for Christmas, make me a list,” he said and he was serious.

Can it get worse than that? A list of things I might like so he can get me a Christmas present. Doesn’t he know me at all?

The man who never takes the last piece of anything to make sure it’s still there in case I want it, who comes home with my favorite candy in his pocket, which he takes out of ANY candy bowl in ANY office, the sweet man who learned to read nutrition labels, to make sure I don’t eat by accident something that will cause me pain, the same man does not know what I might want for Christmas? It doesn’t make any sense or does it?

It actually does. Men are not from Mars, and we are not from Venus -we just ‘tick’ differently. While you can hide nothing from me and I seem to have a sixth and seventh sense that helps me hear the unspoken and see the hidden, he is blessed with blindness to the obvious and he hears only part of what I am not saying.

Husband and wife, we don’t come with instructions or a user-friendly manual, we are all hard work and not always easy to figure out.

So much heartbreak could often be avoided if people would just communicate with each other.

I started giving my husband instructions very early on when I noticed that he felt often overwhelmed and helpless. Just like I don’t send him to the store without a detailed shopping list, I started to share with him my secret wishes and what I had in my mind. I asked him for his and don’t try to surprise him too much.

My husband is romantic, just in a different way.

He is the perfect shopper, comes home with everything on the list, then he smiles, “I bought you something,” and so often it’s either pomegranates, smoked salmon, or gummy bears -all my weaknesses.

Men are more rational and the moment we are aware of it we can adjust our approach and be truly happy without any hidden resentments.

You don’t look outside and mention that the gazebo cover has seen better days. You look at him and tell him what you really want. “Honey, please buy a new gazebo cover, it starts to look ugly.”

If you need him to pick up milk, let him know.