Couplehood (12 page)

When you have no place to go, you can’t believe how long you’ll watch this. An hour and a half watching a zebra chew a leaf.

I always feel bad for the TV networks, spending all this money on prime-time shows, big budget mini-series, and special events, when I’m in a Ramada Inn with a chef salad on my lap watching a badger eat a straw hat from nine to eleven.

A
nd I love those talk shows. If you turn on Oprah, or Donahue, or Sally Jesse Raphael, and you see a panel of five women and one guy—you know the guy’s in trouble.

You don’t even have to hear what they’re saying. You see the guy and you just know he’s gonna have a very tough show. He either did something to these women, or he
failed
to do something for these women—whatever it is, he’s just wrong.

I know it, you know it, yet these guys have no idea. If they did they wouldn’t be on the show.

But they are literally without a clue. Their logic is, “I’m right, she’s wrong, and if I go on national TV, everyone will take
my
side, and that’ll be the end of that.”

Then they share their story, and the guy just gets buried: “He doesn’t come home for three days, and when he does, he brings his girlfriend to sleep with us.”

The crowd boos and hisses.

The guy just smiles and looks to the audience for sympathy. “C’mon, she
knows
I love her.”

Why do they go through this? So that the hostility they breed in their home can now be enjoyed on a national level?

And what about the car ride home? After the show. What could that be like? They’ve just slugged it out and spewed their mutual venom in front of millions of people, and they get into their car, look at each other, and say, “You wanna get something to eat?”

I just don’t get it.

E
ating on the road can be tough. You always feel so pathetic, sitting in a restaurant by yourself. “Look at that guy. He has no friends.”

You try to look busy. You bring a newspaper, and you read it extremely thoroughly. Things you don’t even
care about—“Ooh look, the weather in Utah is apparently unseasonal.” You just keep reading, as if to say, “I
have
friends, but with all this reading I have to do …”

And the people who work at the restaurant make it worse. Most tables are already set for two, and when they see you’re by yourself, they immediately take away the
other
plate, to highlight for everybody else your lack of companion.
“He
will be alone. Furthermore, there’s no chance of anyone joining him, because we’ve removed the plates and silverware.” They also figure you’re so depressed, you don’t need that extra knife around.

The worst part of eating alone is that there’s nobody there to tell you that you have food on your face—another reason people get married; someone to say, “Honey, right over there you got a little thing … nope … nope—got it.”

You could actually finish an entire meal by yourself and leave the restaurant with food
still
on your face. Conceivably, you could walk into another restaurant later that day with food
already on your face.
That’s the lowest thing there is. At least then, people will look at you and realize, “Well, that’s why he’s eating by himself. Look at him, he’s got sandwich on his face.”

I
’ll tell you something about traveling by yourself: It’s ultimately very healthy for your relationship.

When you first learn that one of you has to go away, you’re actually both looking forward to it, but neither of you wants to admit it. So you both pretend you’re going to be miserable.

“I’m going to miss you.”

“I’m
really
going to miss you.”

Again, it’s a competition.

“I’m the one unable to live without you.”

“No,
I’m
totally unable to live without
you
, I swear.”

The truth is, one of you is thrilled to be going somewhere, and the other one can’t wait to have the house to themselves. Then, you get to where you’re going, and you find you really
do
miss each other. If for no other reason, you forgot how to be alone.

“Honey, where are my keys? … Honey? … Oh, right, you’re in Phoenix.… I’ll just … find them myself. That’s what I used to do, sure.”

S
ometimes you get homesick because where you went isn’t all it was cracked up to be.

“You wouldn’t believe the cheesy hotel they stuck me in. I wish you were here.”

“To see the cheesy hotel?”

“Yes.”

Or you just need to hear a sane voice. Ever call from a family get-together that
she
weaseled out of?

“Hi—I’m going to go OUT OF MY MIND.”

“It’s only for two more days.”

“I won’t make it, you hear me? I WON’T.”

Then you start pining for home, like a child.

“How’s the house?”

“What do you mean, ‘How’s the house?’ ”

“What does everything look like?”

“Since you left at four-thirty?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s all different. I repainted, knocked down the bathroom wall, and the garage is gone. No one knows what happened.”

“How’s the dog?”

“Fine.”

“Does the dog miss me?”

“Been crying since you left.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously? The dog has no idea you’re gone. Thinks you’re in the shower … Would you like to know how
I
am?”

“Yes, yes, I was just going to ask. I swear—that was my next question. How are
you?”

T
hose miles between you can really change things. You forget how to talk.

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing. Why?”

“You sound distracted.”

“I’m not distracted.”

“You watching TV?”

“No.”

“So who’s that talking?”

“You can
hear
that?”

“Yes, I can hear that. What are you watching, ‘The Jeffersons’?”

“I’m not watching—it’s just on.”

“You’re watching The Jeffersons’ while you’re talking to me?”

“I’m not watching it. I’ll shut it off. Wait.… Okay, there you see, I shut it off. No more ‘Jeffersons.’ ”

Then you’re quiet. Then you tell her which episode of “The Jeffersons” you were watching. She saw that one. Actually liked it. You talk about Sherman Hemsley. Then you talk about what you used to watch when you came home from school as a kid. What you used to eat
while
you watched TV as a kid. You compare the merits of different snacking foods. Then one of you has the presence of mind to pull the plug.

“What are we doing here? We’re talking long distance about Pepperidge Farm cookies.”

You both say, “Good night.”

You both say, “I love you.”

You both point out how the other one sounds phony.

You sit and say nothing for a while.

You both promise to be better at this tomorrow and swear to never go away again.

Then you hang up, and one hour later you wake her up to find out how “The Jeffersons” ended.

A
t some point, my wife and I got ourselves on every mailing list in the free world. All you have to do is buy
one
distinctly dumb product you don’t need, and everyone with a catalogue hears about it. “Hi! We understand you don’t care
what
you spend money on anymore. We have just the catalogue for you.”

I like the Combination Products. Things that you probably already have, but not in this particular combination.

“It’s a sweater vest
and
a bottle opener.”

“It’s a hot beverage thermos
and
a snorkeling mask!”

And, of course, if you look at the pictures long
enough, you start thinking, “Well, you know, we
could
use that. With a thermos/snorkel mask, we wouldn’t have to come up for coffee anymore. We could snorkel all day and never come up!”

Then they combine things that not only
shouldn’t
be together, there’s no way they
could
be. “It’s a cassette rack
and
a Doberman pinscher!”

How could that be?

“It’s a rain bonnet, but it’s also your parents.”

How could that be?! I just saw my parents. They weren’t a rain bonnet.

T
hey’re doing it with stores now, too. Stores are branching out into areas where they have no business doing business. “Beauty Supplies and Cheese,” “Massage Tables and Skate Repairs.”

There’s a cabinet store in my neighborhood that sells bookcases, shelves, and pineapple juice. Apparently, that was where they felt they were lacking—the juice market.

“Look, we already have a hammer and a flat surface; go get a pineapple, we’ll make juice.”

Even the fast-food places—everybody’s trying to do everyone else’s job. Hamburger places have pizza, pizza places have salad bars, chicken places have croissants, bakeries are developing film—everybody’s so desperate:
“Don’t go anywhere else. We’ll get you whatever you want—just stay here!”

B
ut the catalogues are dangerous because they seduce you with the pictures you can peruse at your leisure.

Victoria’s Secret is big trouble. That’s a good-looking catalogue. That one I don’t throw out so fast.

In all fairness, it’s
more
than a catalogue. It’s a lovely story, a novella, really, that I keep by my bedside, and every night I read a few pages and see what those wacky girls are up to this time.

There are no
words
, of course, but you can put together the story. It’s about a group of women, a Slumber Party Organization. I don’t know what their particular agenda is; I don’t know if it’s a political assembly or more a social, community-minded, grass-roots type of thing. But I
do
know they get together every couple of months to, apparently, slumber.

They meet at this great hunting lodge one of them owns, and though they’re obviously very close, there’s tremendous anxiety regarding their attire. They’re just not sure what to wear. And this is where the drama comes in. The conflict.

They each bring a couple of changes, and they try them on for each other, hoping to gain the approval of this very rigid group. They slip into something—“What do
you think? No? Okay, I’ll try on something else.” And then someone else takes the floor. Many of them are quite distraught and end up standing on the porch alone, so demanding are the slumbering wardrobe requirements.

One woman wearing a peach negligee comes in and leans on the piano.

“Better! That’s definitely a piano type of garment. Make sure there’s a baby grand around when you wear that, because it really accents the weave.”

Trying on, taking off. Trying on, taking off. On and off it goes. Until finally, content with their choices, they proceed to slumber.

A couple of pages of women sleeping, and then, toward the end of the book, you notice they’re modeling the heavier stuff: sweaters, coats, luggage, and gloves. That’s because they’re leaving.

It’s the end of the party, and they’re getting ready to go home. But though the chapter is ending, you
know
they’re coming back next month, because they never tell you which one is Victoria, and what’s the big secret.

T
here are catalogues that my wife gets excited about that absolutely fly under my radar. I never even know about them till things show up in the mail.

“Where’d we get this?”

“I ordered it,” says the woman I love.

“What is it?”

“Tea cozy.”

“A what?”

“A
tea
cozy.”

I run those two words around in my head for a few seconds, thinking that will help me.

“Okay, I don’t know what that is.”

“It’s a thing, you put it over a pot of tea, and it keeps it—”

“Cozy?”

“Exactly.”

“Good. Because that’s the one thing I felt our tea was lacking: that certain coziness.”

When a catalogue comes to our house, we’re both free to browse through it. But with other types of mail, territories need to be defined.

Whose mail is whose? If it’s addressed to both of you, who gets to open it first? If it’s addressed to
one
of you, but you know that it’s going to be for both of you anyway, are you allowed to read it without your spouse pursuing felony charges?

And what about letters that truly
are
personal? Friends that you knew before you were a couple and never bothered to talk about? Old lovers? The very delivery of one of these letters can drive a wedge right through your home.

“Who is that?”

“I told you about her.”

“Never.”

“No?”

“Trust me.”

“Well, probably because I haven’t spoken to her in fifteen years.”

“Why would she write to you now?”

“I don’t know.”

“Does she know you’re married?”

“I’m not sure.”

“What does she want?”

“I don’t know—
you
have the letter, you tell
me.”

“I
had
the letter—I threw it out.”

I
think it’s amazing that any mail is ever delivered in this country.