I Am Not A Naughty Nurse

In case you don't already know, I married a doctor.

Many people think it's funny, once they find out Mr. Handsome is a doctor, to say, "Oh, so you're his nurse, are you?" And then they look at me with a twinkle in their eye, as if they're the first person to have ever said that to me and now deserve a prize or at least a guffaw, because it is so very very funny.

Well, it was funny, but only the time I said it, when Mr. Handsome first got his doctorate. After that, not so much.

So, Mr. Handsome is not an actual medical doctor. He got his PhD in Public Policy a few years back. Quite a feat, I might add, since within that time, we had two children, and dealt with one with cancer and other not so little health problems. Not sure how we managed to do it, but somehow, we did.

What this means is that Mr. Handsome is very intelligent, which is why I married him. That, and the fact that he has nice buttocks.

Anyway, being married to such an intelligent and amazingly cool guy has its moments, which make it very hard for the Blogging Goddess to get through the day. Never a dull moment in this household.

You would think communication would not be an issue between us, since we are both pretty smart and wordy people. But I am here to tell you that communication is our downfall, our one major stumbling block that indeed makes us trip over one another on a daily -- nay -- an hourly basis. So much so that I do not know how we have managed to stay together all these years (we have been together for almost 22 years, married for 18 of those come August).

Because, you see, when Mr. Handsome speaks, I hear something totally different coming out of his mouth. It's almost like Satan lives with us and takes his words as they leave his mouth, catches them in his hands and twists them into something totally incoherent, or into what I end up understanding as being something entirely different from what he actually meant. If you've ever watched Charlie Brown when an adult speaks, you'll know what I mean.

"Mwah mwah mwaaah mwah."

Now, tell me, people, how does one deal with this handicap?

I'm talking about things like this:

Me: Dearest, should I put the vacuum cleaner away now, or later?
Mr. Handsome: I'm pretty agnostic to the whole thing.

What the hell?

Or, here's another one:

It's quite possible that the macro-identical cohesion and micro-factual
rationale won't make a bit of difference in the long run.

OK, so I just made that one up, but it's pretty much what he says most of the time. Even to the dog. And that is just to say something like, "Want to go for a walk?" or "Man, I'm hungry."

Once, we had friends over, friends we'd only see once a year, and Mr. Handsome says this:

Riddle me this, James ... What do you make of the micro-fabrication of the
inequity in the economic fallibility scheduled for this quantum century?

Not only does that not make any sense whatsoever, but he actually said, "Riddle me this".

Who says that?

No one, that's who. Only my husband.

And can I just say, those friends have never come back for another visit?

And then there are things like this:

Dee: Pause the tv please (so I can go to the bathroom/get my pills/torture
the dog). Pause it.
Mr. Handsome: OK. Ummm, how about it won't be as nice a day tomorrow. Or,
how about you're 11 years old. Or, what about this show really sucks. Are those
enough posits for you?

See, that's supposed to be funny.

And then there's the one that just happened:

Mr. Handsome says "thank you" to me for chopping up some carrots for the roast he was doing, so he gives me hug. Problem: His hands were wet. So I say to him, "Hey, don't use me to dry your hands!" And he replies:

I wasn't. But now that you mention it, I guess you could say it's an ancillary
benefit.

Do you see what I mean? It's really sad, isn't it? It's a wonder I don't cry myself to sleep every night.

But somehow, despite this utter lack of communication, we have managed to stay together, and even to enjoy each other's company. Well, a good portion of the time, anyway.

It's amazing, really, because there is almost nothing as irritating and utterly annoying as someone telling you something, and you either don't understand what the hell they're saying, or you are certain they're saying one thing when they're actually saying the exact opposite. As you can clearly imagine, it causes a few problems, not to mention ulcers, migraines, and foot fungus.

So you now understand why I am the way I am, and why I eat supersized bags of Cheetos and need Xanax on an hourly basis along with my martini.

_________________________

I wanted to say something about the reaction to yesterday's post. I was pretty blown away by all the wonderful words and emotions and honesty in the comments. Made me cry, and made me really understand and know that not one of us is alone in this great big world of ours.

Thank god for blogs and the Internet for bringing such wonderful and caring people together, all with similar experiences to share.

I'm here for good.