I’m in a mood.
1:38 p.m.
This morning Hubby was transcribing things from his 2009 agenda to his new one, and made a comment about how much nicer the former is. Traditionally I get him a new agenda for his birthday which is at the end of November, and there’s a reason why the 2010 one isn’t as nice as last year’s.
Hubby had responded to the F0Iio Society, as he does every now and again for their freebies, and when the box arrived with his new books, he pulled out a pretty agenda which he waved around and exclaimed over. I said, “Oh, you have a new agenda. I guess this means I don’t have to get you one this year.” Nothing more was said.
Then, just before his birthday, he dropped a hint that he needed a new agenda. I was rather confused. So, because I had left it to the last minute as I often do, I went to the Bushop’s bookstore and got him one there. It isn’t as fancy as the one I found the previous year at a stationer in town, but it’s perfectly adequate. The F0Iio agenda ended up under the tree for me, as I suspected it might.
I began telling this story to my husband after he made his comment and, very shortly into it, he contradicted me. He remembers the chain of events completely differently than I do, and they do not include my ever having been aware of the agenda that arrived with the F0Iio books. I got upset a) that he interrupted me, and b) that he contradicted me and wouldn’t let me tell the story the way I knew it, which resulted in me complaining that he never listens to me.
This follows an argument we got into yesterday at the car wash, the kind where you punch in a code, the door goes up, you enter slowly so that your undercarriage gets sprayed, and then you’re instructed to stop while the washing and rinsing and waxing happen like magic. Then the blower comes on and nozzles in the ceiling dry your car as you slowly drive it out the exit.
My husband is a smart guy. He has a Ph.D. and is respected in his field. But I get the feeling that the smarter he gets in his specialty, the more he becomes like Einstein and other geniuses who could no longer tie their own shoes. He was like an imbecile in the car wash. I had to tell him exactly what to do. Seriously, I should have been driving, because he got mad at me when I got exasperated. It was not a good scene.
Then this morning there was a phone call for him and I overheard a one-sided conversation about having a cheque or cash to pay for something that was being delivered. Hubby asked me if there were cheques handy, and I said there were; but when I asked him what was being delivered, he wouldn’t tell me, saying it was a surprise.
For quite some time now, Hubby has been encouraging me to start playing guitar again. But my own guitar, which I spent very little on before I went to university, is difficult to play and he keeps saying I should get a different one, preferably a small, parlour-sized one that would go better with my own diminutive proportions. So, naturally, since I also have a birthday coming up in the not-too-distant future, I thought that maybe this was the secret he was trying to keep from me.
Alas. The UPS truck arrived and delivered yet another electric guitar. I could not help but feel slightly hurt and betrayed. First of all, it was another toy for my husband. He already has so many guitars that I can no longer count them. When he was once asked when he was getting a dobro, I jokingly replied, “Just before he gets a divorce!”
So I expressed my disappointment to him because he gets to buy himself expensive toys and I do not. He said I could buy stuff if I wanted to, but I countered with the fact that I don’t earn anywhere near the amount of money he does, and also, it’s not things that I want to spend my money on. What I didn’t say is what I do want to spend money on, which is traveling to visit my faraway friends, something Hubby would never stand for me doing by myself.
There’s also the feeling that his guitars are a substitute for my company. I know this is not true, but I can’t help but feel that I often take a back seat to his other activities: making music (either playing or composing) and tennis/squash. I’m finding it very difficult to finish this entry. So I think I’ll just stop here.
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