佚名/Anonymous
Picture the scene. Other Half and I, sprawled out in front of the television. A fleeting sensation of domestic happiness passes over me and all my troubles vanish quickly.
I look over at Other Half and feel a great dollop of affection.
“I love you.”I say. Not too loud, mind, there’s a plot developing and I don’t want to miss anything.
Other Half doesn’t move a muscle.
“Hmm?”he murmurs.
I said,“I love you.”
Other Half heroically tears his eyes away from the screen.
“Hmm?”he repeats.
“You’re getting deaf in your old age,”I pronounce loudly and clearly.
He hears that.
“Thanks.”he says. And then mutters something.
“What?”I say.
“I said,”he shouts, loud enough for the neighbors to hear,“You talk too quietly.”
What I want to know is how does an innocent declaration of love turn into yet another battle of our perennial !
“No, You’re the One Who’s Deaf.”
I wouldn’t mind, but I’m utterly convinced that Other Half’s deafness is selective. When I mention a subject close to his manly heart—namely, sport, engine valves or something—and he hears it all, clear as a bell.
And am I the only one who has experienced the following conversation?
Me (excited):“What time shall we leave tonight?”
Other Half (anxious):“Leave for where tonight?”
Me (weary):“To the theatre. I told you three weeks ago. And then again two weeks ago. And I repeated it yesterday. Each time louder than the last.”
Other Half:“I don’t remember you telling me.”
Me (very clearly):“That’s because you never listen!”
Other Half:“I listen to everything you say. You must have just forgotten to tell me.”
Me (Beautifully pronouced, with choice semaphore):“I want a divorce.”
You see? A nice trip to the theatre reduced to marital
disintegration in minutes.
How come when we were“courting”he heard everything I said? Now I have to practically climb inside his ear to get the same response. Has he, like so many other Other Halves, simply learned the art of switching off when The Wife talks for longer than her allotted time? When I’m recounting the latest development of“Finding The Right Shoes For That Dress,”does he just see me, mouthing incoherently at him, while secretly picturing what he is really interested in?