Wife gets ticket; I get out of jail free
The yellow sheet of paper looked odd sticking out of the pile of white envelopes my wife left on the kitchen table.
Hmm.
She doesn't usually leave mail on the table. But, then again, she'd worked late. She must have been tired.
None of the envelopes were open, which was also a little strange.
I pulled the thin, yellow slip of paper out of the stack of bills, junk mail and a birthday card.
It was a speeding ticket.
Hey, she doesn't usually get one of those, either.
"Uh, honey," I said, walking into the bedroom where she was changing the diaper of our 6-month-old son - who wasn't in the car with her when she thought she was a Indy driver. "Were you going 82 miles an hour in a 60 mph zone?"
"Yes," she said, not looking up. "I thought I was going to be late for work."
And that's all we said about it.
Well, almost. I had to call her "Speed Racer" once or twice to see how much this ticket bothered her.
"Stop calling me that," she finally said. "I'm embarrassed about it."
That's all I needed to hear.
Sometime in a relationship, your partner's going to do something you don't agree with. Something thoughtless, something selfish, or something dumb.
I don't know how women think, but when this happens to a guy, our brain is only capable of shifting into one of two modes.
1) The Fred Flintstone Mode.
The more Cro-Magnon of the two options, the husband gets angry and yells at his wife, the dog, the wall, air ... He stomps around the house and maybe goes bowling. Later, he brings home flowers from QuikTrip and apologizes for being such a jerk. Unlike on TV, hilarity rarely ensues.
Or,
2) The Eddie Haskell Mode.
Being more civilized than our cartoon ancestors, the husband smiles, says something polite, then uses the situation to his advantage sometime later.
I'm a Mode 2 kinda guy.
That speeding ticket will be more than a source of embarrassment for my wife who buckles up, adjusts her mirrors and never - well, almost never - speeds.
It'll be a "get out of jail free" card for me.
For example:
"You spent the afternoon at Hooters?"
My wife may ask after I come home late and hand her a gift in a gaudy plastic bag reeking of hot wings.
"And, I'm not wearing this stupid T-shirt around the house."
Or she may ask:
"Why is our back yard on fire?"
Or:
"You were supposed to bring home milk and bread and you spent $50 on beer?"
All I'll have to say is: "Remember that speeding ticket?"
End of discussion.
See, husbands aren't so dumb.
