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Could I have been any more inept? | page 1, 2, 3
I'm 31 and my husband of five years is 32. I was raised in the suburbs
and he was raised in a cornfield in Iowa and can't adjust to the sounds of the city, like
subwoofers on car stereos, for example. And he can't seem to find a job he is happy in or
hold it for very long, as his co-workers find him standoffish and not team-oriented. He is a
good worker who does well on his own, and now he's back in school and working on a
second master's; he brings in a small monthly stipend. We are ready to stop renting and buy our first house (on my income alone; the loan will be
in my name only), and I have found the perfect one. My dad, who is handicapped, can visit
and get around in it, and it has all the amenities we want. My husband is stubborn as a
jackass, refusing to consider it, worried that he won't be able to sleep
in our new home. He refuses to go to a sleep clinic. Advice? Beside Myself Dear Beside, It isn't perfect if your husband doesn't like it. To bring him along on this move
you need to find a house that is demonstrably quieter than whatever you're living in now.
Quiet has to be a main consideration. Sleep is crucial to a person's well-being. Heavy
sleepers tend to pooh-pooh sleep problems, but you shouldn't. The fact that you're the main
breadwinner doesn't mean you can bulldoze over his objections. Be patient and try to
navigate this rough spot with all the kindness you can muster, and try not to cause hard
feelings. Dear Mr. Blue, I need a male opinion on a sensitive topic. I am a 54-year-old
female, slim, attractive, single for years. In my youth I was very well endowed. As I get
older I started to look matronly, and now I have chronic neck and shoulder
discomfort. My physician and insurance company have OK'd breast reduction
surgery, which would transform my saggy DDDs into perky Bs or Cs. It also
involves scars, which fade but never disappear. What if I get lucky and meet that man of my
dreams and have a chance at a sex life again? Would the scars be a problem? Droopy Dear Droopy, No. A man who is looking for Barbie is not going to look at you in the first
place. The man of your dreams is a man of more sophistication than that. He'll have his own
scars. It's a shallow life that doesn't give a person a few scars. Mr. Blue Garrison Keillor's column appears every Tuesday in Salon Books.
Feeling blue about your prose? In the doldrums over your last date? Ask Mr. Blue. Dear Mr. Blue, My wife of three years is one of the most beautiful, intelligent and caring people I know, and we are very much in love. Recently, we had the fight to end all fights, and I'm confused. She asked me if I'd had any contact with an old girlfriend of mine (from 10 years ago) and when I admitted that I do correspond with her -- I haven't seen her in five years -- my wife blew up. What could possibly make her feel so threatened? How can I convince her that the ex is an important old friend whose advice is important to me? Scratching My Head Dear Scratching, Jealousy is powerful and often irrational, and your beloved wife is in the grip of hers. You can try to convince her, in a quiet and thoughtful moment, that you need your old friend, but to show your good faith you may need to offer to drop the friend if your wife continues to be troubled by her, and don't be surprised if this is a non-negotiable issue. She wants the old girlfriend to have never existed in the first place, and how do you negotiate that? You may have to do a painful thing, sir, and dismiss the friend. A spouse does not have executive powers over the other spouse's social life, but there are certain irrational demands in marriage that must be respected. Dear Mr. Blue, I have my own business, based at home, and support my family with it (my wife is a musician) and also do the cooking and a lot of the housework. (My work bores me to tears. But who said it would be easy?) We live a simple life, have no desire for a posh house or nicer cars and my children seem to be thriving and successful in school and socially. My wife started graduate school last year, and she has been gone a lot. At the same time, my income took a dip, and although we are financially comfortable, we still owe money we should take care of, and college is looming, and the responsibility is still mine. I finally admitted to my wife that I have a serious problem with alcohol addiction, and we are working through that together; there is a strong element of depression, which does run in my family; and I'm isolated, of course, and end up talking too much to grocery store clerks. My wife wants me to get a happy pill, as she puts it; but I think that some depression is situational. I haven't had a vacation in 11 years. She is smart and compassionate and aggressive and has kept her figure and loves me and we read the same books and love the same movies and have inadvertently raised outstanding children, and I love her back, but she doesn't understand this, that I need a week off, and soon. How do I explain to my family, who are used to me always being around, that I need a week? Burning Out Quickly Dear Burning, If you went berserk tomorrow and walked down the street arguing with lampposts, your family would find a way to shovel you off to the loony bin and cook their own dinners and clean the bathrooms, and your clients would be patient for at least a while, so arrange an emergency landing, rather than crashing, and take your week. Take it before the holiday season. You're not proposing to run off to St. Kitt's and live at the Ritz; it's probably enough just to get on a train and ride somewhere and get off and walk around and spend a couple nights in a hotel and come home. Or take a bag of books and register at a B&B overlooking a large body of water and sit on the veranda and read. Not a big ticket item. You absolutely should do this. Better to apologize than to ask permission, in this situation. Find a plausible destination (New Orleans, Chicago, Seattle, Savannah, San Diego, Duluth) and tell your wife and kids you're going. Everyone has an obligation to take care of himself. Dear Mr. Blue, I am 25 and have been dating a wonderful guy for the past year and a half. He is kind, a great friend, supportive, fun, someone with similar morals and upbringing, my friends like him, as does my family, he would make a great husband and father. I am wondering if he is the right guy for me. And I'm thinking about heading off to Europe for a year or two to teach in an international school. Next year would be the year to do that. He's not so thrilled about this. I'm afraid of always seeking for just one more thing before I get married and then never settling down, and missing out on a wonderful guy. How do I choose? Thoughtful Dear Thoughtful, You're so right about next year being the right year for you to head for
Europe. And it's a good thing to do, to be on your own in a foreign city and find out that
you can manage and adapt and make a life for yourself. The man you're seeing is a
wonderful guy all right but we're not interviewing for a girls' softball coach here, we're
talking about whether he is Your Guy, and what you don't say is that you love him with a
crazy passion that wakes you up in the middle of the night smiling. You're not sure of your
feelings for him. These are tricky feelings to sort out, the emotional spectrum from
friendship to romantic love, and you don't gain anything by leaping, not at the age of 25.
You gain a great deal by showing the strength to refuse to say you're in love with someone
you're not sure you're in love with. It's too early for you to worry about missing out on
marriage. Go to Europe and have a great year.
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