Every marriage requires patience. And I’m positive that mine
requires more patience than most. Harry and I are complete and
total opposites. We don’t have the same interests. For example,
Harry actually only has five pairs of shoes. Just five. And he only
really wears one pair. One. I know it’s hard to believe, but that
man wears the same pair of shoes day in, day out.
Every marriage requires patience. And I’m positive that mine requires more patience than most. Harry and I are complete and total opposites. We don’t have the same interests. For example, Harry actually only has five pairs of shoes. Just five. And he only really wears one pair. One. I know it’s hard to believe, but that man wears the same pair of shoes day in, day out.
I could not live my life with five pairs of shoes. And I certainly wouldn’t have one pair that I wore every day. As any woman obsessed with shoes understands, you need to have a lot of shoes.
Take black sandals, for instance. You can’t just have one pair of black sandals. You need one pair of plain, black flip-flops, one pair of fancy black thongs, a pair of waterproof black sandals, a pair of black mid-heel casual sandals, a pair of black, mid-heel sandals with embroidery, a pair of black, mid-heeled sandals with rhinestones or shells, a pair of high heeled sandals for evening wear, a pair of high heeled wedge sandals for dressy day wear and of course, a pair of sandals that can get wet and muddy and yucky while in the yard.
But under no circumstances can you ever just have one pair of black sandals. And, you must have all of these combinations in red, brown, beige, white, gold, pink, green, blue, gray, leather, suede, canvas and at least one pair that is multi-colored in case you don’t have exactly the right shade of sandal to match your outfit.
Harry has one pair of sandals. They’re brown. They’re ugly. They’re waterproof and look like something that Roman soldiers would have worn while walking to Greece or somewhere. In fact, they’re so old and scuffed up, they look they have been worn to walk from Rome to Greece. They’re hideous.
But if I replace said disgusting sandals, Harry would have a cow. Because he likes those sandals. And according to Harry, people only need one set of sandals. Are you beginning to see why my marriage requires more patience than most? The man is insane.
And it’s not just shoes, it’s T-shirts too. Harry has a million T-shirts and not one of them has been in fashion in the last decade. And not one of them doesn’t advertise some company that sells electronic junk. This is because the T-shirts are “gimme shirts” that some salesperson dumped on my husband. I think they get together in sales meetings and have contests to see which company can make Harry wear an ugly shirt with their company logo on it the most often.
And even though I do have the patience of a saint, my patience has run out. So I cleaned out Harry’s drawers. I removed the shirts that were old, ugly or from companies whose logo I didn’t like. Oh, I had to be clever about this of course. After all, if Harry found out I’d tossed away perfectly good clothing, he’d, well, he’d take my credit cards away and we can’t have that happening. How else would I get my shoe fix in?
So I resorted to underhanded tactics. When I was washing his shirts, I’d “accidentally” spill a cup or two of bleach. I “mistook” a few shirts for rags and used them to clean toilets and showers. Several developed mysterious rips and tears that couldn’t be mended. Still others were shredded. And a final few were used when Junior forgot to put the dog out before we spent an entire afternoon at the Aquatic Center and came home to a couple of her messes.
Suddenly my poor, fashion-victim husband had only one choice. Wear the two T-shirts he had left or run around shirtless. Turns out, the company he works for frowns on shirtless Harry’s running around the office. So I went shopping. I bought T-shirts. I bought collared shirts. I even bought a T-shirt with a collar.
And Harry hated every single article of clothing. So I took everything back and I had Junior pick out all of Harry’s new shirts. And guess what? My husband, the fashion victim actually got a compliment from a friend who works as a fashion designer. She said Junior had excellent taste. I’m so happy, I might run his sandals over with the lawnmower so Junior can pick out a new pair.
You know, even though this marriage requires patience, there are days when it’s all worth it.
