My own personal Heart of Darkness was upon me. I threw my back out and was on some serious pain meds. But excruciating back pain worse than childbirth was nothing compared to the hideous situation I would find myself in last Sunday morning: The Husband was going to Target.
That’s right: he was going on the two-week overdue Target run instead of me, because of silly incendiary wording on the side of my plastic prescription bottle, wording like Danger: May cause extreme drowsiness and DO NOT under any circumstances operate heavy machinery!!! Apparently, in The Husband’s creative mind, a car was a piece of heavy machinery.
“Okay, Honey. That’s fine. You drive, then,” I acquiesced, stifling a yawn. “We’ll just all four go together. We can have fun family time.”
The Husband suppressed an involuntary gasp, as his eyes absorbed my pajama-clad and un-showered appearance.
“Are you out of your mind?” he queried, as I tried five times to get out of my chair, each time resulting in a fresh stabs of scream-inducing back torture. “You are not going to Target. You’re not going anywhere. You will lie here on the couch and get better. I know you’re not used to that, but … wait, what am I saying? It will be just like any other day for you. Minus the bon-bons.”
Ha, ha. The Husband was, of course, right. (About me not going, not about the bon-bons.) I had Tall get me a piece of paper and a pen so I could draw up the list/ map for The Husband.
It was making me depressed to think of The Husband going to The Happiest Place On Earth without me. Plus, to him, it wasn’t THPOE, it was merely a store. It was as if I had handed my unusable ticket to the Philharmonic Symphony to a deaf person—it would never be appreciated or even fully comprehended. Sure, the deaf person would sign thank you and pretend they were happy, but you and I both know it is an inappropriate gift.
The Husband glanced at my list. “Oh, god,” he cringed, “I forgot about you and your list maps.”
That’s right; so what? I write my list in store map form so no back-tracking would be required. This is exactly what I mean by underappreciated and not fully comprehended. “My list will save you time since I did it this way,” I proclaimed confidently, “you’ll be happy I drew it as a store diagram.”
He and Tall left (I told him he had to take at least one kid with him), and I was immediately overcome with the plummeting feeling that he would Buy The Wrong Things. I had given very explicit (read: Virgo) instructions on which type of paper towel to buy, but what if he bought a 50-pack of ones with little bears on them? Ugh. I would be stuck mopping up spills with cutesie smiling-bear visages for the next three months.
Or how about a simple instruction like plain bottled water? Would he purchase Perrier by mistake? “Sweetie,” I imagined myself saying later, “we’ve never, ever, ever, ever, in the history of the world bought sparkling, so why would you buy it today?”
Would he mess up on the most basic thing—Mint Milano cookies? Surely that was self-explanatory. Was it even possible that there was some sort of generic kind that he might buy to save a few bucks, a chocolate impostor cookie packaged similarly but labeled Mint Detroit?
In the end, I worried for no reason. It was true, he did come home with all the wrong products … but then, just as the heavens started to open to release an ominous black downpour of epic emotional proportions, dazzling sunlight blinded me instead as he reached in one of the bags and handed me a beautiful foreign object.
“Us Weekly?” I inquired cheerfully, as I snatched it out of his grasp, eager to read about Cameron Diaz’s latest romance, “I didn’t put that on the list!”
He laughed, the hearty laugh of a wise husband who knows his soul mate well. “I realized that if I screwed up every single item on your list, you’d never even notice as long as you were distracted by trashy celebrity gossip magazines.”
If Joseph Conrad were alive today, he surely would never have finished writing Heart of Darkness because he, too, would have been distracted by the likes of Us Weekly or People. The horror, the horror, indeed.
MOV
a store map? i've never thought to draw one for my husband when sending him on a mission. might be good to tuck that possibility away for the future.
ReplyDeleteand he must be at least slightly smart if he knew what he needed to bring you to distract from his failed mission.
yes, he does get credit for glancing up while paying and saying, "Huh, I'll get this magazine and pretend it's for MOV and then when she pitches it in the recycle bin, I'll dig it out because it's really for me." Diabolical.
DeleteThat sounds familiar -- except the distraction is Dove dark chocolate. Works like a charm.
ReplyDeleteohhhhhhhhhh, kindred spirits! (I joined some Godiva email stupid thing so that I can have one free Godiva every time I go to the mall. I just got back from the mall and I am going again tomorrow morning.)
DeleteI have a friend who does the same thing at Meijer's. She even puts what shelf it is located on too, even when she is the one going to the store.
ReplyDeleteoh, she is my new best friend. Is she Virgo? Tell me she's Virgo.............
DeleteMint Detroit, gotta take an exception here, we don't have mint cookies. Vernors Ginger Ale, Better Made Potato Chips, some cars, and used to be Stroh's beer.
ReplyDeleteI call them smut magazines and I love them, nothing like some good trash.
Nola, I totally thought of you when I typed in Mint Detroit. I almost wrote Mint Newark or Mint Cleveland. I agonized. I was going for the name of a city that sounded less glamorous than Milan. I figured you might not be too upset as you are living in China right now. And yes, smut magazines. When we were growing up, my mom called them "The Lies of the Week," with a tone of condescension (as she tossed three of them into our grocery cart).
DeleteHaha Ok, store map is a good idea! No it's not, it is a FANTASTIC idea!
ReplyDeleteHope you start feeling better soon!
I cannot remember when I came up with the store map thing. I just am a very visual person, and it is easier for me to picture where things are and write it on a pseudo-map so that I do not have to backtrack. Some of these stores are so BIIIIIIIGGGGGGGGG that I hate to be at one end of the store and be forced to walk back. I will think, "We don't really need shampoo *that* badly, soap probably works just as well and I did remember to buy that."
DeleteI prefer to have my husband wander aimlessly through stores, sans map, and experience the shame in being unable to find desired items. It gives me a tiny edge of superiority that keeps him from asking when I plan to go back to work. Hope you're feeling better!
ReplyDeleteoh, I love this. Although I think that most likely The Husband dropped/ lost the list-map in the first five minutes in the store and muddled his way thru grabbing whatever looked appealing. Hence the shoe polish, duct tape, athletic socks, Scope mouthwash, and printer ink. None of those things were on the list.
DeleteAs for my back: it is slowly feeling better. Either that or the drugs have decided to permanently swim in my bloodstream. I don't really care which it is.
Bwahahaha! I give my husband directions too, on the rare occasions I'm incapacitated. He's so lucky I'm over menopause and he never had to shop the Tampax aisle any more.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure he is happy about that. There is really no equivalent product that would make women sqeamish. Athlete's foot medicine? Bring it.
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