The Perils of a Long Marriage
A while ago, I started to recognize the symptoms that I have been married a long time.
I am beginning to sound like my husband.
Like when I said to the salesman at the kitchen shop, “I might be tempted to buy this skillet if you could give me a ten percent discount.”
Uh-oh, I thought afterwards.
And I was even more scared after I complained about a car that had parked too close to me. It made it really difficult to get out of my parking space and I have a hard enough time of that already. (My mother looks for four spots – think of the letters HH – so she can pull through with plenty of room and never have to back up. I am sure I am just a few years away from that.)
Anyway, I was griping about this close-parker (like Seinfeld’s close-talker) and I said, “It was a piece-of-shit Mopar.”
Holy crap, it even sounded like my husband’s voice.
It is just a matter of time before I hear myself talking about the idiots at the bank.
And then it is only a short hop from there to asking the McDonald’s kid, “Can you put some ice in my coffee so I don’t scald myself and sue you?”
Yikes.
But I just found that it works the other way too.
My husband and I received a wedding invitation, and he was really excited about dressing up. (It appears that I may not be the only one in my family who secretly wants to be a princess.) To be fair (which I rarely am), over the last year my husband has been my inspiration in eating healthy food and getting in shape. And he has discovered what I have known since age four – that it is fun to buy clothes and look great.
So he bought himself a gorgeous new outfit. Honestly, it was nicer than what I was planning to wear. Which was fabulous news – because I got to shopping again.
And two days before the wedding, he said to me over breakfast:
“I’m really stressed. I have a hair appointment today, and I’m so afraid that the hairdresser will screw it up, and I’ll look stupid.”
This is me at the salon. But just picture someone a bit balder, and I don’t have to draw a new illustration.
- Posted in: Aging ♦ Humor ♦ Marriage
- Tagged: Humor, husband, Marriage, middle-aged, old couples, Relationships, Seinfeld, Shopping
notquiteold 
HaHa! love this!
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I’ve been married 25 years. It definitely comes full circle!
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That is priceless!
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I like this twist. I can’t wait to see if my husband starts acting like me. Actually, that would be horrible. One of me is more than enough!
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it’s also great fun when all my kids start talking like me or hubby. well, fun and a little terrifying.
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I only have cats. But they do act like us. The crabby ones are like my husband. The sweet ones are like me.
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Uh-oh…..I must be old: I always look for a pull-through parking spot!! 😦
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I can back out okay. But I can’t back in. I cannot figure out why.
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You might very well end up sounding like your spouse. That’s why it pays to marry someone smarter than yourself.
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My husband is very smart, but I ALWAYS need to be the smartest person in the room.
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Needing to be and being are not always the same thing…
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I’m not expert because I didn’t make it far up the marriage ladder but I’ve given this some thought. You say you are beginning to sound like your husband and I believe your husband is picking up on your fashionista. Clearly a win / win, don’t you think? I’m not sure about his anxiety about the hair appointment though. How far wrong can that go. (giggles)
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He has very little left, but those strands are extremely precious to him.
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So funny but so true. It’s kind of like dogs and their owners starting to look alike! 🙂
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I actually considered making the dog analogy!
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Oh is this ever true! Hubbs and I’ve been married 21 years and, when we met, I didn’t speak up too much (I know, funny!) …. now, not only do I get after the boys but I say HIS words to them “What in Sam H*LL are you doing that for???” Even when I say it it sounds just like him.
Funny stuff 🙂
MJ
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I am always saying “Please Be Careful.” That’s him all the way.
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Oddly, my He-Who is now more stressed about his hair and beard being perfect than I thought possible. He will go to a 2nd barber to fix the mistakes from the 1st barber. I really don’t think that he got that from me, however, my language has become more “colourful” over the years and my eating habits are abismal. Totally him.
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Oh, my language is atrocious. I never said more than ‘damn’ before I met him.
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This is soooo true! After only 10 years of marriage, I have picked up several of my husband’s more ‘colourful’ sayings (most of which are not fit to repeat here) and he’s picked up some of my habits (‘good’ ones, of course). He had a terrible experience with a hairdresser the day before we attended my niece’s wedding back in 2009 (she cut his hair so short at the front/top, it took a year to grow back), so now I have the ‘pleasure’ of trimming his (very long) hair and beard/mustache!
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He never cared when Dominic the barber cut his hair. Now that he goes to a “stylist” he is incredibly fussy.
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Maybe you can get a two-fer at your hairdresser? This is a nice twist. My husband recently donated a bunch of perfectly good shirts I thought were frumpy. I asked him why and he said they weren’t right for his coloring. Wow!
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Wow is right!
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Uh-oh. That REALLY sounds like something a chick would say. Has he started to use “product” in his hair?
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YES he has! After he first started going to a “stylist” he asked me if I had any of the stuff she used on his hair. So I gave him my mousse to use sparingly. He asked if it was “girly” stuff. I told him it was full of estrogen and his breasts might grow.
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So true! I hear my hubby’s words come out of my mouth way too often.
Just an FYI… Parking in a pull-through parking spot is not necessarily an old thing, or a man thing, or a mom thing. If you live in the snow-belt like I did most of my life, pulling through so you’re facing out of a parking space in a parking lot is essential during the winter. You don’t want the hood of your car tucked up nice and close to the car in the opposite spot when you need a “jump” to start your car. 😀 Now that we live in Florida, I pull through so I’m facing out for self preservation… backing out of a parking space can be hazardous to your health.
Anyway, back to my hubby’s words and mine co-mingling; it’s not entirely unpleasant. I have found myself getting better reservations and deals when I use his words. Just a thought.
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I certainly get better deals.
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Still laughing over the “piece-of-shit Mopar”! I’ve only been married to my current husband for 14 years, but he has yet to adopt any of my (smart and wonderful) habits or characteristics. Do you think there’s still hope?
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When he starts using your ‘product’ – you can start to worry. Let’s just hope he hasn’t picked up too much of your colorful language 😉
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So maybe you are not sounding like him, he is sounding like you and has been all along. Who knew.
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I’ve been with hubby for 32+ years, and I’m afraid I might be falling into the same mudhole! I wonder if that happens to seasoned veterans like us…
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