Pretend I'm Dead

It’s a pleasant morning, almost noon, and the Wife is outside, enjoying the sunshine, and deadheading her flowers. Her Husband moseys over to where she is kneeling next to the flower bed.

Husband: I’m hungry, what is for lunch?

Wife (sighing): Can’t you see I’m busy right now. Why don’t you pretend I’m dead and you have to make lunch today?

The Husband moseys on toward the house, presumably, to make some lunch.

A short while later, the Husband, munching on a sandwich and carrying a newspaper, comes out of the house and sits down in a lawn chair.

Wife (calling to him): Hey, where’s my sandwich?

Husband (sly smirk on his face): I thought you were dead.

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This little vignette appeared in a comic in the Sunday paper a few years ago. Gerry and I were sitting in bed, enjoying our coffee and the paper, when he saw it and shared it with me. We shared a laugh together over this little joke that the husband played on his wife and since then we have made it our own, in the way that husbands and wife create for themselves a unique way of communicating with each other.

I’ll send him an email at work some afternoons that says "P.I.D. until 6:30". (P.I.D. being an abbreviation for "pretend I’m dead".) The concise email communication means “I want to work on my book after work so I’ll be upstairs in my office until 6:30”.

Or he’ll send me an email at work on Friday afternoon that says "P.I.D. tomorrow morning". I take that to mean that he has booked a tee time and he’ll be out golfing with the guys on Saturday morning. (Which means I’ll have more time to work on my book!)

I love the intimacy that comes with being married for any length of time like the way I can look him from across a room and know what he is thinking, or the way that he understands what I am trying to say when the words just won’t come to mind. (Remember that guy we met at the thing we went to that time?)

And I like the special language that develops over the years that includes things like P.I.D. that no one understand except us.

6 comments:

Karen said...

I like that, too. PID, I will have to remember that! Good post and ideas! :)

Hill Country Hippie said...

We have one too, that came from that Hagar the Horrible comic years ago - "I love you so much my earlobes stink." I sent him a telegram once for Valentines, where the guy either had to come to the door, or read it to him over the phone, can't remember for sure. Anyway, John said the guy totally lost it, and couldn't keep from cracking up every time he tried to say it.

T. Powell Coltrin said...

I miss being married. The closeness.

Great post!

Anonymous said...

Ours is, "I wonder what normal people do in a case like this?"

Beverlydru said...

I remember my mom telling me that marriage gets smoother with years as you mellow into one another's weaknesses and value more each other's strengths. Our 32nd anniversary is just a few weeks away and I can say "it's true". Thank God for the language of love. Enjoyed your thoughts on this.

Linda Hoye said...

Becky - that's hilarious!
Kathy - we've used that one too.
Beverly - after 32 years I count you as an expert in the field. I agree, it does get easier as we come to know each other beter and our love grows to another level.