SHORTHAND
The kind I didn't learn in business school.
Conventional wisdom suggests that after being married for several years, spouses begin to think alike. They are so in tune with one another that they can complete each other’s sentences.
This romanticized ideal imagines that whole conversations can be communicated with a mere glance. Well, I have to tell you, in my 28 years of marriage experience, conventional wisdom is wrong.
Take the other day. My husband says to me, “Call that guy with the thing.” He said this completely out of the blue as we walked into the kitchen. I had no idea what he was talking about. After a few back and forths of him insisting, “You know, the guy with the thing,” and my replies, “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” we realized that earlier that day, I suggested we hire someone to dig out the large stand of Bird of Paradise stumps from the front lawn. And yes, I would call the guy with the thing. Translation: The landscaping company with the bobcat.
Or the unfortunate and regular occurrence around dinnertime when I’m waiting for him to bring some food home, and he lands in and asks, “What’s for dinner?” I remind him that he offered to pick something up, so I didn’t have to cook. And he insists that I say I love to cook, so he didn’t pick anything up. I may have said that. It’s true—I do love to cook. But not so much that I’d refuse takeout!
We have this type of conversation a lot. It’s the conversation where he is talking, and I am talking, but we’re definitely not completing each other’s sentences. I chalk it up to timing. I’ve written that, in the language of sleep chronotypes, we are opposites. He is a wolf, and I am a lion. I like to wake up with the sunrise, ready to share my plans and thoughts on a myriad of subjects. That’s the lion in me. Just like the lion wakes to hunt in the morning—I’m alert and productive until early evening, and then I crash.
My husband, on the other hand, hates mornings. He needs two alarms to wake up and would rather not talk or do any heavy lifting until after 10 am. That’s the wolf in him. Wolves do their hunting at night—he’s ready to go when the sun goes down.
What this means is that not only does our social life take a hit—I’m ready to leave the party, and he’s the life of the party—but there are approximately three hours in every day for optimal communication. We may not fit into the romanticized version of marital communication, but what our 28 years have taught me, as impossibly difficult as it feels sometimes, is that if I want my husband to hear me, I have to go against my natural tendency to want to talk every morning. I have to wait until midday or it’s not happening.
We’ve perfected our own language of sorts. If we communicate in the three hours when we are each at our best, there’s a good chance we will be having the same conversation.
It’s our shorthand.
