Nice, respectable, boring

By Amrita Dhingra

I feel cheated! Short-changed! And I think it’s high time I spoke out. I mean when I got married I had much the same dreams as every other girl who gets married. I wanted to find myself a rough, lonely heart who was harsh to the rest of the world because they just didn’t understand him and then I wanted to reform that heart. Simple. Every woman’s secret ambition. And what did I get? A guy who was so likable that nobody, even if they tried very hard and kept at it, could ever dislike him. A guy who’d agree with you even if you said the moon is made of green cheese. A guy who wouldn’t say boo to a goose.

Of course in the beginning, I thought it was all an aberration. Just a facade, put on, no doubt, so that I wouldn’t turn tail and flee. So I’d wait it out. Sooner or later I figured the mask would slip and the rake would show his true colours. And when that happened I’d be ready. Before you could say "reformed man" there you’d have him, bright and squeaky—- the ideal man. And all my creation.

Sadly enough it never happened. What is a woman to do when she has nothing to reform? When her husband insists on being the epitome of the nice, agreeable, pleasant gentleman all the time and all on his own. Irked by his perfection, at one point I decided to take things into my hands, guide the situation a little bit so that he would be forced to loose his temper, shout a little or, at the very least, make one scathing remark ( which I then intended to escalate into a full-fledged, red-blooded row). With this aim in mind, I took his new car for a drive and, well...accidentally, banged the rear fender. This done, I broke the news to him just when his income tax forms were due. "Well dear, we’ll just have to call the insurance agent this evening."

That’s all! I mean I just near enough squashed the back of his new car and the guy doesn’t want to yell, he just quietly wants to call the insurance agent! Unbelievable! But what do you expect from a guy who sailed through college on a scholarship, who got the right job at the right time, married the right girl at the right time, who knows exactly how much money he has in the bank, who calls his mother twice a week and mows the lawn every Sunday? Nice, respectable, decorous. Boring.

I mean I wanted, I expected a lot more in the way of the fire works. I guess I just wanted to fight so that we could make up. I wanted him to slip up and forget my birthday, our anniversary once in a while so that I could boss on him and then he could be abjectly apologetic and send me flowers and chocolates. I got the flowers and chocolates all right, but always at the right time and always from the florist where he has an account.

Then for a few years I sort of lived in the hope of the so- called middle age blues. I mean, I was hoping the naughty forties would do something for him but, alas, he just stood there. A pillar of society, with about as much animation as a lamp post. So while the girls at the kitty parties boasted about how they had a detective tailing their husband while he painted the town red with his latest secretary, I squirmed in my chair. I had nothing to tell. My husband’s secretary is a fiftyfive- year- old grandmother, and no my husband did not switch to a red two-seater. He still drives the same saloon.

And to top it all, he does not intend to quit his job, take up mountaineering, or explore the Amazon. He likes his coffee with milk and sugar, reads the paper from back to front and helps me with the dishes at dinner.The mid-life crisis could hit him on the head and he wouldn’t even raise an eyebrow. He will probably never raise his voice and put on the lord and master act. Which is why I will never get to show him who exactly is the boss!

Sometimes I look behind those horn-rimmed glasses of his and wonder what goes on in there. Surely nobody could live such a faultless life and be content. But then I remember my new hairdo last week and it all comes back to me. It was by far the worst hairdo I’ve ever had—-short back and sides with a hideous perm in the centre. "Very nice dear.", was all he said

The fault of course is all mine. I should have found a rake who needed reforming and set to work on him. I guess it’s a little too late now but my advice to all you girls out there is to find yourself some really good raw material—- say someone who is a bit of a rebel, a man who thinks marriage is dispensable is ideal—- and then set about making him really nice. Believe you me you could spend a very interesting lifetime doing just that. In the mean time, I shall stick my chin out and try and make my husband a little bit of a cad.

Just a line before you go: Please don’t leave this communiqué lying around. I don’t want my husband to read it. He’s a nice guy. It’d break his heart..