Strong, Silent Man Drives Woman Crazier
Even more so than she was in the first place.
--
My husband frequently makes me angry with his silences and lack of communication. I don’t know how a yappy wordsmith like me ended up with a man who is so taciturn he often won’t talk even when there is a need.
His mouth stays shut. I try to read his mind, mostly, a habit the therapist said is not good for me. I know she’s right but she doesn’t know just how silent he is. I’m not even sure the good-looking ole duffer would yell fire if the house was burning. But he’d probably save me.
I can coax him into talking. I learned to do so many years ago. But it is so time-consuming and so irritating that I seldom try anymore. I’ve told him that his silences are bad for him as well as for our relationship. My patience wears mighty thin playing 20 questions every day and being the sole soundtrack for most of our time.
This is a dude, who when he was just a teenager, cut his hand very badly one day just as his mother was loading he and his brother up to go to the grocery store. He dutifully got in the back seat. Saying nothing as usual. But his twin brother, never a quiet guy, started yelling that he was getting blood all over the place.
Their mother stopped the car, saw the extent of the cut on his hand and went to the ER instead of the grocery store, to get his hand stitched up.
We tell it sometimes as a funny family story, or as an illustration of his tough silence. But really, it’s not funny for someone to be so taciturn that he won’t even mention when he is hurt.
I have a more recent example.
I didn’t tell you guys, but for several days now I’ve been thinking I might have to tell him to go down to Florida to live alone before I do him grievious harm.
He has been a bear. Yelled at me over the stupid refrigerator. He’s not always quiet when he’s mad, in fact, he proves that he can vocalize quite loudly during those times.
He didn’t gather and take out the trash yesterday — a task that has been his since we married. We each have our “chores” and we know it, so there’s no need to fight over who does what. We worked that out a long, long time ago. In 25 years, he’s…
