A Wife Doesn’t Come With Instructions

“I never want to be like my mother.”

At seven years old, I knew that idea was big thinking for a little kid.

The thought sprouted into existence as my sister and I sat in the back of our 1952 Hudson sedan. My mother’s arm draped over the no-headrest front seat next to my father. The skin jiggled just a little as the car moved. It perched at eye level. And freckles, scattered here and there, were cut off from view where the skin creased when it met the seat back. Light blonde hairs pattern themselves up towards her short sleeve. No matter where I push my eyes, they drifted home to the jiggling flesh.

” I don’t wanna be like her,” I thought. “No. Not ever, never, ever.”

A woman angry, depressed, and dangerous to mental health. My mother was like that married to my father. Maybe she was like that before she married my father, but I hadn’t been born yet to see it.

One Sunday morning they got into another of their endless arguments. A Washington Post Sunday paper squatted in the living room arm chair, fat and heavy, dripping with comics, magazines, and extra pages. Neatly folded and unread. Every weekend my parents performed the reading of this engorged edition as a sacred act. Then my father would drive us to Sunday School (which I hated) and wait for Sunday class to be over. I never thought about whether he brought the paper with him or not. I just knew they both loved reading it all week long, but especially on Sunday.

But that morning was different. My dad threw a plate of scrambled eggs at my mother across the breakfast table. It hit her in the face, spattering yellow scrambles everywhere. Her brown, curly hair dangled yellow pinpoints of egg, while another bunch scattered on the refrigerator, counters, and floor. Some of those smooshed-up, sticky scrambles fell into the little narrow space between the fridge and the counter, and all over the notes and papers lying there. I knew it was a mess because my mother was a real neatnik.

What I don’t remember is how I got into the living room. It wasn’t hat far– but I don’t remember moving. I think I had on my Sunday school dress but I can’t be sure. The hurricane in my head swirled everything around, smashing thoughts from one side of my brain to the other. I had to get rid of that swirling head dragon, break something, rip something, throw something, anything to get rid of the wild feeling I’d explode into pieces.

The neatly folded, sacred Sunday paper loomed into view. I approached, shoved the whole thing to the carpet, grabbed the double folded pages as they fell, and ripped. And cried. And kept on ripping. Like snowflakes raining down on the living room floor, I hurled imaginary paper dragon eggs all over the room. Until there was no more Sunday sacred anything.

I wanted them to stop being mean.

I remember wishing they would get a divorce.

Nice people don’t always stay nice and mean people don’t always stay mean. But that’s not so about being a wife. A wife doesn’t come with instructions. And I learned that husbands and wives don’t always know how to get along with each other.

So, how in the world do men and women ever learn to live together, to family together, or, (perhaps the most crazy of all), even learn to work together?

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