There are times when I open my mouth and it's the 12 year old me speaking. I normally don't realize it until it's too late. Until I glance at my husband smirking, waiting for my ears and brain to catch up to my voice.
A friend once told me that's why my husband and I make a great couple, he noticed how patient Mike was with my Lucille Ball moments. Keeping quiet and giving me small clues like a grimace or chuckle, guiding me back to the educated, occasionally bright grown-up that I am.
I mix up words. I get names wrong. I insisted in one conversation that the lead singer of R.E.M. was Michael STRIPE. There are times I speak with too much confidence and the other person might not catch it, other times my husband comes to the rescue and eases in the right information before the transmission enters the ears of another person. We're a good team that way, tries when he can to eliminate me creating an awkward moment for myself. Sometimes he's too late.
For years I would tell him about the time I met my sister's husband while they were dating; it was on the 4th of July. We all went to see fireworks and Karl Marx performed. He always smiles and says quietly, you mean Richard Marx? And we laugh. We will be 98 years old sitting on the porch and have that exact conversation all over again. And we will laugh the same together about it like it was new.
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During our courtship, I took him to Vegas for his birthday so we could be sinners by gambling and making out like rock stars. I arranged the whole thing and was quite proud about it. I even got us tickets for an evening performance. We were so wrapped up in making out, that we were running a few minutes late. As we sprinted across MGM Grand (hey what can I say, I was a big spender) I realized I had no idea where we were supposed to go.
I finally spotted the concierge desk as Mike trailed behind me (he wasn't quite the marathon runner yet). I caught my breath and put on my proper adult voice to request the location of the magic show. She said we needed tickets, bla bla bla, make me more late why don't ya. Then I held up the tickets and inquired again which direction we needed to go to see the David Hasselhoff Show. She told me she had no idea what I was talking about. I was getting frustrated and more time was being wasted. Mike finally overheard my part of the conversation and leaned in casually to inform her we had tickets for David Copperfield. I turned 5 shades of red and shrunk to about 3 foot 2. We were quickly on our way and got into our seats just as the show began.
I love that we can laugh about that part of me. I love that he handles my verbal slips gently in a way that works with me and gets us where we need to be. Or that, at times, they are not discussed and never criticized. That sometimes I get angry with the B student in me, the lazy part of me that may surface at really inconvenient times when I wanted to make a good impression.
I love how careful Mike is to speak and choose his words. How he takes a moment before he explains something to gather his thoughts and deliver them graciously. I love that my goofiness adds humor to our marriage, even if they are little kinks I sometimes wish I had ironed out when I was 12.
