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Illustration by Marley Allen-Ash
When I share I have been married for 39 years – to the same man – people congratulate me as if I’ve recently scaled Everest’s North face wearing sneakers and a micro bikini. Like most imposters, I smile back and say “thank you.” Meanwhile the refrain, I married the wrong man, plays inside my head like a song one hears on the radio and can’t shake for the rest of the day. Only I’ve been trying to shake this one for decades.
I was on a one-year sabbatical from the United Kingdom when John walked into my favourite Toronto bar and subsequently invited me to a hockey game. Watching him chase a rubber bullet at breakneck speed across frozen water was hotter than sex and I lost a chunk of my heart to him that day. I returned to the U.K. eight months later only to be blinded by the Hollywood glow of long-distance romance – flirtatious phone calls, heart-tugging letters and a Christmas visit that had friends swooning over his Canadian masculinity.
And so, one month shy of my 27th birthday, I made the impossible promise in front of a church full of family and friends to have and to hold John “for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do us part.” At no point during the ceremony did I calculate the long haul toward death or pause to consider who my 33-year-old studmuffin might be in 40 years. Instead, I stood there, feeling particularly beautiful in my white froth of a gown, naively buying into the belief that I would – from this day forward – live in perpetual harmony. Wedding vows have evolved since my special day, but I do wonder at the absurdity of the marital commitment and marvel that any of us avoid divorce.
I notice girlfriends who married later in life, or are on their second run at matrimonial bliss, are confident in their choice of Mr. Right. The question, “If I had waited, would I have chosen John?” sent me on a destructive path of comparing us to other couples. It started 25 years ago when we were invited to dinner by newlyweds Lorne and Jenny – both on their second marriage. Shortly after dinner, Jenny felt compelled to share their secret to keeping the magic alive: Naked Date Night. Every Saturday evening this attractive couple would lock the doors, mute the phones and turn off the TV to do whatever was on their agenda: cooking dinner, cleaning bathrooms, enjoying an intellectual round of Scrabble. While naked. John went remarkably quiet, a sign of his discomfort with the conversation. I imagined him mentally retreating to a rerun of the relative joy of his recent colonoscopy. My brain tripped back to our most recent Saturday night: Me, seductively dressed in my hot (and not in a come-take-me-now way) flannel jammies and blue bunny slippers, curled up on the couch with John. Steinbeck, that is. While John hunkered in the basement below, hurling abuse at his beloved Maple Leafs.
It hit me that perhaps comfort was all that held John and me together, like that old pair of undies I keep because it fits in all the right places. And if I send it to that big underwear drawer in the sky, will I yearn for it when the lace of sexy new lingerie rides up my derriere? I doubt John appreciates being compared to a pair of de-elasticized knickers but I started to believe our relationship was speeding past habit to destination Downright Dull. Until the disturbing visual of my husband dribbling spaghetti sauce onto his genitals once a week had me feeling pretty good about our Saturday night choices.
Perhaps my doubt in us is rooted in John being my polar opposite. Life for John is about today. The past is gone, the future may not come. He has never worn a watch and doesn’t own a cellphone. He worships the status quo – psychologically he never moved on from the Sixties. Such is his level of content that he falls into a nine-hour coma as soon as his head hits the pillow. I, on the other hand, am a slave to punctuality, I care little about the Sixties, and am awake much of the night as my brain wrestles with thoughts of everything that has happened, might happen and is likely to never happen.
While our differences are a recurring source of irritation, in some ways they make worthy companions. When I worry, John is annoyingly calm. When I strive hopelessly for perfection, he drags me back to Earth. I have a love-hate dependency on technology. He reminds me how enlightened it might be to live without it. For much of our union, our asymmetry was less important. My career took me away for days at a time. John’s changing shift work made dinner together a cherished reunion. We had space. Lots of it. Space saves a marriage. But John is now a home-happy retiree while I, the workaholic, am kicking and screaming my way into a hazy definition of semi-retirement. Coupled with the 24/7 confinement of a global pandemic, the eddy of our incongruity has shifted to a full force tsunami.
We clash when John withdraws into his uncomplicated world and I seek entry to discuss what I believe is important to us. Although apparently only to me. My request for his involvement inevitably shifts to nagging, a sport in which I hold a black belt, and I crush his patience. His words, “I’ve had enough of this conversation,” sting as he leaves the room, leaving me empty, alone – with the hum of I married the wrong man escalating to a high-pitched wail.
But they are moments. The next day, sweet John slides out of bed two hours after me, all soft edges. He wraps his arms around me, plants a kiss on my head and asks this insomniac if she slept. The beauty in this tenderness quiets the confusion and, for now, wins me back to us. But is this enough? John says we are more than enough. Good friends, who know the depth of him, tell me that I am his world. But if I don’t feel this, does it count?
As I enter the final third of life and watch my runway shorten, the doubt lingers within me, “Did I marry the wrong man?” Maybe I’ll never be sure of the answer. Does it matter? John would tell me to change the radio station inside my head. Tune in to a new song. One with an upbeat melody and inspired lyrics, “I married the right guy. For me.” He may be right.
Jill Harrington lives in Unionville, Ont.
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