Equal Time for Husbands

Published September 18, 1980. A few weeks ago in this column I said that most men love their wives, but husbands often show their love in ways other than wives wish.

Reader response from wives was invited on two questions: (1) what has your husband done in the past to show his love for you that you appreciated most? and (2) what could he do in the future to show his love that you would greatly appreciate?

I promised to make an anonymous synopsis of the responses and send each respondent a free copy of the summary.

Numerous readers wrote in, and I thank you for your insightful comments and suggestions. Others who wish to participate still have time if you send your letters in the next few days. I am putting the summary together now and would be happy to include any additional letters.

Several of the wives said it would be interesting for the husbands to have a chance to write on the same questions. So, being a believer in equality. I will offer the husbands the same opportunity and the same deal. Here it is:

Write a few paragraphs answering the same two questions. I promise to make an anonymous summary of the responses and send each of you a free copy in the mail.

While reading the letters that have come in from the wives thus far, I have gained several valuable insights about love and marriage and am sure others who receive the summaries will experience the same. When some of the wives suggested that we ask husbands the same questions, I started thinking about Susan and how I feel about her. Let me share with you just one reason I love her.

About the 20^th of each month, Susan and I, like most of you, get a letter in the mail with the cellophane window. It is from the bank and has our cancelled checks and a record of our monthly spending.

A few years ago, we were sitting at the kitchen table trying to reconcile our records with theirs, and we discovered that two of our checks were missing and had not been recorded in our bankbook. We didn’t know how much the checks were for, to whom they were written, and who wrote them. This doesn’t happen very often, but when it does, we have some colorful conversations.

Susan finally remembered she had written one of the checks, to whom, and for how much. She apologized and entered it into our account. I felt rather self-righteous and smug as I went into my song and dance about how we can’t keep our records straight if we didn’t write down the necessary information. We both assumed she had also written the other check but realized we would have to wait for the next bank statement, since neither of the cancelled checks were with the ones we had just received.

I asked her to be a little more careful in keeping track of our written checks, and she assured me she would. To make a long story short, we got the cancelled checks the next month, and guess what? As you have suspected, it was not Susan who had written the other check. It was the great record keeper, Brent Barlow, who bought $10.00 worth of gas and failed to write it down in the check book.

Susan had her moment. She could have cut me down to size had she wanted to, but she didn’t. You see, she is more mature in many ways than the man she married. And that is on reason I love her. She neither dwells on nor reminds me of my mistakes.

Because I am learning from Susan to be forgiving in our relationship, our marriage has become much more meaningful.