Ever since my wife read the story from Gill Martin in London (The Advertiser, 11/10/83) that courtliness and romancing are back in vogue I have been told to lift my game.
In other words, more hand-kissing and less finger-licking
How about a few nice compliments? Why not a stroll in the moonlit garden? Why not, at least you can’t see the weeds at night.
Every man should a-wooing go and one should persevere, dear. I shall sweep her off her feet, I swear it, even if I have to use a fork-lift.
“There was a time,” cried my wife, “when you came knocking on my door, grovelling before my father, praising my mother’s cooking and throwing me glances that singed the curtains. Do you remember what my father said when you asked for my hand?”
“Yes,” I cried. “He said, Take both of them. You look as if you’ll need them”
She wasn’t finished with me yet.
“And what do we have now?” she asked. “A great form slumping and grumping. Wherefore art thou, Romeo? What climbs my balcony now apart from kikuyu grass.”
So goes her complaint.
She can be very persistent. She said: “Once there were stars in your eyes. Now only contact lenses. Once you threw yourself at me. But not now. The walls would never stand it.”
Perhaps we men do subside in marital apathy, which is just another name for my TV chair.
“Do you remember,” she whispered during a commercial break when you took me dancing and I came home with hammer toes? But you’d made the effort. What do you make now? Not even money.”
She tossed her head and I caught her spectacles in a low diving catch.
She said: “Bring me home something besides the dry-cleaning. Something that shines and sparkles, something that illuminates the innermost recesses of our being, something that lights our dull old globe.”
So I took her home the bill from ETSA. Nobody can say that I don’t try.
I suppose I’ve lost some of my daredevil self. The spring in my step has turned to autumn, my high noon has become low cunning.
My wife said: “I ask myself, is this the man I wedded? Then I read our marriage certificate and can hardly believe my eyes”.
I knew we were in for some drama.
She said “I wait, trembling for your arrival, watching with thrilling heart the sudden kindling of your embrace, the pounding proximity of self, and through my modestly lowered lashes I see your mouth pursing with passionate information, the burning question trembling on your lips and then, falling at my feet those torrid words what’s for tea?”
So she has taken to reading romantic novels, the betrayal of servant girls by harsh Victorian masters, the family sagas, the young men who run away disgraced and return fall of honour, driving their carriages madly to the stately home.
“Cynthia, I’m back. Forgive me, forgive me, and the butler announcing Master Derek is home, Miss He has come back.”
“Can’t you go away somewhere.” my wife cried, laying down her novel “and then return to me. Go somewhere, make your fortune. To some far romantic place.”
Well, how about Gawler?
Recently she sat on the TV set right in the middle of a one-day match. I somehow got the message that she felt that cricket was beneath her.
I suppose I’m a heartless brute.
One woman wrote:
“I wouldn’t touch you with a 40-metre pole. I bet you bite your nails too.”
What does she think I am, a Nail Chauvinist Pig?
A woman neighbour told my wife, “Your husband certainly doesn’t grab me.”
She responded. “My dear, I can’t even get him to grab ME!”
So more romantic notions, more courtliness and why not! Sir Galahad is not dead. After all, Sir Walter Raleigh was the first man to spread his cloak to keep women away from the pools. As King Alfred said, you can’t have your cake and heat it.
“Shall I greet you tonight with a flower in my hair?” my wife asked.
“Provided it’s self-raising.” I responded.
Keep Cupid in the kitchen I say. rotter that I am.
Max Fatchen