No Joke

Magnify

He’s no romantic, my husband. We had only been an item for a couple months when that insight hit me over the head.

Picture a candlelight dinner in my tiny apartment, the two of us seated on the floor at the coffee table, across from each other. Dinner is a smorgasbord of snacks—lovers’ treats: olives, smoked oysters, gourmet crackers, special cheese, and wine. The music of a favorite Canadian singer spills into the room. Hey, I didn’t say I wasn’t a romantic.

Jim looks across the table, shakes his head, and says in a husky voice, “I can’t believe it. Sometimes you just look so beautiful.”

My heart almost stops. Really. A prior marriage and divorce had left me bruised and disappointed. I rarely felt beautiful—but I see something in Jim’s eyes. This is magic. I don’t know what to say. His words dance around my brain. “Sometimes you just look so beautiful.”

But spells, alas, are easily broken. He pauses only a moment before saying, “And then again, other times…”

End of magic moment. Curtain comes down on that picture. I must say, however, that to Jim’s credit, once he realized that I was hurt, that I felt like the butt of a joke just when I was most vulnerable, he fell all over himself apologizing. It was just that he couldn’t resist a punch line waiting to happen. That’s his credo. I learned to be prepared.

Lest I seem to be painting a sad picture, I must say that Jim’s ability to laugh at a wide range of foibles, pretensions, and fantasies, including his and mine, has taught me to take myself much more lightly. This, in turn, has made my life easier, better, and a whole lot more fun. So he’s not romantic. So what?

I know Jim’s sense of humor and his style so well that these days I can anticipate the one-liners before he speaks. I know his repertoire of jokes and often begin rolling my eyes before he opens his mouth, sensing, as I do, what’s coming. He is quick with unexpected quips or puns, too, but even with his “new material” I can guess the tenor of the remark brewing. As he has aged, he has also learned that there are times for silence, but I have been amused on several occasions knowing that he’s holding his tongue while someone pontificates and imagining—almost like thought transference—the quip he longs to make. I guess I’ve internalized his sense of humor. Our daughters share my skill at reading their father, and sometimes we’ll all groan before he even starts a familiar story. He accepts our teasing with his typical good humor.