Communication Breakdown

It is raining today and I'm kind of depressed. I've been depressed for a while, and it's taken its toll, in that I've retreated into my shell and have not been communicating very well with my husband. It all came to a head yesterday, when I realized I need to stop going off on a vacation inside my head and actually listen to people.

My husband, three year old Sausage and I went to the mall in the morning. Apparently, before I ran off to go clothes shopping, I said to him, "I will meet you outside the Apple shop at 1 o'clock." I don't remember saying that. I remember him saying, "Don't worry, I will find you later on." I suppose I should have thought that it would be hard to find me in a three storey mall, but I had other things on my mind.

Like finding transitional clothes. Let me explain. In a novel by Louise Wener, I once read about a thirty five year old man, who had spent months looking for a pair of transitional shoes. Like, up until thirty five, you can wear trainers or runners or whatever you call them here, but if you keep wearing them over thirty five, you start to look like a sad old git, or Peter Stringfellow. Once you hit sixty you can start wearing trainers again, because you basically wear one outfit all day (a tracksuit) and trainers. But betweeen 35-60 this guy needed some transitional shoes that screamed, I am sophisticated, I know I am not young, but I am hip.

And this was the rather thorny dilemna I was facing at the mall. I have no interest in dressing like a mom, in sweatpants, or wierd sweatshirts with hearts on them. I am in a transitional phase. I was pleased that I could fit into all those tight t-shirts in H&M with funny logos on them, but not so pleased that they made me look like a 35 year old trying to look 18. Nor am I ready to go the route of Ann Taylor pastel separates. Maybe there simply isn't a chain store in the US for transitional clothes. Maybe there is an entrepeneur out there who could start such a chain. You want the elements of fashion without looking like you are trying and failing to look young.

So I was basically shopping away until about two o'clock, when I'd had enough, and decided to try and find my husband. I had forgotten that I said I'd meet him outside the Apple store, (if I indeed ever said that). But after an hour walking about, I began to feel nauseous from all the foul cookie smells and decided to walk home (we came in his car). So I go to his car in the car park and put a note on his windscreen saying I have gone home. Then I walk home for half an hour. It is now freezing cold. When I get home I realize I do not have my house key. Fuck.

So I sit there for a bit thinking, isn't he going to realize I am NOT at the mall and bloody well drive home? But no, he does not realize that, because apparently (I find out later), he noticed that my keys were stuck on the inside of the front door and consequently did not think I would be stupid enough to walk home with no keys.

So I am stuck in a blizzard outside my front door without a cell phone (I've never had one, for some reason). Eventually I go and take refuge with my neighbor, who looks at me like I am nuts when I tell her the story, but lets me use her phone to call my friend Daisy who eventually picks me up...etc etc.

Meanwhile, my husband is still walking around the mall with a bawling Sausage because he thinks I am still somewhere in the mall. We do eventually meet up later, and neither of us can remember what the other said about meeting up. Which tells me that I am going to have to start living more in reality. Or get a cell phone.

Or, maybe it is just that we need to communicate more effectively. Tell me it is not just me. Surely you've had a fiasco like this with your spouse?

Other than that, maybe someone can cheer me up a bit. If all else fails, I guess I will just have to take a leaf out of this cartoon's book: