Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Despite my recent posts, I still believe in love.

Husband or Boyfriend: You Make the Call: A Wedding Season quiz for the alert bride-to-be

This quiz is my gift to brides-to-be, about to spend their lives sleeping beside, and putting down the toilet seats of, the men they love. If you don't do very well and find yourself uncomfortable at the end of it, don’t postpone the big day. Just go into it with a little more information than many of your older sisters had when we said, “I do” and ... you're welcome.

Let’s begin.

1. You’re dining with two other couples, including women you've befriended through your job. As you pull into the parking lot, you turn to the man of your dreams and say: “Okay, they're Ken and Dana, Mary and Chris. Right? Remember?” Your companion that night is:

A. your husband

B. your boyfriend

Correct answer: A. Your husband always enjoys these evenings enormously but will barely recall one scrap of information about anyone between occasions. You recite crib notes before every get-together. You: “I worked with Dana and her husband is the engineer? Mary works freelance and her husband is the cop?” [Your husband is concentrating; possibly on the clues, possibly trying to remember who played right field for the Phillies in 1964.] “Anything sound familiar?”

He retrieves a shred of knowledge from his memory, and with a look of satisfaction he declares in triumph: “Chris follows Penn State? And Ken is the cyclist?” Atta boy.

Never correct: B. Your boyfriend knows exactly who they are. Couples don’t categorize friends until they’re about to marry and are drafting guest lists and seating charts and overhearing the inevitable “bride or groom?” question posed by ushers the world over.

Fun fact related to question 1:

As a dating couple, you see friends regularly.

As a married couple, you have his and her friends you see bi-annually, until you have children. Then you see them every leap year.

2. The man who obsesses about the dog’s burned out four-inch-square patch of dead grass on the perimeter of the yard will ignore the twelve inch gouges your son’s football cleats left in the center of the kitchen floor. This keen eye belongs to:

A. your husband

B. your boyfriend

C. the landscaper you paid $7,800 (plus shrubs) to upgrade your property.

Correct answer: A or C. But the landscaper will comment on the damaged linoleum before your husband does.

Never correct: B. Your boyfriend doesn’t know you have a yard.

3. It’s after ten p.m. The man across the room wants a little snack and asks: “Do you have any ice cream?” He is your:

A. husband

B. boyfriend

Correct answer: A or B. This is a trick question, with the latter being slightly more logical but that doesn’t matter. My husband is perennially curious and surprised about the food in our kitchen. Despite the fact that he does more grocery shopping than I, he continues to ask, “Do you have any chips?” “Do you have any cookies?”

It couldn’t have been this way when we all lived in caves and wore animal skins. Did the men ask the women, “Do you have any mastodon?” "Did you save any of those nuts and berries I gathered?"

4. It’s snowing and the roads are treacherous. You’re behind the wheel and your hero has dug out a reasonable path in the snow and ice for the car. He wants you to give it a shot and he straightens up, backs away and calls out: “Now...cut the wheel!” He is your:

A. Husband

B. Boyfriend

C. Tow-truck guy

Answer. All of the above. All men say, “Cut the wheel” and I guarantee you there is not one woman alive who has ever said it. I always make the wrong move, and my husband in his infinite patience will shout over squealing tires, “Stop!” as he shakes his head at my lack of fluency in his language.

5. You stand before family, friends, God and everything you hold sacred, as the man beside you pledges to love and cherish you - cherish you! - for the rest of your life. He is your:

A. Husband.

B. Friend.

C. Confidant.

D. Advocate.

E. Beloved.

Correct Answer: All of the above.

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