I moped into the living room last Saturday, falling face-first onto the couch, as if collapsing after a long, exhausting work day. However, it was only 8:30 in the morning, and I was still in my pink flowered pajamas, devoid of any desire to be productive.
“Francis!” I mumbled into the couch cushion.
Briskly, my husband appeared, thoughtfully carrying a cup of coffee for me. “Mornin’ Hon,” he said. “Hey I was thinking I’d pick up the leaf blower, and then maybe we’d swing by …” he rattled off a list of Saturday errands that pummeled my brain like hailstones.
I write “To Do” lists most days, but Francis orally recites his daily tasks. Since retiring from the Navy eight years ago, he commutes out of state weekly for work. But when he’s home, our family must endure Francis’ recitations.
Typically, he appears in our kitchen with a sense of urgency, hoping to find an audience. Usually, I’m at the table working on my laptop. While his umpteenth cup of coffee brews in the Keurig, Francis begins his oration. “I have two meetings before noon, then I’ll leave for my PT appointment, and I’ll stop by …” He rattles on until his schedule has been meticulously proclaimed. It doesn’t really matter who’s listening, as long as someone bears witness to the tedious details of Francis’ life with feigned interest.
We’ve nicknamed this Francis’ daily “Blow-by-blow.”
I reluctantly lifted my frizzed head from the couch cushion to interrupt Francis’ Saturday Blow-by-blow. “Hon, can’t we just binge watch Netflix all day?” I whined.
I’d expected Francis to poo-poo this ridiculous suggestion, but he was silent. It was a beautiful winter morning, and I’d just proposed that we do nothing but watch TV. Indoors. All day long.
“Okay!” he said with surprise enthusiasm. I peeked from my upholstered nest looking for confirmation. “I’ll get wood for a fire. You find something on the boob tube,” he tossed me the clicker. Like a bear preparing to hibernate, Francis scurried about — gathering wood, letting the dog out, and topping off our coffees.
“Whaddaya say we watch a reality show,” I suggested with excitement, knowing Francis would’ve preferred “The Lost Pirate Kingdom” or “Alexander: The Making of a God” or “Rise of Empires: Ottoman.”
“Alright,” he acquiesced, clearly not wanting to dampen his wife’s rare spontaneity.
After a few minutes of searching, I announced, “We’ve got ‘Love Island,’ ‘Love on the Spectrum,’ ‘Twin Love,’ ‘Strange Love,’ ‘Burning Love,’ ‘Cosmic Love,’ ‘The Real Love Boat,’ ‘Down for Love,’ ‘Love is Blind,’ ‘Alaskan Women Looking for Love,’ and something called ‘FBOY Island.’”
We settled on ‘Love is Blind,’ and I fired up Episode One, explaining the premise to Francis while he laid across the sofa in slippered feet. “These singles date but never see each other because they’re in those pods, see?” I pointed to the screen. “If they get engaged, they meet and then vacation together at a tropical resort. That’s where things go haywire.”
Francis seemed interested, but he disappeared to the kitchen during Episode 3. During Episode 6 I found him in our bedroom taking a nap. I lured him back downstairs with the promise of peanuts and true crime.
That afternoon, we watched a true crime docuseries while gobbling restaurant leftovers. That evening we broke out cocktails and binged on “The Haunting of Hill House,” during which I housed an entire bag of Chex Mix.
When I woke the next morning, familiar guilt berated my conscience. “You wasted the entire day,” my customary self-censure began. This time, I fought back. “I deserve a break every once in a while,” I retorted, realizing that as a military spouse I was conditioned to feel “responsible,” “in charge,” and “in control.” The rare instances when I’d slack off, I always felt remorse.
Suddenly aware that self-imposed guilt had been a mistake, I reminded myself that weekends are for rejuvenating, even if that means laying around all day in pajamas watching morally bankrupt television shows and stuffing one’s face with Dove Bars and Pizza Bites.
“I was a total slug all day Saturday,” I later bragged to a friend. “And you know what? I look forward to doing it again soon.”
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