Understanding

My wife wants a dog. She says I don't show her enough affection. She
says that a dog shows unconditional love and would understand her. She
says I don't understand her. I don't know what the hell she's talking
about, she doesn't know the first thing about dogs.

My wife bought this book all about dogs and now she thinks she's a
veterinary surgeon or something. I told her. I said to her "You don't
know the first thing about dogs," but she just keeps on reading her
book and acting all aloof and academic. It's driving me nuts, I'm not
kidding.

It's just like this guy I used to know. He thought he was getting a raw
deal from life just like everybody else does. He thought that no-one
cared about him or showed him any affection or anything, well, not
since his wife left him. But the one thing he did have, he thought he
was a big-shot about food and eating because he had this chart that
described all these different types of potato stuck on his kitchen
wall.

I'd tell him he was putting too much salt or red wine into a casserole
and he'd get all snooty and defensive. He'd say "Who's the epicure
here, you or me?" I felt like telling him that having a chart on
potatoes doesn't make anyone a goddam epicure. I'll bet he didn't even
have the faintest clue what an epicure is - but you know what people
like that are like, they think they know it all.

My wife's getting more and more agitated about buying this dog. It's
all that she has on her mind. You'd think that dogs ruled the world or
something, the way she talks. She keeps telling me how it wouldn't cost
too much, this dog, in relation to the happiness and affection she'd
get from it. I said to her "Don't you get enough affection from me?"
but she won't listen.

Anyone would think I was a cold-hearted bastard or something the way
she talks, but I'm not. I buy her what she wants, I take her to the
places she wants to go, but it doesn't mean a thing to her. Take the
other day, I bought a big bag of chips and I gave her a whole handful.
It's the little things as far as I can see. There's this girl at work
who's married to a real booze hound. He knocks her about. Every day she
comes in with new bruises. I ask her what's happened and she's always
saying she walks into doors. She's the clumsiest goddam person around
if you believe that's what happens to her. I know what it is, he knocks
her about. And that's what gets me, she says this guy hits her because
he loves her. Maybe I should smack my wife about, but I don't feel like
it. I don't think you need to hammer affection into somebody to show
them you give a damn, that's the difference between my wife and
me.

That's why this whole dog thing bothers me - I don't see what a dog can
offer her that I can't. Besides, I know people with dogs and half the
time you can't tell which one's the owner and which one's the dog. They
start looking alike. I don't want my wife to look like a dog. Ever
since she curled her hair she's been looking more and more like a
poodle. It's frightening.

But she doesn't want a poodle, she wants a spaniel. The idea of her
with the big ears and hair and that wet smell that spaniels have makes
me want to throw up. She doesn't want any kind of spaniel though, she
wants a King Charles Spaniel on account of her great aunt is from
Scotland and she has Celtic blood in her. I don't see what the hell
that has to do with it, but she seems to think this dog will make her
look royal or something I suppose. It really is beginning to worry me,
people can get obsessive about this sort of thing, I've seen it happen.
Things can get out of hand, take over from what really matters.

I know I keep going on about the guy and his potatoes when I'm trying
to tell you about my wife, but it all ties in, believe me. That's why
I'm worried in a way I suppose. Anyway, like I said, he had this chart
on potatoes and he thought that made him an epicure. I knew him before
I was married, we worked together and sometimes used to go for drinks
after work. Then his wife left him. They'd married young and the flame
had fizzled out before they were even in their mid-twenties. I'd go
round to his place for some food - I wasn't as hot about his cooking as
he was, but it meant I didn't have to do any cooking myself - and all
he'd do was talk about potatoes. He'd give me a goddam lecture on which
variety was best in which season and which potato was best for
roasting, or which potato was best for boiling. It bored the hell out
of me, but at least it meant I didn't have to cook.

He'd say the problem was that people just didn't know when to plant a
potato, when to pick a potato, and what to do with it once you had
anymore. I made a mistake though. We went back to his place once after
I'd had a few too many drinks and after hearing all his talk on how all
these farmers did everything wrong by putting the wrong type of potato
in the wrong soil and then people ended up cooking them the wrong way
anyway, I got him all agitated by saying that I was sure the farmers
knew more about it than he did.

He got mad as hell when I said that. I'm not kidding, you never saw
anyone get so passionate about potatoes in your life. He stood up from
the table and was going red in the face. His head looked about ready to
burst by the time I managed to settle him down again. Anyway, that
wasn't my mistake. What my mistake was, after I'd managed to calm him
down finally, I said "Why don't you plant your own potatoes if everyone
else does it so wrong?" That was my mistake.

After about two minutes ago being mad as hell, suddenly he got all
excited and crazy about the idea and started pouring us celebratory
drinks. I just sat there, drinking this beer he'd given me, wondering
how anyone could get so worked up about potatoes. He said he was going
to plant his own crop, that he'd have a potato patch right in his own
back garden. He needed to lay new turf and buy gardening equipment and
seeds and everything, and the whole back yard would need clearing out,
but he was excited as hell. I'd never realised anyone could think an
idea I'd ever have would be so good.

He kept pacing around the kitchen, gesticulating all over the place and
spilling his beer. But he was excited, you could tell that. He was
saying to me how he was sick and tired that every meal he made was
ruined by some son of a bitch planting the wrong type of potato at the
wrong time. He even apologised for it. He said "I've done all I can
with these potatoes, but I'm afraid they were ruined the moment they
were put in the ground." It put me off my food.

But I'd say "That's okay, I understand," when I knew deep inside that I
couldn't tell the difference between one potato and another if my life
depended on it - if some madman held a gun to my head and told me to
identify what sort of potato I was eating I still couldn't do it. They
all taste the same as far as I'm concerned. Not that I told him this
though, he'd probably have had about three hernias on the spot if I
said that to him.

It's the same thing with my wife. I'm constantly saying to her "That's
okay, I understand," when I don't have the faintest idea what she's
talking about. She's always got some hair-brained scheme on the go. It
may not be planting a potato patch, but it's the same principle. One
time she wanted to take up ballet because she wanted to learn how to be
poised. All I'd said was that she shouldn't slouch so much when she
sits down. She's a terrible sloucher. Whether she's sitting watching TV
or sitting at the dinner table eating, she slouches all over the place.
I said to her "Slouching's bad for your spine you know." So then she
got all worried about her spine and her posture. She started walking
round the house with books on her head and talking about taking ballet,
when she can't dance to save her life anyway. The only time we ever
danced was before we were married and when we got married and she
wasn't much good even then.

I've started to feel like I ought to watch what I say to anyone. People
always seem to get these crazy ideas whenever I open my mouth. Not that
my wife ever took up ballet or anything, but she did start walking
round the house with these books on her head. Now all she does is read
this book about dogs and talk about how much she wants a dog, just
because she thinks I don't show her enough affection and that if it's
missing from me, she can get affection from this dog she wants to buy.
I keep my mouth shut now in case she gets any more ideas, but that
doesn't seem to help. Now she thinks I don't talk to her anymore and
that I don't understand her. It's enough to make anyone want to keep
quiet when everything you say starts putting ideas into people's
heads.

Like after I told that guy I knew to plant his own potatoes. After I
said that, he cleared out the whole of his back yard. He cleared out
stuff he'd had there for years just so he could put in all this new
turf and start to grow his own potatoes. The potatoes were all about
affection with him too. You should have seen the way he looked after
that potato patch he started. He'd be out there at all hours of the day
and night looking after these potatoes, talking to them - I'm not
kidding. But then, just when it was coming up to the time when he
needed to pick them, we had this terrible weather. It rained for about
two weeks non-stop. I mean, it literally didn't stop raining for about
fourteen days. It washed his whole crop out. His back yard looked like
a swimming pool or something and all his potatoes couldn't be picked
because they were all washed away. But he was a pretty Church going guy
and he just said it was a message from God that he shouldn't be a
farmer. If you ask me it didn't need God to tell him that, but I didn't
say anything of course. I knew better than that by then.

Anyway, my wife's little thing about dogs is all over now too. She got
to the part in her book about rabies and stuff and then she started
getting all worried that our dog would have rabies, whether it had
royal blood or not, and would just bite someone and then we'd get sued.
She threw the book out and came to sit with me on the sofa to watch
some TV. She put her arm in mine and her head on my shoulder and said
she didn't know what had got into her. I said "That's okay, I
understand," but I had no idea really what had caused everything. But
saying you understand, even when you don't, is sometimes all the
understanding you need.