Cooking Lit :: with Jessica Baxter

Love and Smearage

Meal: Hours ago now

Drink: Long gone, it’s late

Just a few moments ago, I was quietly laying in bed and feeling the cool air from the open window, and generally minding my own business, when my husband came into the room. We cuddled and kissed and practiced our nightly ritual that entails Clint smothering me by crushing my chest. He listens to me rasp for air, and eventually one of us gives in… He releases his clutch or I bat him away, gasping for oxygen. Weird little people, we are.

After the horseplay he left our room to go across the hall. I yelled after him, “can you pleeeeeze bring me a Skinny Cow?”. Playing the poor, bedridden, sleepy wife has always been a favorite of mine.

Can you guess what he said in return? He might have said, “Sure!” or “Just a minute”. He could even have refused me service. But HB, my husband, CHOSE to say the following:

“Are you SURE that you really want to eat that now?”

The judgement reverberated through the house. I only wanted a skinny cow! So guilt free, yet there is the guilt… Peeing in my toilet and staring at me as if I’d asked to be spoon fed sugar covered whale lard- a delicasy on Alaska.

This judgement from my 120 pound husband. A guy who has not ever needed to work out. A guy whose own diet plan includes eating 10,000 calories a day. Nutrition advice from a man that has lived in the exact body since age 14 is insulting.

I petulantly refused his make-up Skinny Cow presented to me in bed. I scorned his offer to rephrase what he said into what he meant.

Now I am cranky and alone, minding my own business and enjoying the spring breeze from my bed windows. My tummy is rumbling but I am too proud to cross Clint in the kitchen. I’ll lay here and eventually fall asleep… Loathing the newest monkey on my back… My HB/dietician/Life coach.

Terrific.