He's Watching Me

 Getting ready for my trip south ... and constantly tripping over my husband. I know that all I really need to do is invent an errand to get him out of here.

I am sitting at my desk, phone in hand, credit card at the ready, about to make our reservations. HeWho runs errands was supposed to be on his way with my texted list of necessities. I look up to see him leaning on the counter, watching me. Thinking he wants to tell me something or ask me something, I pause before dialing. "Do you need something?" I ask. "No." he responds. "Then why are you watching me? Do you think I need help making a reservation?" Once again he answers with "no".

I hate it when he stands watching me with his full attention. It doesn't happen often, so you would think I might like being the center of his attention. But, it makes me feel like he is waiting for me to make a mistake. And I did. I screwed up my own phone number and had to correct it. I wanted to tell him I did it on purpose to see if he was paying attention, but that would be a lie.

He does this when I am driving, too. When I come home with a carload of groceries and back up to the entrance to unload. I can back up just fine. My car even has a camera to see the rear view, not to mention mirrors that I have been using all my driving life. But if he sees me coming in, he will go outside and direct me with hand signals. The car will be all askew when I finally put it in park and he will begin with a litany of things I almost hit. Why does he do this? I can back that car within mere inches of the door when left to my own devices.

When we lived in Albany, Ga, the twins were early teens and most all neighborhoods had alleys to access your driveway in the back. I would change seats with Jill and let her drive the car to our driveway and park it. It was a short distance, but she loved to do this. One particular day, both girls were in the car with me and, as usual, Jill took the drivers seat. As we approached our house, we could see HeWho is her Dad in the back washing our van. His Jeep was parked at an angle on the side where we always parked, where she had parked plenty of times.

I could feel her tension as he stopped to watch her pull in. "Mom, he's watching me, what do I do?" This makes it sound like he was the strict, unbending parent, but he was the big softie who would retract the restrictions he doled out almost immediately. I was the mean one! I knew exactly what she was feeling, so I said, "You are fine, you've done this before, just pull in next to Dad's Jeep and don't hit it."

She hit the Jeep. Why did I say that? It was like saying it went into her brain and she couldn't do anything else! The Jeep was uninjured, but the drivers door was stuck on our car. HeWho loved that stupid Jeep was yelling, "Why did you do that?" Jill was crying and trying to get out through the stuck door. Adrienne was in the back seat laughing with hysteria because I had said NOT to hit the Jeep and she hit the Jeep. Jeff was at the back door to see what the commotion was about.

I got out on the passenger side and pulled Jill through, still crying. I yelled back at my loving husband that is was my fault, that I was the one supervising and to shut up yelling at her. I sent her inside and Adrienne finally got out of the car and stood in the driveway, bent double laughing. She answered Jeff's query "Jill hit the jeep!" through spasms of laughter.

Jill and Jeff disppeared into the house and poor Adrienne became the center of attention for her angry Dad for thinking the situation was funny. It WAS funny, but I had enough sense to laugh inside where he couldn't see me. 

Later I explained to my still upset husband that this was how we learned and that I was quite certain he had done his share of mistakes while driving. Years later I could point out all the dents and dings on our vehicles that are all due to him!