What I’ve Learned About My Husband Since He’s Been Working From Home

Like so many of you, I have a spouse who is now working from home. On an odd weekday somewhere back in March he was told he’d be working out of the office until further notice. My life has never been the same since.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I know we are one of the lucky ones. We never had to worry about whether or not he’d be getting a paycheck. We didn’t fear his being exposed to the virus and, in turn, potentially exposing us. And, for the most part, he’s happier and more productive working from his desk in the bedroom.

But this forced social experiment is not all rainbows and sunshine, friends. I have learned things about my husband in these long months that have shaken me to the core. Things that, had I learned about them at any point during our almost 30 year marriage, would have forced me to fake my own death and run away in the night to a deserted Caribbean island.

For now, the covid has me stuck here with this stranger who calls himself my husband. I’ll call him The Whistler. Yes, my husband is a whistler. This is something that probably should have been apparent to me over the years. I’ve known this man since I was 18 years old. But for some reason now, and only now, I’ve discovered he whistles.

But he’s a very specific whistler. It only seems to happen when he’s loading and unloading the dishwasher. And he’s loud. It’s like he’s calling in a herd of cattle from across the prairie. How have I never noticed this? Does he whistle at work? Do all his coworkers secretly want to murder him? Who is this man?

It doesn’t stop at whistling. I could also call him The Fear Stoker because of his obsession with the news, or more so his obsession with telling us the news. And not the good news. It’s never the good news. It’s always some horrific tale of a tiny child abducted at gunpoint left to die in a hot car who was then eaten by a pack of rabid wolverines.

“Did you hear about this?” is something I hear at least a half dozen times a day.

“No, I didn’t hear about it and I don’t want to hear about it and LALALALALALALALALALALALALA,” is my general response.

No, thanks. Life is challenging enough with the evil and incompetent president and the swirling pandemic and the 17 year cicadas. I’m full up on bad stuff, babe, but thanks for thinking of me.

And he’s also Package Is Coming Guy. I’m expecting a package. Did my package come yet? Is that a FedEx truck the dog is barking at? Oh, my package is here! You’d think when the package arrives that would be the end of it, but that only begins his role as OCD Man.

Because the package can’t just be brought into the house and opened. The package must be picked up only while wearing gloves and then the package must be quarantined in the garage for at least 24 hours. Then, we must begin the ritual of washing the hands and the doorknobs and the quarantining of that pair of the package bringing in gloves.

When he’s done quarantining cardboard he listens to a soft rock station called Yacht Rock or Soothing Sailing or some other nautical name that I can’t remember. He says it calms him down. And he only listens to that because I threatened to throw his phone off a sailboat if he kept listening to the 70’s channel that only played The Captain and Tennille and Debby Boone. This is a man who used to own AC/DC on vinyl. Who exactly is this person?

I could also call him The Odd Shopper because, from his grocery store purchases, I’m given the impression he thinks we run a fajita restaurant. He never fails to bring home a giant bag of bell peppers every single time he goes to the grocery store even though none of us have so much have taken the smallest nibble of a bell pepper since 2006.

Every week I throw away last week’s bell peppers to make room for this week’s bell peppers, all while explaining that no one ever eats the bell peppers he brings home and so maybe he should stop bringing home bell peppers. I’m sure every single time I do it, in a field far away, somewhere a farmer weeps.

Have I told you about his computer monitor? It’s huge! It’s bigger than the television set I watch numerous hours of trash TV on. I thought he worked in cybersecurity, but maybe he’s been lying to me and he’s really an evil overlord or he launches rocket ships for a living. Is my husband Elon Musk?

I don’t even want to get started on the pajamas. All day every day. Like a middle aged Hugh Hefner minus the harem of bunnies…

Wait, is there a harem of bunnies? Let me go check. I haven’t been up there in awhile. They’re probably hiding behind the monitor.

*Featured image courtesy of Pixabay