Flying Household Appliances, Holes in the Wall, and Other Fun Stuff

(Marriage Part Deux – from “My Marriage” Series)

I knew from the get-go my ex had a temper. Oh, boy, did he have a temper! (And here I thought I’d blocked out all the unpleasant memories---hah!) I learned about his temper near the beginning of our courtship, when I attempted to step out with a gentleman caller I’d met at a weekend fallout shelter “retreat.” My ex and I had made no promises to each other—nothing in writing—but I had the good sense to know he might be pissed at the thought of my stepping out with another guy. So, that’s why I didn’t tell him. I didn’t have a phone back then, and since my ex never committed to the next date when we were together, I gambled and told Ray to come over on a Wednesday night (I think). As luck would have it, my ex showed up shortly before Ray and quickly picked up on the situation. The blood draining from my face, and my stammering and babbling must have cued him.

Long story short, I didn’t go out with Ray that night—probably just as well because the name Ray conjures up images of bowling leagues, tattoos, scratching and farting—you get the picture. In spite of a good deal of yelling and hollering, Ray managed to avoid a physical altercation with my ex. (Coincidentally, I never saw him again…) The wall in the hallway wasn’t so fortunate however; it got a fist through it, just for trying to give some structure to the building. But I digress. The point is, I knew about his temper and married him anyway. Sigh.

Fast forward to our first year of marriage. We lived in an efficiency apartment with a Murphy Bed. For you whippersnappers, that’s a bed that pulls out of the wall. Our refrigerator was an under-the-counter deal like you might find in a dorm room. Vinyl tile floor throughout. Luxury. But one of the bright spots was our black and white TV that we watched from bed (Do you know you can buy a Murphy Beds over the Internet??) Since the furniture came with the place, the TV was one of the few things we owned. (When you’re married in the courthouse, you don’t get a lot of nice stuff—something Will and Kate apparently figured out.) Toward the end of year one, we were splitsville and I moved into the YWCA (That’s a blog for another day!). When I returned three weeks later, I learned he’d thrown the TV off the balcony in a fit of anger. Not sure what the TV ever did to him, but whatever it was, it didn’t do it again.

Another fast forward. We now had a 3-year old daughter and were in our first house, which came with a stove. The stove wasn’t much--didn’t have a working oven, which didn’t bother him. But it irked him that the burners didn’t turn on right away—sometimes there was a delay. So, for nine months, I went without an oven. One sunny Saturday in June, I came home from my part-time job at the S & L to find I no longer had an oven or a stove. It seems the burners didn’t come on fast enough for him that day, so he threw the stove out the back door. (He was strong when he was angry!) As he tells it, the neighbors on both sides were talking across the fence to each other when the stove went flying out the back door. That must have been quite a sight — and sound; I’m sure the air was blue from swear words lingering in the air.

So, we — actually, I — went a month without a stove. I made do with a little outdoor grill, a crockpot, and an electric frying pan. What more could a gal want? Well, apparently I wanted a 1930’s model stove that he surprised me with one day. He liked it a lot. I’ll have to admit it was cool looking and a pretty color of green. The oven was about big enough to bake a TV dinner. It didn’t have any temperature markings on the dial—you just had to guess how hot it was. Fun!

He got custody of the stove when we divorced, as well as the house (he bought me out), and most of the contents. We’d never had a sofa (a cut-out bathtub was our sofa—his idea, of course) and I was hot to buy a waterbed and start my new life. So I left with the rocking chair I’d rocked my daughter in, the kitchen table and chairs, my daughter’s bed and dresser (that we’d paid $15 for), some burlap shelves and cement blocks, my clothes, and half of my six-year-old daughter.

So, what’s the point of telling you all this? I’m really not sure. So you’ll appreciate your lives/marriage more? Dunno. But I have come up with the perfect moral to the story: “People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stoves.”

Bah dump!