This is How I Know I Will Stay Married
Yesterday, Martha and I drove from our home to Savannah to Nashville. My sketch comedy troupe, The State, is performing here on Monday so we decided to road trip the seven plus hours. From the time we left the driveway, the trip was a disaster.
First, Martha forgot her phone. Ordinarily, this wouldn’t be too much of a problem because I forbid her from talking to anybody without my permission, but as it happens, I am flying to Austin on Tuesday and Martha is driving home. We own a Tesla, which uses the phone as a key. So we had to call our son to send the phone overnight, annoying but hardly disastrous.
Next, a rock found our windshield, splintering the glass with a fine little divot, surrounded by a perfect circle of broken glass. It kind of looks like what happens in the movies when a bad guy shoots at a bulletproof window. Again, taken by itself, not the worst thing in the world but, still, not good.
Third, when we stopped to charge the car in a random strip mall outside Atlanta, I made a beeline for a restroom because I’d been holding in a fart for hours. As I walked to whatever restaurant I could find, I unclenched my butt cheeks to let a little gas out. I did fart, but also a bunch of butt water poured out of my ass, soaking my underpants. Why is my butt leaking water?
On my back to the car, now with my underpants hidden in the pocket of my hoodie, I see Martha standing outside the car waving at me. Something’s wrong. She couldn’t call me because she didn’t have a phone; the car won’t charge. I have encountered this problem a couple times before. Usually, you just need to change charging stalls. We did that. Car still wouldn’t charge. So then we went to another charging station altogether, thinking maybe that particular station was on the fritz, not our car.
No, it was our car. The trip was now, officially, a disaster.
We found the closest Tesla dealership, unsure whether their service department would even be open late in the afternoon on a Saturday. One good piece of news: the dealer was not only open, but they were the largest dealership in the state of Georgia, which meant they had loaner cars available if our car needed repair. And, brother, it DOES need repair. The charging port, apparently, is fried.
Two weeks.
Which means, we’re going to driving around in a loaner for at least a couple weeks, at the end of which we will have to drive five hours each way to retrieve our vehicle. Disaster.
(Also, when I say “we” will have to drive five hours each way to get the car, I mean “I” will have to do that.)
When we finally got back on the road, we began bickering about everything because that’s what long-married couples in the middle of a disastrous road trip do. Bicker, bicker, bicker. About my driving, her driving, the faults in my personality which are TOO NUMEROUS to elucidate, her general tardiness, who was to blame for breaking the car (objectively speaking, neither of us, but if she thinks I’m not going to lay the blame at her feet, she’s out of her mind), the fact that I sacrificed an easy hourlong airplane flight to accompany her on this last-minute, slow-motion road trip, our various failures as spouses, parents, and humans, etc. etc. etc.
Eventually, finally, we made it to our hotel eleven hours after starting our seven-hour drive. We shared some pretty good charcuterie and went up to our room where we could not figure out the correct temperature in which to sleep; I woke her up in the middle of the night to feel my face which was covered in sweat.
I’ve been having night sweats semi-regularly over the last few months, a heavy sweat that soaks through my t-shirt and sweatpants. Maybe my butt was having night sweats yesterday? I’ve obviously looked up the symptom and, apparently, night sweats aren’t much to worry about but I’m still thinking I might get looked at anyway because I’m probably going to lose my health insurance at the end of this year so I might as well spend as much time with Dr. Cohen as I can before I have to bid her adieu. Plus, who knows? She might be excited to hear about my anal leakage!
This morning, we woke up before 7 and came down to the lobby to have a little coffee and tea. And guess what? Even after yesterday’s misadventure, I woke up still loving the horrendous creature who broke my car yesterday. She’s sitting beside me now, sipping her beverage and eating yogurt. Yesterday I would have liked nothing more than to shove that stupid yogurt into her dumb face. This morning, though, I just want to enjoy my time with her and make sure she’s happy. And that’s how I know I will stay married. Just probably not to her.
(Kidding.)
Oh yeah, I also lost my sunglasses yesterday.
Tesla → Anal leakage = Elon Musk.
That much is clear. Case closed.
Now to continue, we'd like to call Martha to the stand.
This was so great. I laughed out loud multiple times. Did you consider just throwing out the underwear though? I think that’s what I would have done.