Tales from a bad husband

By Staff
Scot Beard
Habits that never showed their ugly head during dating have began to emerge during my marriage, which is getting close to five years in length.
I am talking, of course, of the habits I kept hidden away in fear of scaring off my wife, Erin.
Anybody who has known me for any length of time – longer than my wife has known me – knows I love to aggravate and pick on the people I like the most, so you can imagine what Erin goes through on any given day.
It has gotten worse lately as we are preparing for our vacation.
I like to travel, and so does my wife. Since we met, I have taken her places she had never been before, including New York City and Massachusetts.
She liked the Massachusetts trip more for one very simple reason – we drove.
My wife hates to fly. I love to fly.
We are heading to California for vacation, and, you guessed right, we are flying. She is extra nervous about this trip because she is worried a big earthquake will happen while we are in California.
The first time I flew I was 14-years-old. I have had the opportunity to fly numerous times since then, so it doesn't bother me. Actually, I would love to get my pilot's license, but I won't because I know it will worry Erin and I wouldn't put her through that stress.
That doesn't mean I won't put her through a little bit of flight stress.
The first, and to this date, only time I took her on a flight was the trip to New York.
She was nervous, and I didn't help the situation any when I showed her the wings of the airplane gently bouncing up and down as we taxied to the runway.
I told her the plane stayed in the air because it was flapping its wings. She did not find the humor in the joke, but I had a good chuckle.
We were talking a few days ago and she seemed to be handling the idea of flying better than she did a few years ago.
Then I made the mistake of opening my mouth.
When I told her the plane flew about 500 miles per hour, she freaked out and said we were going to crash into a mountain.
I laughed and reminded her we had a layover in Denver, so we would definitely be in the mountains.
She groaned in agony and I tried to comfort her by telling her, "Look on the bright side, if we do crash, we will beat the paramedics to the site of the disaster by a good half hour."
Again, for some unexplained reason, she failed to find the humor in my joke.
That was a few weeks ago, and now she seems to have forgotten the comments because she does not seem as stressed.
I am happy to see she is getting over her fear of flying even though I am making it difficult for her.
I told her the other day, "I love you."
"You love to aggravate me," she replied.
I told her we were both right.
Then I found a show about earthquakes on the Discovery Channel.