Being wrong before you’ve even spoken

The other day, I was wrong. 

And whereas in itself that’s far from unusual, what differentiated this particular incident is that I hadn’t yet said anything in order to be wrong. 

It unfolded around our dinner table, as it often does, when my wife and son were having a robust discussion. As soon as there was a gap, I proffered my opinion. Before I had completed a full sentence, my wife, gesturing towards me like a judge whose verdict was final, said, “Howard. You are wrong.” 

“But I haven’t said anything yet!” I protested. 

“I know what you are going to say,” she replied calmly, “and I’m sorry, but you are wrong.” 

(Reader’s note: she didn’t sound sorry.) 

“And that,” I said to my son, “is what it means to be married.” 

It means apologising to my wife for something I did in her dream. Because although she knows, on a rational level that I was sleeping quite innocently beside her when she conjured up my misdemeanours, she also remains committed to her knowledge that I could well have said or done whatever it was I apparently did. Because it’s what I would say or do, and that, in her view, makes me guilty enough. 

Which makes no sense at all. Yet it’s frustratingly difficult to argue with. 

There’s a logic to long marriages that defies science and reason. It’s a kind of emotional quantum physics, where two things can be true at the same time: I can be both asleep and guilty, silent and wrong. Schrodinger’s husband, as it were. It’s the law of relational relativity, what Einstein might have discovered had he been married longer. 

There’s an additional nuance that comes with being a Jewish husband. We grow up learning that peace in the home – shalom bayit – is sacred. And that sometimes peace is achieved not through being right, but through saying, “Yes, dear.” The rabbis never quite wrote that into the Gemara, but they probably should have. 

In Jewish tradition, we say that the home is built by the eishet chayil (woman of valour). Which leaves the husband, presumably, responsible for taking out the bin, making sure that the Wi-Fi is working, and accepting blame for everything else. 

Over time, one learns that marriage isn’t about being right; it’s about being together. It’s about knowing when to let a discussion go, when to make tea, and when to nod knowingly even though you have no idea what you’re agreeing to. It’s about understanding that “It’s fine” never ever means it’s fine. 

There’s a kind of comfort in that. 

Because if someone can anticipate your thoughts, interpret your silences, and still choose to argue with you over dinner, it means that you are, in some profound way, seen. 

So yes, the other day, I was wrong. But maybe that’s what being married is: an ongoing exercise in humility, humour, and love. And perhaps, after all these years, being wrong before I’ve even spoken isn’t such a terrible thing. 

It just means that someone knows me far too well, and is still willing to have dinner with me anyway. 

In many ways it’s simply the triumph of optimism over experience.