The
“No-Nookie” Clause
I guess my friends know I like to listen, even
though I hate to give advice, so they come to me or call my phone, just so I
can listen to their problems. The reason I don’t give advice is that I was
raised a bit differently from many of them. My friends, especially the women,
but I have found the men, too, were taught some relationship rules that I didn’t
get. Like…I learned, in college, that many of the young women were there to
find a suitable husband, so, their education was secondary. I went to college
to get my degree, and to learn how to make it on my own, after I left mama’s
house. That husband thing went right over my head. That’s another whole story. Sometimes
I still feel dumb about the things I don’t know, but I don’t mind. Sometimes it
trips me out!
A few years ago (quite a few now) when I was
teaching in the county, a few of my colleagues and I were sitting around, just
talking. There were all women in this group, and they were talking about the
things they expected their husbands to do. One said, “My husband cooks every
day, and he knows he’d better have my dinner on the table soon after I get
home.” I knew her husband worked the night shift, so I thought it was really
good of him to make sure she had a hot meal ready when she got home. Ronnie was
working noon to nine, so he wasn’t even at home when I picked the kids up and
got home. I’d feed the kids leftovers from Ronnie’s lunch, play with them and,
later, check homework, and make sure they took their baths. By the time he got
home, he only had time to play with them a little while, and then it was time
for them to go to bed. During that time, I was cooking the meal that would be Ronnie’s
lunch the next day, the full course meal that he ate just before he left for
work. He never ate heavily at night, which was why he stayed so slim, but he
could put away some food during the day. Many times, the kids would be almost
asleep by the time he got home, but that was okay. It just gave him more “mommy
time!”
The next woman said, “My husband cleans the house.
After I spend all evening dealing with the kids, I’m not even trying to clean
anything. He knows it had better be clean.” I thought about how hard it was to
keep the house clean, and how sometimes I just gave up and settled for “straightened
up” because I never really got to “clean”. Besides, teaching had made me a “pack
rat”. I collected school supplies and all kinds of things to use in my
classroom, and I hated to throw anything away that I might be able to use with
my students later. I tried to picture Ronnie trying to clean all that mess up,
but really couldn’t go beyond just getting him to put his clothes in the hamper
to be washed. The only thing that amounted to cleaning that Ronnie did was
clean out the refrigerator at the end of each week, eating all the leftovers
and washing all the dishes from that cleaning. Ronnie often left work to go to
work, driving a wrecker truck on-call overnight. I never expected him to clean.
The third woman talked about her husband’s love of
clothes and how he meticulously did the family laundry. She said that her
husband didn’t like the way she ironed, said that he did it better and faster,
and told her that she could fold the clothes if she wanted to, but most of the
time he didn’t let her do that either. She told him that he’d better do the
laundry if it had to be perfect. She didn’t feel like it was making an unusual demand
on him, even though he worked a full time job, just like she did. I sort of
chuckled at the thought of having Ronnie do laundry. He did collect his
uniforms, tie them in a ball, and take them to work to get them laundered. I
had to hang any clothes that were not his work clothes, in the order he needed
to wear them, to make sure they weren’t mix-matched. It was sort of a “garanimals”
arrangement for grown-ups. I shuddered to think of the mixture of fabrics and
colors the laundry would contain with Ronnie doing it.
The thing that interested me about these
declarations was that, if those husbands didn’t do what they were expected to
do, these wives would withhold sex. No work, no nookie. I was appalled. When
did they add a “no nookie” clause to the marriage agreement? I surely didn’t
know about that. In fact, I thought that was the real purpose of marriage, to
be able to have sinless, legal nookie as often as you liked. At least, that was
my reason for getting married. I loved Ronnie and wanted to spend be with him,
but marriage wasn’t really a necessary thing, except that we both wanted to be
legal… to get legal nookie. They looked at me like I was from outer space when
I told them that “no nookie” would be a deal breaker for me. I told them that I
got married for the free, sinless, unrestricted nookie. I asked them why they
thought I put the children to bed so early, and made sure they were good and
sleepy… so Ronnie and I could have some adult recreation time. Ronnie never
objected, and neither did I. Now, it appears that a “nookie” clause must be
added, and if it’s not, the couple agrees that there doesn’t have to be any
nookie involved. Sometimes, I think the men don’t know it until after the
marriage, but that is also another story.
As I have gotten older, and have talked to married
people, I see that there must be an unwritten “no nookie” clause in the
marriage agreement. So many people my age and older, some who are working on
second and third marriages, have amended the marriage agreement to almost
totally cut out the nookie. Well, I guess that works for them, but I’m not
buying into it. As I have contemplated re-marriage, I know that the “no nookie”
clause will not be a part of my marriage contract. In fact, my last
relationship was long distance, and it mostly worked, but two trips, months
apart, that yielded no nookie, because he had gained weight and wasn’t
interested in sex, made me reconsider our proposed marriage. His last trip to
see me yielded no nookie either… so it was the end for me. Little did I know he
was already seeing someone else, whom he eventually married, but I know that,
other than some good phone sex, she ain’t getting the nookie either. Too bad
for her… but glad it isn’t me.
When I talked to my “brother”
(from another mother) and sister-in-law, I asked them to share the secret of
their thirty-two (as of today) year, “happily having fun with each other”
marriage. They both said that they like each other, they get a kick out of
hanging out together, they always have something to talk about, but most of all…
the nookie is still great. I rest my case.
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