Marital Bliss

Sophie and I have been married 26 years. I'm sure the church we were married in would largely attribute that longevity to our having attended, lo those many years ago, their mandatory marriage prep classes.

These classes taught us things like household finances, sharing the housework and all sorts of other subjects my beloved and I still fight about to this day. Really, they just needed to teach me to say "yes, dear" and I'd have been all prepped and ready to go.

Having been on the road camping now for about ten weeks I have come across another topic that all couples contemplating wedlock should be prepped on. That would be how to communicate effectively while backing a camper or RV into a camp site.

Now if two guys were doing this there'd be some muttered cursing but basically it'd be bada bing, bada boom and done. Asking a man and a woman, especially if they are married to one another, to do this and you introduce a whole other level of drama.

The trick of course in effective communication and presumes both are speaking the same language. And since this feat requires both spoken communication along with hand gestures, well, all bets are off. There's not a whole lot of entertainment at most campgrounds so sitting in your camp chair sipping your favorite beverage and watching all the other couples go through what you and your spouse went through a little while ago does lighten up the evening.

So for what it's worth, here's some of what I've learned the hard way and through trial and error (mostly error...).

Here you have the standard hand signal for "go left". However, I've discovered it can also mean "oh, what a pretty view over there" or "oh, look at the really pretty flowers" (which they indeed were).

So too the opposite. As I look at my beloved in the mirror I think she's telling me to go right but no, she's telling me "grab the camera! There's a (bear, Moose, Caribou, elk, rabbit, pretty butterfly) right there!"

You'd think the universal symbol for stop would be pretty straightforward. Not so. I see this in the rear view mirror only after I've already collided with whatever was behind me (tree, rock, park ranger, you name it). By this time the camper is pretty close to being jack-knifed or one wheel is hanging off the edge of something steep or deep. I'm not happy, Sophie is not happy, ain't nobody happy which is about the time communication starts to improve.

Finally! Something I can clearly understand! Ah, Marital bliss at last! Now when Google finally perfects the self-driving car let's see it back up a camper into a campsite. Until then guys, and gals, make sure in those prenuptial classes they teach you what's really important.

"Yes, dear!"