Is Husband’s Surprise A Good Thing?
To be surprised? Or not surprised?
That is the marital question I need your help with this week, Dear Reader.
I’ve shared in previous columns my husband’s rather quirky, geeky hobby.
Crazy, mad genius obsession, might be a better description.
Husband collects frequent flyer miles without flying.
Millions of them.
It’s all the way we spend our money: mortgage, power bill, grocery store, clothes.
No dollar goes out the door without generating miles. Make that multiples of miles.
We live by spread sheets, blogs, Twitter feeds, all tipping him off to the latest deal to multiply the miles.
Before you ask for more details, let me say, our home is “Crazyland.”
“Never heard back from your friend, Judy,” Husband mentioned after he sent her his introductory single-spaced mad-scientist miles explainer.
“Remember the movie, ‘Jerry Maguire,’” I told him. “’You had me at Hello?’”
“Sure.”
“You lost her at ‘expect to spend 8-10 hours a week pursing this hobby.”
He still doesn’t get how funny that line is to normal folks.
His craziness does mean we usually take at least two big trips a year.
For this year’s Grown ups only trip, Husband is whisking me off to the Maldives.
Yeah, I had to look it up on a map, too.
Basically, it’s one of those magical huts over clear blue water kind of places on the other side of the world.
We’re flying some super luxurious airline over there. I think we get our room or something crazy like that.
The tickets to get there would coast $45,000.
I kid you not.
Husband paid $7 a piece.
Again.
Not kidding.
Seven bucks.
Yep, life with Crazy Husband has its perks.
The challenge is the way back.
We are stopping somewhere on the way home.
Allegedly as fantastic as the Maldives.
Husband doesn’t want to tell me where.
“This will be so romantic,” he insists. “A surprise.”
He laughs when he says this because he also knows it tests my desire, to well, control things.
Gasp!
Husband being great husband doesn’t want to be too tortuous, so this week he made an offer.
“I’ll tell you where we’re going,” he said. “If it will help you relax and have a better time.”
So there it is—offer on the table.
My question to you, Dear Reader, should I find out now? Blow the surprise, but ease my international travel butterflies?
Or do I go with the flow and pretend this is, what’s the word he used, oh that’s right. “Fun.”
Our girls will be with my sister and her wife. They will be so well taken care of and spoiled at “Aunt Camp” that their only worry will be that our trip doesn’t last longer.
And all the aunts, adults outside of me will have an exact itinerary of where we are headed.
To know or not to know?
That is my challenge and question to you this week.
Do you like being surprised by your spouse?
Please weigh in and help me decide.
Find more uplifting stories on my website, DarynKagan.com
For Husband’s tips on how you can get into the crazy miles capturing game, click here.
Please catch my newspaper column each week in the Atlanta Journal Constitution,the Dayton Daily News and other newspapers across Ohio.
2:18 pm
Let him surprise you ! That is part of the fun for him. Enjoy
5:49 pm
Nope! Don’t dig any further. Trust that he knows what he’s doing and will take good care of you. The Maldives are on my bucket list… He’s doing a great job, so far!
11:09 pm
Hi, Your husband might be interested in reaping United miles in exchange for a charitable donation (see below). Another suggestion, respectfully made, is that your husband perhaps has Asperger’s Syndrome & maybe you want to scale back on the Crazyland comments. Or perhaps he takes the ribbing in stride & doesn’t get his feelings bruised.
As for surprises, I prefer being in on the planning. My husband once surprised me with a puppy. Either Dalmatians are hard to train, or maybe it had something to do with it being our FIFTH dog and my having just given birth to our first child. In any case, I never succeeded in training that dog & 18 months later, when we moved from FL to CA, I sold the dog to a Dalmatian-lover.
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■ Receive 250 miles when you donate $50-$99 USD
■ Receive 500 miles when you donate $100-$249 USD
■ Receive 1,000 miles when you donate $250 USD or more
We have committed to awarding up to 5 million miles to members for contributions made before May 15, 2015, to support this initiative. In addition, United® will provide up to $50,000 total in matching donations to these partner organizations.
3:21 pm
If I could have 1 more hour of my late husband’s life any way he wanted to spend it would be fine with me. Count your blessings.