Marital age gaps are not for the faint-hearted and, to be clear, I don’t believe that anything less than a decade constitutes a real age gap.
Indeed, as my husband, who is 11 years my senior, never tires of reminding me, the French age rule for marital bliss is half the groom’s plus seven years. So, I should “consider myself lucky”.
Pretty much all the younger wives I know do consider themselves lucky but, when it comes to older husbands, the casual clangers are notable.
Here are eight things never to say to your younger wife:
“I remember on my first honeymoon/stag night/wedding night”
Obviously the last option would warrant an instant phone call to your divorce lawyer of choice, but the first two aren’t much better and you’d be amazed how often they slip out.
You’ll take a left turn down a tiny London sidestreet and suddenly there it is: “I think this is where I got down on my knee to my first wife….”
You’ll be enjoying a drive through the shires only to have it marred by: “Oh my God! That’s the hotel I stayed in the night before my second wedding!”
Listen: we, the second, third or even fourth wives club, understand that you were sold to us as “pre-loved” from the start. We actively like the “lived in” aspect; the frayed edges and the tarnish. All that adds gravitas – but being reduced to a number in a back catalogue? One of a list you could only locate from the alphabetised index? Not appealing.
After all, when you were reading Cinderella as a little girl and having highly unrealistic and potentially unhealthy white male saviour fantasies about your “one and only”, Prince Charming never said: “I thought maybe this glass slipper had belonged to a previous wife or girlfriend of mine. I have to tell you, this one girl’s feet …”
“How do I make this WhatsUp thing work?”
For the last time, grandpa, it’s WhatsApp. Also Facebook doesn’t need a definite article, you do not need to speak into the phone at a decibel level that’s audible on the Asteroid Belt and, no, I will not call you an Uber, simply because you don’t know how to work the app and are convinced putting your bank details “online” will allow Russian identity thieves to empty your account.
“You know you’ll only regret it in the morning”
Those of us who married museum artefacts will know that statements like this are common, and part of a larger issue known as Victorian Dad Syndrome (VDS). There’s a reason you didn’t marry your great-grandfather. Several, in fact.
And up there with ill-advised blood relations is the censoriousness.
You may have lived to regret that third 100 proof martini, that late night, that moment of silliness or impetuousness, but we’re still busily amassing our regrets.
Once we’ve got a great big stash of them we hope to lay them out on the mantlepiece and regularly hold one up to be admired, just as you lot do when you reminisce fondly about what a “terrible” idea hiring that moped in Malta was.
Isn’t it always better to regret something you’ve done rather than something you haven’t?
“You’re not wearing that, are you?”
Another classic sign that your vintage appendage is suffering from VDS. According to a recent poll (conducted by me on WhatsApp yesterday) 50 per cent of old, older or downright elderly husbands will frequently imply that an outfit is too provocative (pronounced “youthful”).
The other half actively like you to dress as inappropriately as possible. I’m grateful that my husband is in the second camp (a common reaction to “is this too short?” is a thumbs up and a vehement “absolutely!”), because the “do cover up” brigade tend to come out with equally cringeworthy Victorian Dad-isms, like the following.
“It’s not done”
We may be a little younger than you but we are not savages. We understand social mores and don’t need to be told that we can’t rock up once the dinner has started or leave before dessert.
Also, please don’t remind us again about that “thank you” note.
“The 80′s/90′s/Noughties weren’t a patch on the Iron Age”
Don’t diss our era, Tollund Man. We happen to be rather fond of it. So, when you brand all the music we grew up with as “derivative” and sneer at the fashion and television programmes, it offends us.
You don’t catch us making fun of animal hide thongs. Oh, wait…
“In our day…”
If there’s one thing worse than having your generation dismissed, it’s being lumped into theirs. To be clear: we are not from the same generation.
We do not remember where we were when the Duke of Normandy landed at Pevensey or how “exciting” it was when you had to cut the pages of a new hardback.
One of the reasons we married you was so that we could always feel, as Tina Brown once said, like the “hot young thing”.
Which is easy when you find yourself at dinner parties that might as well be branded with the National Trust insignia. Please don’t take that daily source of enjoyment away from us.
“I just wish I had a younger wife”
We’ll admit it: making youth our Unique Selling Point is a fool’s game. Because whether it’s that first “ma’am” or the realisation that something curious is happening to our neck, at some point there’s going to be a reality check.
We, too, are getting older and, trust me, after putting up with our Fred Flintstone jokes for decades, they are going to relish every single second.
