After a few minutes I stopped her with these words:
Penny and Ian grew up on the same street.
Their parents were great friends.
They went to school together.
He was the quarterback and she led the cheer team.
They were inseparable.
They were in love.
After school, they got married and a year later, they had twin boys.
That was 20 years ago.
Now the boys are both away at school. And with the boys gone the house seemed very empty.
Penny and Ian didn’t know how to fill the void much less connect anymore.
And they were headed to court.
Penny stopped talking and gave me a hard stare that seemed to last for an age. Then she said this:
“It’s always the same. Whatever I’m doing when he walks into the room, he comes up behind me, puts his arms round me and all he wants is sex!”
Ian’s jaw hit the floor…
“You’ve got it all wrong Penny! All I was doing was giving you a hug. It’s my way of telling you I love you. Why didn’t you tell me how you felt?”
See, Penny and Ian were not communicating effectively.
It’s like they were speaking different languages to each other…
Russian and Chinese.
Certainly not plain English.
It didn’t take long to fix their problem.
The divorce got cancelled and a decade later they could not be happier.
Now they’re proud grandparents!
For many of us, Lockdown was responsible for a major breakdown in communication.