Louis Roney: My 'wacko' wife

As one might expect, such a splendid column as “Play On!” has been a lodestone for considerable praise through the years. And so it is that after more than a couple of decades, a piece of iconoclastic mail arrived at our home — a bizarre occurrence in that the letter lacked the customary identification of the sender as being of high station or public office, great fame, education, or impressive wealth.

The envelope, with no return address, was written in distressingly puerile handwriting. The note itself, scratched out on plain paper, consisted of but one sentence. That sentence did its intended communicative job with no evidence of style or flair. It stated, in short, that my b.w. must be “wacko” to live with me (period).

A “wacko” — plain and simple. Nothing more. There was no signature.

Because of the extraordinary early education that marked me for brilliant success in life, I have a lean and comfortable tolerance for criticism. And it is in this light that I find myself in perfect equanimity, in agreeing wholeheartedly with the anonymous correspondent. Whoever he or she may be, my answer is, “You are right! Absolutely right!”

However, naming an enigma does not necessarily solve it.

How many times before my b.w. and I married 35 years ago did I warn the poor girl, “You are quite mad to think of becoming my b.w. and trying to make a life with me.”

In less than a minute I was able to reveal to her in their entirety my several trifling character and personality flaws. These minute peccadilloes year after year go unnoticed by all but the most perspicacious ill-willed observers. My (future) b.w. would not listen to my self-criticism! And so it was that my conscience was clear when, in 1980, we rode in a taxi down to City Hall in Manhattan and got hitched.

My unknown letter-writer will kindly note herewith that, in the intervening 35 years, I have confessed my unworthiness to b.w. a thousand times — but to no avail. She only nods and smiles at me, as though we two are sharing some arcane super sensibility of which the outside world is sublimely ignorant. In observing my unfortunate mate, I have been forced to admit to myself that she appears to be happy. She cannot, of course, be happy. Her self-hypnotic neurosis is lamentable.

For she virtually fools herself into thinking that she is happy.

That frame of mind can assume the identity of true happiness — and therein lies the insidious danger of self deception. Years can go by in which a deeply troubled psyche stubbornly manifests itself in the gaudy guise of felicity.

I once even suggested to my b.w. that she might be inveigling herself to believe that she was enjoying her marriage. She answered with words to this effect, “Whassamatta, Pops, you nuts or somethin’?”

And so, dear anonymous letter writer, you and I agree completely that my b.w. must be out of her gourd to keep picking up my option. Believe me, I would try to change myself in any way that suited her, but she will not hear of it!

I hear her in the shower every morning as she sings a snatch of melody from the evergreen ballad, “Stay sweet as you are....” “I was singing to you, did you hear?” she asks, while placing before me the vitamin-and-fiber-rich breakfast she has prepared prior to waking me.

It may be, my anonymous correspondent, that my b.w. will someday suddenly “see me as I really am.” If so, the jig may be up! Until then, do continue sending your unsigned letters so that I do not forget for a moment that I am living in a fool’s paradise.

(Parenthetically, my b.w. has three university degrees; therefore it is plainly evident that others have been injudicious and misguided in evaluating her cerebral capabilities.) The great tragedy in believing blindly that one is happy is that the “happy one” accepts the status quo as propitious, even though the most obtuse of observers can see at a glance that the subject is suffering the tortures of the damned. That knowledge is the cross that I must bear throughout my life in sorrowful silence.

In case the anonymous writer, who is, after all, the instigator of this discussion, be a male, he may be thinking of procuring for himself a darling “wacko” b.w. such as mine.

If so, I have only one reliable, though well-nigh hopeless, caveat. Namely, he must skillfully emulate my person in every possible way, as daunting as that task may seem. Pure logic dictates that singular approach.

I often say to people that my b.w, has made “only one big mistake in her life.” You will easily detect the touchingly wistful inherent logic contained in those honest words — my own mea culpa. B.w.’s comment, as if by rote, is, “It’s the best mistake I ever made!” So you can see, alas, the pitiless toll that the disease has taken on her thinking.

In closing, let me say to all my many admirers: “We live in a crazy world. We have the choice of laughing or crying. I’d rather laugh. It undeniably helps me to have a beautiful wife who enjoys laughter. Some people may call my b.w.’s laughing a lot, ‘wacko. I call it, ‘Her wisdom in making the best of a tough situation.’”