When Hubby's Best Mate Has to Go

When Hubby's Best Mate Has to Go

• 11.1.09

by SHELL SHERREE

My hubby has finally had a parting of the ways with his best mate. They'd been together for thirty years. And they were a tad too close for my comfort. After all, I've only known my hubby for twelve years. Even a rug rat (ok, a large one) could do the maths and figure it out; his best mate has been part of his life more than twice as long as I have.

Before the psychoanalysts amongst you tut-tut off emails of concern that I'm way too clingy and perhaps a touch paranoid, allow me to elaborate. If they'd just knocked around together in a typical semi-detached bloke way for a thirdish of a lifetime, I'd be cool about it. Peachy keen. Happy for my hubby to have someone with whom to share the highly overdeveloped sports stats sector of his brain (which has been the subject of much debate in government secret agencies because it shows up like Christmas tree lights on satellite pics of our region).

But no, it doesn't stop there.

His best mate has clung to him like doggie doo to a shoe. (And think of a Great Dane named Dumpster, not a Chihuahua named Princess.) His best mate has been there for all of my hubby's youthful Aussie Rules footy club post-match celebrations. These were back in the days when they bore a startling resemblance to 'The Club' plonked into the middle of 'Don's Party' - or so I hear. Fortunately, I wasn't there. Unfortunately, my hubby's best mate was, and serves as a constant reminder of my hubby's former beer capacity at the height of its glory. His best mate is also a walking Wikipedia on my hubby's previous girlfriends and has them and their bra sizes filed away in his memory banks to be drawn on at the most inappropriate times.

Of course, his best mate was at our wedding. But he didn't stay at the reception after we left. Oh, no, no, no. I concede that he refrained from shave-creaming our car with graffiti and raiding the loos to weave clumsy toilet paper macrame decorations, but it was probably just to save himself the embarrassment of motoring up the coast in a cream bun on wheels. That's right - his best mate came along on our honeymoon with us.

In spite of all this discomfort, I had learned to accept his best mate and it wasn't through any urging on my part that my hubby made his decision to cut the ties. After all, they'd been through a lot together and his best mate was unreserved in his affection towards me. No, my hubby had been tossing it around for some time. He thought he may have outgrown his best mate. He felt like a new lease on life. He figured if he really couldn't cope without him after a brief adjustment period, he could get him back.

His best mate has been witness to three decades of my hubby's life. And even though I was happy to have a fresh start, too, I could totally understand how bereft my hubby felt when he shaved off his moustache and washed his thirty year old best mate down the bathroom sink. At first, he felt like he'd rinsed away more than just whiskers. But as the days wear on, he's starting to realise those memories are still with him. They're dancing with his sports stats under the disco-ball in his brain.