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Promising to make spouse spoon happy

Once or twice a year I threaten Better Half or promise him or reaffirm a vow, whatever the appropriate verb is I’m not sure.

I tell him I’m going to start making him happy.

He just smiles a fake smile and always shoots me a look of disbelief when I announce this.

The old “yeah, right” response.

Mind you, my credibility isn’t really great in this respect, because I’ve mentioned this to him on an ongoing basis for a few decades now, usually as a distraction when I realize I’m probably getting on his nerves.

“I’m going to start making you happy, sweetums — any day, month or year now, honest,” I caution.

I am, after all, a woman of faith and hope or maybe just a little bit obtuse. (As I write that, I am reminded of my mother, picturing her drawing a square in the air when she would mention from time to time that people who just didn’t get it despite repeated explanations and urgings and ample allotted time for processing were indeed “obtuse.”)

Anyway, I made this promise anew the other day when Better Half was watching me fix a cup of coffee.

Now, I’m the kind of coffee drinker who likes coffee with cream. Not milk or liquid creamer because it takes away from the heat of the coffee.

We use the powder Cremora in the Kiaski household, and my practice is to put in a couple of heaping teaspoons to make my coffee the perfect color for the perfect taste.

We always have a spoon in the big-sized Cremora container we have strategically located next to the coffee pot, and I use that spoon to scoop the powder into my coffee cup and then I …. yes, I confess.

I use that very same spoon to stir the coffee, too, and then, if you can bear to keep reading this horrible, awful admission, I return that very same coffee-contaminated spoon to the Cremora container.

I feel liberated in the revelation of this, I have to admit.

It’s the rebel in me, I suppose.

Or, honestly, I think it’s just a reflex to use one scoop-and-stir spoon, despite Better Half’s failed attempts to retrain me — he puts an extra spoon next to the Cremora container for my stirring convenience since he’s the one who always has the coffee ready to perk, wonderful man that he is.

I was chatting away to Better Half as I went through this process all over again and then realized, oops, I’d done it again.

I could have been the inspiration for that Britney Spears song.

He was shaking his head.

I am the lost mouse in the maze, unable to find the chunk of cheese.

I don’t think I’m totally without hope, though.

I’m starting to think I might switch to black coffee.

(Kiaski, a resident of Richmond, is a staff columnist and community editor for the Herald-Star and The Weirton Daily Times. She can be contacted at jkiaski@heraldstaronline.com.)

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