bad boy

We all spend a great deal of time and effort teaching our children how to behave.  But what happens when it’s your husband who needs a lesson?  A close friend of mine recently relayed the following experience to me:

Last month, a group of husbands and wives who were all friends arranged for respective boys and girls nights out.  The boys husbands were the first to set their plans, an overnight gambling trip to Atlantic City for which the wives happily agreed to stay home in exchange for a future night away.  At some point, the wives decided that on the night the boys husbands were away, they would hire sitters for a few hours and enjoy dinner together at a local restaurant.  They made a reservation for 7 people which was a good idea because the restaurant was small and often crowded. The husbands were all aware of the dinner.  Every one was happy.

Until that evening.

Upon arriving at the restaurant, the wives were informed that someone had called and cancelled their reservation.  The hostess remarked that the man who did this was very obnoxious, and was calling from a noisy place, like a bar.  In Atlantic City.

One of the boys husbands had cancelled the wives’ reservation, presumably as a joke. Except that it’s… uh, not funny.  It’s mean.

The wives then had a choice of abandoning their dinner or squeezing around a very small table, their evening ruined either way.

The specter of this prank lingers as the guilty party has not come clean.  The boys husbands refuse to rat him out.  And the wife of the husband (if she even knows) is surely too mortified to admit she is married to such a schmuck.  Everyone has their suspicions, which poisons the group even more. (For the record, my friend’s husband is not suspected, as he has an air tight alibi.)

If I need to lighten up MoB readers, please tell me.  But I’m not sure I could re-engage with this group with a clean heart.  My friend is much more forgiving and understandably more invested in the relationships that have been built.  But let’s say this transgression was carried out by a child instead of an adult.  If my son ever did something like this, there would (as we like to say around my house) be serious consequences.  Should grown men get a break because they know better?   I think not.  What would our new President think about this joke?

What do you think?

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