No Salt For You: A Circular Dinnertime Conversation Between The Married People

/ Ally Bean

You know how in the movies married couples have these amazing heart-to-heart conversations over a home-cooked meal? We’re not like that.

Our conversations are more like a Looney Tunes cartoon.

~ ~ • ~ ~

Me, putting a plate of hot food in front of him: Don’t want any salt on your dinner.

Him: Ok.

Me, sitting down to eat: How does it taste?

Him: Tastes good. It doesn’t need salt.

Me: Good. Then you don’t want any salt on it.

Him, giving me an odd look: Yes, I don’t want any salt on my dinner.

Me: Excellent.

Him, still staring at me: Yep, quite tasty as it is.

Me: Uh huh.

Him: ARE YOU EVER GOING TO TELL ME WHY I CAN’T HAVE ANY SALT ON MY DINNER?

Me: Oh, sorry, you don’t know. We’re out of salt so don’t want any salt on your dinner.

Him: You’ve said that.

Me, distracted by the merry-go-round of thoughts in my brain: What?

Him: I don’t want any salt on my dinner.

Me: Well, good. That’s what I told you to do.

Him, giving me a sidelong glance: Yep, you did. Happy to cooperate. Wouldn’t want any salt on my dinner… oh. no. I. wouldn’t.

Me, half listening: Uh huh… what? Ok.

~ ~ • ~ ~

Could it be that The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down is the Looney Tunes Theme? Why by golly, it is.

~ ~ • ~ ~

That’s all Folks!

90 thoughts on “No Salt For You: A Circular Dinnertime Conversation Between The Married People”

    • Zen-Den, yes, you’ve mellowed over the years. Much less snarl, much more zen. And I’m happy that someone is happy that I’m cooking because cooking makes me happy.

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  4. That may very well be the One Thing we’ve never run out of here at the Dept. I buy the huge boxes of Kosher Salt.

    We’ve had, sadly, lots of conversations like that around here, mainly because Rick is deaf in one ear and before I got on a B12 regimen, I couldn’t remember/concentrate on a single thing to save my soul. It was like a shuddery preview of Life In Thirty Years.

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    • nance, I’m surprised that we ran out of salt, but somehow it happened. We have a few salt-free seasonings in the cupboard so it wasn’t like I’d made a bland tasteless dinner.

      I hadn’t thought of this conversation in the context of where we’ll be 30 years from now but you make a good case for what’s going to be happening. At least you’re better now, so you can converse [somewhat] normally.

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  6. Sounds like a typical conversation in our house with two people, one of which refuses to admit that he can’t hear so well so he makes up what he doesn’t quite hear. I, on the other hand, lose interest fast so sometimes by the time he ends the sentence I’m in lalaland.

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    • Kate, I can see how your dinnertime conversations might be a bit strained… under the circumstances. Hearing loss has yet to affect us, but I imagine it’s coming our way. I drift off into my own mind if I’m obsessing on something, so I occasionally miss whatever the heck Z-D is talking about. ‘Ya know?

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    • marian, no we’re not prone to salty language. We understand each other and are by nature [nurture?] polite people. It’s just that one of us tends to get lost in her thoughts. Oh well.

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  10. too funny. guess someone needs to go out and buy some salt so that you no long need to convince your husband that he doesn’t want or need salt before he even tries the food (:

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    • teacherturnedmommy, you said it! Salt is on the list, and thanks to salt-free seasonings that we had on hand, dinner tasted good without it. Still, my preemptory move of telling Z-D to not want salt was, I believe, brilliant.

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  11. While I confess I’m not superstitious, you’ve adroitly avoided the entire problem of what to do when you’ve spilled salt (throw a pinch over your left shoulder with your right hand, thus averting any additional bad luck). No salt, no spill equals no need for luck reverses. Nice work!

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    • Deborah, YOU’RE RIGHT! A brilliant observation on your part. I hadn’t thought of that, but now that I have I’m wondering if we even need more salt in this house. Can’t be too careful when it comes to superstition-generated luck. 😊

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  13. Ha, this sounds familiar. My high school son laments our conversations now that he’s stuck with us alone while older son is at college. So I tell him, if he doesn’t like the conversation, then tell us something about his day or what happened at school. To this I get a “nothing.” So it’s back to the Seinfeld-like conversations with my husband.

    Actually, we used to enjoy discussing politics over dinner, but now we’re all so fed up with it, son included, we don’t have the energy to rehash it.

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  14. Married people sit down and eat dinner together? No salt would be an issue in our house because although I never salt anything, hubs is a definite salter. He had stomach issues for the first 20 years of our married life and so our dinners are not of the norm. That doesn’t mean we don’t have conversations like that, just not over dinner 🙂

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    • Janet, I imagine that circular conversations are pretty normal, no matter where they take place. We try to eat dinner together, but often it’s me who has already eaten an hour ago, cleaning up the kitchen while Z-D eats his dinner sort of by himself. It works for us.

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  16. We wouldn’t have had that conversation in our house, because John avoids salt all the time. We do have your kind of interaction, though. I always seem to be scrambling to unravel who he is talking about. He’ll begin a sentence with someone’s first name, and he will finish that sentence while I’m still trying to find out WHICH Chris he is talking about. We know about five people who are named Chris, Dennis, Bob, or Larry. Your conversation made me feel right at home.

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    • Anne, YES, yes, yes. Me too. Same thing happens to me with Zen-Den. He starts talking about someone assuming I know which Mike it is, but I don’t know which one and become confused by what he’s saying about Mike because it makes no sense to me. I’m pleased to know that I’m not alone with this multiple same name people problem.

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  17. I was also wondering about the necessity of having salt in case it got got spilled … necessity is the mother of invention? Sometimes people put salt on their food without even tasting it first!!!!!!! The cooker’s worst thing!!!!!! Best to put no salt on the table, and rather pepper the conversation with the missing salt as you clearly do …

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    • Susan, I don’t use much salt in cooking because I don’t like it very much. And Zen-Den goes along with what I cook. But I know that sometimes my yummy bland food makes him reach for the salt. I like your idea of peppering the conversation to distract from the lack of salt. Clever word play, my dear!

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  22. This one made me smile. Every couple has their own code, so to speak. When my wife and I have a conversation like that (i.e. slowly going no where), one of us will eventually say, “It’s okay.” It’s okay is short-hand for “let’s move on….” 🙂 – Marty

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    • Marty, thanks. This conversation was typical in that, like you said, it went nowhere. But I did make it clear that we had no salt, so from my point of view I was effective. And that may be all that matters when it comes to marital communication. I get your “It’s okay” secret code. It rings true here, too.

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    • Janis, I get your point. Fortunately Z-D knows my weird communication patterns and understood what I was getting at. Sure, there might have been a better way to tell him we were out of salt, but I was tired.

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  24. My husband generally brings up topics like “did you know that people who like to salt their food are ten times more likely to go to bed in the nude.” Or something equally obtuse. I generally reply with “That’s nice dear.”

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  26. This could easily go the other way! More often than not, I get a “hmm, could use more sauce” or “too much cilantro” or “I think it’s overcooked.” And all I can think of is how does any of that translate to “Gee Mom, thanks for taking the time out of your work schedule to make us dinner AND do all of our dishes!”

    And if I ran out of salt in my house, there would be HE-double hockey sticks to pay! 🙂

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    • Kate, you make a good point about dinnertime conversations. I’m sorry that you’re not appreciated at home by your salt-loving [salty?] family.

      I believe that your cooking is great and it is wonderful that you do the dishes without complaint. What a good mom you are! [This encouraging message brought to you by women everywhere who get what you’re saying.]

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    • Emily, I hear ‘ya. I’d like to think that Z-D and I have life-altering emotionally-uplifting conversations worthy of a movie script, but I know otherwise. We’re old. We’re tired. We’re just happy to be together when we eat.

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    • Sue, you make a good point. We don’t use much salt to begin with, but using less of it can be a good thing. THAT’S WHY WE’RE OUT OF SALT. I was intentionally making us more healthy! 😉

      [Thanks for letting me know my comment turned up unharmed. I didn’t know if the system had eaten it or it had gone to moderation. I try to be a responsible blogger, honestly I do!]

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  32. I wanted to say what Nancy said. Except I didn’t think of it first. And she’s so clever. But I did laugh out loud at your post. A perfect example of two loving/loved people who know each other so well, they can talk in riddles and still love each other. 🙂

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