Ignorance Must Be Relative

Sam and Betty Ann have been married about five years now. That’s about four and a half years longer than most people expected. You would have to know these two to understand. I think Sam and Betty Ann love each other. We all do, but they fight like cats and dogs. They always have, from the moment Sam passed her a note in third grade that read, “Do you wanna be my girlfriend or not?”

Fight and make-up has been the story of their lives. They were childhood sweethearts, lasted all through high school and college. I know Betty Ann’s mother, Aimee. Aimee said she used to worry about them but no more. “I turn a deaf ear to it, now,” she told me on the phone today. “They wake up in a new world every day. Yesterday Betty Ann was telling me they hadn’t fought in forever; that they were really beginning to understand each other. I tried not to laugh. If I had a dime for every time I’d heard that…” Aimee
trailed off.

“But maybe they’ve turned the corner,” I said.

Aimee laughed. “Well, they turned it again. This morning, Betty Ann came by on her way to work. She was furious, all wired up. She said she went to bed without speaking to Sam. I never did get exactly what happened. All she kept saying was that Sam was ignorant. Ignorant, ignorant, ignorant, she said. She said if she had him tested for ignorance he’d come in second.”

“Ouch,” I said. “She does sound mad, but I’m confused. Did you ask her why, if Sam was so ignorant, why he would come in second?”

“Yes, I did,” Aimee said with a sigh. “She said he’d come in second because he was too ignorant to come in first.”

~Shellie