Zack and I made our annual pilgrimage to REI today. We were looking for a jacket he wants. A mythical, doesn’t-actually-exist, every-feature-a-guy-could-ever-want kind of a jacket*.
As you might have guessed, we didn’t find his jacket. What we did find was the women’s cycling section. There were some shorts hanging on a rack that looked shockingly short for cycling shorts. Zack, who thinks I am the hottest human alive, has always been very interested in the idea of me wearing microscopically short spandex bike shorts when we’re out on our rides. In order to lessen the blow of not finding The Dream Jacket, I jokingly tried on some spandex for him. 
The shorts didn’t turn out to be as short as they looked on the hanger. They hit me mid-thigh–about 4″ below the pseudo-porn-star length spandex Zack prefers to imagine me wearing. But they did turn out to be the most stinking comfortable bike shorts I’d tried on in a long time. We did a 25-mile ride this evening, and I don’t have the least bit of saddle soreness. With my old shorts, there were times that I actually got cuts (pressure splits!) in some of my, ahem, regions (!) as a result of pressure/friction from the seat.
So I guess Zack did get something out of today’s trip, after all. It wasn’t the jacket he wanted, or the microscopic shorts he wants me to wear. Instead, he got a wife that’s now willing to go on long road rides because she no longer comes home with pressure-related wounds in her nether-regions. That sounds like a birthday present to me.
*Note: I’m not saying that Zack is super needy. I’m saying, is it too much to ask for a company (Columbia) to make a jacket that has everything that he (and, subsequently, I) want**? All he’s really looking for is a warm, hood-less, waterproof jacket with pit zips, that will zip into his outer shell. This shouldn’t be so hard.
**On the flip side, yesterday’s fruitless adventure did improve our marital communication. Zack finally got to see what it’s like to want a clothing item that doesn’t exist. This happens to me at least once a season. I decide I want a dress that looks just like X. I design it in my mind, then I set out in search of it. And I never find it. Until 3 years later when every dress looks like that. And I’m like DAMMIT. THAT IS THE DRESS I WANTED TO WEAR TO PAPA’S FUNERAL (or, OUR WEDDING or, MY JOB INTERVIEW!) All of those are real-life scenarios. Trick is, Zack’s need still wins over my need. His need is all, DAMMIT, THAT IS THE JACKET I WANTED TO WEAR IN FREEZING TEMPERATURES TO KEEP ME ALIVE. But whatever. Dresses are important, too.
