STAPLES

A while back we were in Ames with a bit of time to spare. We drove around campus and then by the first place we called home. It was a basement apartment. As we recall it was clean, cheap and four or five blocks from campus. It was not lovely but it was serviceable. We were young; we did not have much money; we were together.

About a block away was the area grocery store and laundry. We have an ongoing laugh. When we got to our apartment and were settling in I announced we needed to go get some staples. My new hubby wondered what this was about. Why did we need staples of all things? I wanted to stock my kitchen with the items we needed to start off our domestic life together and he assumed I was thinking of the kind of staples that one put in a stapler. I doubt if we owned a stapler between the two of us. His family had never used the word staples, as in basic grocery items, mine did.

We learned a good lesson that day about communication. It could be argued that it has yet to be fully implemented but the lesson was presented early in our marriage.