Learning to be a Spouse--Flowers for Shabbos

Someone commented on another posting that it is upsetting when bringing flowers to a wife for Shabbos comes from being a "you have to" or a "you must." It isn't a gift when someone tells you to bring it. I understand the point that was being made, but I'm not really in agreement with all of it, hence this post.

There seems to be a mistaken idea that husbands and/or wives are born, not made. You get married and the "spouse" gene, which has lain dormant, jumps to life. Being a good spouse is not innate--it is learned behavior. Nor is there a manual that someone can read that will give you the definitive rules of "spouseliness." What works for one couple may not work for another. It is trial and error until you find what works for you.

This is not to say that we don't ask for advice from others who have already passed the point where we are now at. And yes, sometimes that advice is given without our asking.

Flower giving is not an everyday occurrence. Most boys and girls do not routinely buy their mothers flowers for Shabbos. Sometimes, if they are going to someone else's house for Shabbos, their parents, usually their mother, will tell them to buy flowers or a bottle of wine to take as a hostess gift. They may see their parents bring flowers when invited to someone's home, or for a simcha. Flowers thus get linked in a boy's mind with being a guest somewhere or with simcha occasions.

In addition, when a young man gets to that point in his life where flowers may have some importance, or when he actually starts looking at things that his father does for his mother, he may not be seeing flowers coming home for every Shabbos, even though they once did. I asked some married friends if their husbands still bring home flowers every Shabbos. Without exception they looked at me very strangely. Most agreed that they still might get flowers from their husbands for a birthday or an anniversary, and very occasionally for a yom tov, but for every Shabbos? No more.

Did they miss it? One woman seemed to sum up everyone's opinions this way: "It's not about missing it. It's about not needing it anymore."

Newly married couples, no matter how much they like each other before marriage, are on shaky ground. They go very abruptly from parties and gifts and fun experiences to laundry, dirty dishes and bill payments. There may be self confidence issues. "I got him/her--now can I keep them?" The idea of bringing flowers to a newly married wife for Shabbos was around when I got married. In thinking about it, the reason may have been to show the young married woman that she was still "special," that it is not only new kallahs that are deserving of the "romantic" gesture. Whatever the reason, from what I see the custom does not last. It may make it through the first year of marriage or two, but rarely past that. Any man, married 20 or so years who is still bringing his wife flowers every Shabbos is the exception rather than the rule.

So, is it a "bad" thing if a new husband brings his new wife flowers for every Shabbos because someone told him he has to or should do it? I don't think so. It is one way that husbands are "made." It is establishing the idea that doing nice things for your spouse is what a husband should be doing. It is learning to think about someone other than yourself. Once you have been married for a while you will have learned about other, more personal things that you can do that show your spouse that you care about her.

I love flowers. When I was first married my husband brought me home fresh flowers for every Shabbos, even though he couldn't understand why I would want them since they die in a few days anyway. The move into our house coincided with a job change for my husband and there wasn't a flower stand near his new bus stop, and the flowers stopped coming. Frankly, I didn't mind. I liked picking out my own flowers. That way I didn't have purple and yellow flowers mingling with my cobalt blue dishes. But there is a point to my telling you this. I said up above that flower giving can condition a husband to the idea of doing something nice for his wife. It sure did. My husband may not have brought me flowers every Shabbos any more, but one day he arrived home with 6 trees and bushes for the new garden I was putting in, because he knew "I loved flowers."

It doesn't matter if someone else tells a young husband to bring home flowers--it is what the young man learns from this that is important. So as far as I am concerned, someone go ahead and tell all those young husbands out there that they have to bring flowers home for Shabbos.