Grumposaurus REX

“Why are you SO GROUCHY today?” It’s a question MOST MEN—especially the author—get asked ( maybe more than they should). So...WHAT’S THE ANSWER?

- Dwight Garner

The name is Clem Williamson Snide. I am a private asshole. —William S. Burroughs, Word Virus

My close friend Will is the Fred Astaire of put-down artists. He has a jeweler’s eye for his friends’ pretensions. He’ll single these out and, over dinner, toss light darts that even the person who’s suddenly bleeding from his shirtfront finds disarming and funny. This is his way of saying he likes you. If he dislikes you, or thinks you aren’t made of stern enough stuff, he won’t hassle you at all.

Over the years, my wife and I have picked up a bit of Will’s style. That is to say, we show our love by zinging each other, as if we were a couple of borscht-belt tummlers. (“Nice work on the pasta. Did you pick it up at Sbarro on your way home?”; “I know that shirt—it’s the one you screwed up your last presentation in.”) Our kids and our friends have grown used to our rat-a-tat-tat style over dinner. People who don’t know us are horrified. We’ve made this shtick work for us for a long time, because we high-step our way through the entire routine. But we’re starting to back away from it. We’ve come to realize that our aim will never be as perfect or as gentle as Will’s. We’ve come to realize that we’ve left some lasting scars on each other’s hides, like manatees that have been run over by cigarette boats in the Florida Keys.