London Letter: The art of gentle persussion

Management and I have a good relationship regarding decision making: she leaves the big ones to me, and I let her take care of the rest.

For example, if you wanted to know whether Britain should pull out of the European Union, should we mine the asteroids, or even what is the meaning of life, you ask me.

I may not have the answers – in fact I don’t – but I will give the question the gravitas it deserves.

However, if you want to know what the kids are doing, what colour the kitchen should be painted, or something more serious like what are we doing for lunch on Sunday, you ask management.

I believe that properly defined decision-making roles are the key to a good marriage. I’m not saying this lightly; a couple we knew are both marginal control freaks and recently had their house re-painted.

They couldn’t agree on colours so the whole project ended up as an uneasy compromise with both disliking their ‘new’ home. They have now divorced.

This would never happen in the Spence household.

Management would decide on the colour she liked then give me three choices. The first would be so garish that even I would reject it, while the other would be such a slight variation on what management actually wanted that I wouldn’t notice the difference. The only thing that could go wrong is her asking me to do the painting.

However, when management ventures into my ‘big decision’ territory, I tend to be obnoxiously patronising.

If for example, she ventures an opinion on mining the asteroids, I’ll make a sexist remark that it’s only because she thinks they’ll find ingredients to make cosmetics more affordable. Or if she says England should remain in the European Union, I’ll retort that’s only because she wants easy-access holidays in France.

The French connection

Speaking of which, management has been talking about France an awful lot lately. I am not a fan of the country, mainly because the French are rude to us rosbifs, but also because I like the more arid wildness of Spain. But management is currently fulfilling a lifelong ambition to learn French and is currently taking lessons. The problem is that she can learn all the grammar she likes in a classroom, but to be an actual French-speaker, you have to speak to Frenchies. And the best way to do this is to go to where they live – France.

Now holidays are the one grey area of decision making for us; we both decide on where to go as it’s a drain on our mutual bank account. Management usually wins, but that’s because she fights dirty.

She has now set her mind on going to France. I said no – but the fight had barely begun when she started punching below the belt with an email pinging up in my inbox titled ‘Flyfishing in Brittany’. Attached was a list of some wild rivers in exquisite countryside alongside photos of ‘gites’ (rustic cottages) for a quarter of the price you would pay in England.

I’m proud to say I didn’t surrender meekly. I googled ‘guiding in France’ and sent her a list of what a day’s guided fishing would cost: 300 Euros. Management responded by saying I keep alleging I’m a good fisherman – why do I need a guide at exorbitant cost?

I then said I don’t have waders to fish fast rivers. She responded by sending me a list of Black Friday bargains with a reminder that Christmas is around the corner. I then said I needed a new rod, but even I knew that was pushing it.

The end result is next year will see me in my new waders in the Loire valley hunting trout and grayling, while management chats up men in black berets smoking Gauloises in a bistro to brush up on her French.

However, this exercise has shown me one thing. I’m happy to continue making the big decisions to which I have no answers. And I’m even more happy to let management make the real decisions; the ones that enrich our lives.