Carol’s Column

Cold feet will always fry

IT HAS saved my marriage.

I'm quite honest about it.

We were on the brink of divorce.

Which would have been a tragedy.

I mean, how do you divide four children, three dogs, one cat, two goldfish and a mother-in-law satisfactorily?

Things came to a head about three weeks ago.

"This is the end," shouted my husband, a note of despair creeping into his voice. From beneath his spectacles, a tear of rage trickled slowly down his furrowed, unshaved cheek.

"If you put those blocks of ice on to my legs once more, I'll scream."

Some people are born lucky, others are born with permanent frostbite. That's me.

The circulation in my body stops at my ankles which results in cold feet.

This is not a problem during the day, when they are incarcerated in woolly tights and snug boots.

However, during the long, cold winter nights, they make their presence felt and keep their owner awake.

Under those circumstances, the obvious solution is to find a hot-blooded partner with much hirsute covering who does not object to his spouse placing her cold feet on his hot, hairy legs.

And there lies the problem.

My husband objected.

It is no good saying he should have known better before he married me because he'd gone into my background thoroughly. Which is the way it should be.

He knew I came from a long line of cold feet.

My great, great grandmother Gittel, who came from a tiny village in Russia, reputedly had the coldest feet in that vast country.

Legend has it that once, while paddling in the Vyatka River, it froze solid and she stood there for two hours before someone rescued her.

My grandmother Bertha, used to wear a full-face muff in winter due to the fact that when she spoke — which was often — her jaw froze.

And my mother, even today, goes into hibernation in winter and only emerges on the first day of spring.

Finally, the last in this long line of frozen-blooded people is me.

So, to get back to the point of the story.

I made a discovery that saved my marriage.

An electric blanket.

In fact it is surprising. I had no idea I could have such warm feelings towards an inanimate object.

Our marriage had almost broken down.

In midwinter, my husband insisted on sleeping without pyjamas, on cotton sheets with one thin blanket.

I on the other hand, wore a woolly nightie, fluffy bedsocks, an acrylic-padded bed jacket and a fur-lined cap. I fought (and lost) for winter sheets but compensated with seven blankets and a goose-down duvet.

Nevertheless, my feet were still cold.

Things came to a head when, while snuggling up to my husband, he revolted.

"This is the end," he said, flinging off my blankets and duvet. "We can't go on like this. This bed is not big enough for you, me and the arctic bedding. It's causing a rift between us. Why, in a moment of need, I can't even find you.

"Last night I spoke to you for half an hour before I discovered you weren't even in bed. I'd been talking to your fur cap — it has the same hairstyle."

OK, there comes a time in life when a decision has to be made. This was it.

So, I invested in an electric blanket.

It is beautiful, blue, slender and warm. What's more it doesn't lift its legs when it turns over, it doesn't read until 2am in the morning. It doesn't snore, snuffle or grunt and it doesn't eat apples in bed.

The kids call it the frying pan — but so what, my feet are always warm.

Did I say it had saved our marriage?

Come to think of it, who needs a husband anyway when you have an electric blanket?

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