I don’t know how much this qualifies as a guilty pleasure but I love watching Desperate Housewives and love Tom and Lynette Scavo’s storyline most of all. I was heartbroken when they broke up and I’m still hoping they get back together.
Lynette is crazy and controlling, but she loves her family to death. She’s strong and that often comes off as abrasive but she’s gotten through so much because of it. Tom is just as strong, I think, but in an opposite way because he’s silently strong. He’s loving and patient, often mistaken for being henpecked, but I think it takes a great man to be okay with that kind of public perception because that’s what he thinks his wife needs.
Today, I saw a rerun of Everybody Ought to Have a Maid (S06E05), and got teary-eyed from Roy and Tom’s conversation, which happened after Lynette fired Roy for joking about how she doesn’t respect Tom.
Tom: Hey Roy, can I talk to you?
Roy: Sure thing, pally. Here, take a load off. If it’s about me getting into it with your wife though, I have to stop you first and say I’m sorry. I mean, I know times have changed, but a man’s still a man. And you deserve to have your wife respect you.
Tom: She respects me plenty, Roy. Here’s the thing you gotta understand about Lynette. She grew up without her dad. Her mom was a drinker. So she had to be responsible for everyone.
Roy: Yeah, well, that’s rough.
Tom: Yeah. It left her with this constant fear that everything could suddenly fall apart. And that’s why she needs to control everything. Of course, she can’t. Nobody can. But… She can control me… If I let her. So I do. Because it makes her feel safe. And that is my job, as her husband… to make her feel safe.Roy: You’re a good man, Scavo.
Tom: I try.
How can I not admire that?
One other scene that I loved and can’t forget was between Lynette and Tom in Pleasant Little Kingdom (S07E09). Tom got angry because he resented the fact that Lynette never tells her friends about his good qualities but always notices the bad ones. Lynette revealed her reasons and it broke me.
You can watch the scene here (I had to search for a while for it but glad I found it). Here’s Lynette’s quote, though, if you don’t want to watch the video:
Lynette: For almost twenty years, all I’ve heard is how incredibly lucky I am to have a guy like you. So if I don’t constantly brag about how great you are, it’s only because I don’t want to be reminded of how much I don’t deserve you.
I just cried again while typing that haha.
I’m guessing that if you’re still reading this then you’ve gotten at least an inkling of why they’re my favorite Wisteria Lane couple. I sometimes feel like Lynette because I have an incredibly amazing partner and best friend. He’s kind and nice, wants to make the world a better place, extremely talented but is still on a quest for self-improvement, patient, encouraging and supportive, funny and sweet, loving and really wonderful…and well, I can be a bitch.
But the one thing that’s different with Lynette and myself is that I don’t see “my luck” as something to be shameful about because that’s not all I am. Yes, I can be a bitch and more often than not, I probably am, but I know that I also love this person enough that I’m doing everything I can to be worthy of being loved as much as he’s loving me. I know that although people tell me how lucky I am with him, I shouldn’t be sad because I know that he knows that he’s just lucky with me.
And isn’t that what every relationship aims for? To constantly work at being the best for each other and to bring out the best in each other?
