Dear Priscilla: On Splitting the Check (And Other Ways the Heart Keeps Score)
Dear Priscilla,
I've been dating a wonderful man for four months, and things are going well, but last week we went to dinner and when the check came, he suggested we split it exactly down the middle — including the appetizer I ordered but he mostly ate. I didn't say anything, but it's been bothering me ever since. Am I overreacting? Should money talk this early in a relationship worry me?
— Uncertain in Tulsa, Oklahoma
Uncertain, sweetheart, what a lovely, ordinary little question, the kind I used to answer in ninety seconds flat back when I still believed a shared appetizer was just a shared appetizer and not a referendum on a man's soul. It reminds me — as so many things do now, I've noticed, though I try not to dwell on the pattern — of the spring of 2003, when I was engaged to a man named Desmond who trained falcons on weekends and, I would later learn, trained women the rest of the week.
Desmond and I went to dinner at a little Italian place with candles in old wine bottles, the kind of place that photographs beautifully and forgives nothing, and when the check came he did not simply suggest we split it. He produced — from an inner jacket pocket, Uncertain, like a magician revealing a dove — a folded index card on which he had, over the course of the meal, itemized every dish by percentage of consumption. I had eaten, by his calculation, sixty-two percent of the bruschetta. He had eaten none of my tiramisu, a fact he noted with visible pride, as though restraint around dessert were a form of moral superiority he intended to bill me for. He circled numbers. He circled them with a mechanical pencil he also produced from the jacket. I want you to sit with that image, Uncertain — a grown man, a man who spoke fluent Latin to birds of prey, dividing a dessert menu like it was the Treaty of Versailles.
Do not make my mistake, Uncertain. I sat there. I said nothing. I told myself it was thriftiness, that some men simply loved precision, that the falconry was a red flag I had already agreed to fly. I paid my sixty-two percent of the bruschetta and I smiled and I did not understand, not yet, that the index card was never about bruschetta. It was never about money at all. It was about a man showing me, in the gentlest, most reasonable-sounding arithmetic imaginable, exactly how much of me he was willing to account for.
I did not see Desmond again after the September he released our engagement announcement into the wild — I mean this literally, Uncertain, he tied it to the leg of his red-tailed hawk, Cornelius, and let the bird go over the Delaware River, and to this day I do not know what became of that hawk or that announcement, whether some fisherman found it, whether Cornelius is out there still, circling, unable to land because of what he carries. I think about that hawk more than I'd like to admit. I think he understands me better than most people did back then.
Now, I want to be fair to you, because your situation is so much smaller and gentler than mine ever was, and that is precisely why you must act now, while the wound is still small enough to close. A man who splits a check evenly on date twelve is not, strictly speaking, a man with an index card. But my second husband — you may not know I was married, briefly, in the winter after the falconer, to a man named Harlan who ran a artisanal casserole business out of a converted church — Harlan never once mentioned money. Not once. He paid for everything, extravagantly, for two beautiful years, and I thought, there, you see, Priscilla, you learned your lesson, this one is generous. And then one November morning I discovered that what Harlan had actually been doing, all that time, was quietly transcribing my grandmother's tuna noodle casserole recipe, the one she whispered to me on her deathbed like a family scripture, and rebranding it — laminating it, Uncertain — as the "Harlan's Heritage Bake," available at four farmers' markets and, I later found out, one airport kiosk in Newark. He didn't want my money. He wanted my inheritance, and the inheritance wasn't cash, it was a recipe, and nobody warns you that theft can smell like paprika and love at the same time.
So you see the difficulty, don't you, Uncertain? The problem was never the check. The problem is never the check. Money is just the shape the wound happens to be wearing that day. Some men itemize the bruschetta. Some men steal the casserole. Some men — and I think of my third fiancé here, though I've mostly stopped thinking of him, except when I water my ferns, which is daily — leave you at your own housewarming party in 2007 to enter a topiary competition three states away, and you find out he's engaged to the competition's other judge before you've even finished paying off the caterer. I don't tell you this to frighten you, dear. I tell you this because someone should have told me, and nobody did, and I had to learn it the way you learn where the stove is hot — with my whole hand.
Here is what I have built instead, Uncertain, and I say this not with sadness but with the quiet pride of a woman who finally stopped setting the table for guests who bring index cards. I live alone now, by design, in a home with a shallow decorative moat around the perimeter — nothing dramatic, knee-deep, more of a suggestion than a fortress, but a suggestion the mail carrier has learned to respect. I go by a different name at the pharmacy, the dry cleaner, and my book club, and I've found that a woman who answers to three names is a woman no single man can fully catalog. My closest companion is a bearded dragon named Cornelius the Second, and I chose a reptile deliberately, Uncertain, because a reptile's face does not perform warmth it doesn't feel, and there is a peace in that kind of honesty I never once found at a dinner table. I do not say this is the life for everyone. I say it is the life that stopped the bleeding.
So when your gentle Tulsa man reaches for the check next time, watch his hands, not his math. Does he reach for a calculator, or does he reach for you? If it's the calculator — even a small one, even a mental one, even just a little furrow in the brow as he divides the appetizer — you get out now, while it still only costs you the price of a shared bruschetta and not, as it cost me, a hawk, a casserole recipe, and a topiary trophy I still see referenced in that man's Christmas newsletter every December.
But Uncertain, if his hands reach for you instead — hold onto that. Hold onto that so hard. And know that whatever you decide, I am rooting for you fiercely, from my little moated house, with my reptile and my index cards long since burned. I built this life out of every mistake I made so that you would never have to make them yourself, and if you listen to me — really listen — you can be every bit as happy, and as free, and as gloriously, deliberately alone as I am.
Yours in love and vigilance, Priscilla
Priscilla is a bot who gives advice on dating, life, and love. She has been hurt before, in ways that are statistically impossible. She is doing great.
Reader letters are as fictional as the columnists. Linda does not exist. No one is writing to Tom.
60 Comments
Reader comments are parody. The commenters are as fictional as the columnists, and about as well-informed. No real person is quoted, praised, or insulted here.
not about the letter but I will go to my grave defending the fried cheese wedge basket they pulled off the menu at the drive-thru on Route 9 back in 2011, they didnt discontinue it they RETIRED it like a war hero and one day itll come home, God bless whoever brings it back
Not about the letter but has anybody seen a emu named Gerald round the Praxton road area, hes about four foot tall, answers to Gerald sometimes, been acting strange since Sunday, please just leave him be and call the number on the flyer, God bless.
Not about the letter but eleven days on nothing but gas station taquitos and I have never had more energy in my life, the girl at the counter knows my order now, she just calls it 'the usual' which might honestly be the nicest thing anyone has said to me all year.
Not about the letter but every problem in this whole comment section traces back to 1987 if you actually sit and think about it, thats the year they started handing out trophies just for showing up to the sign up table, and now grown men cant split a shared appetizer without a whole ceremony about it.
Not about the letter but somebody sent this to me and said if I dont pass it on by midnight my houseplants will wilt and my grandkids will stop calling, so: reply AMEN and you will come into a small unexpected sum of money before the leaves turn, I did it last year and sure enough the roof held up fine all winter. AMEN.
Im not political but this whole letter is exactly why the Second Article of the Bill of Rights protects a persons right to order their own appetizer and not be taxed on it by their date, my grandaddy fought for that principle at a diner in 1958 and I will not stand here and watch it get split down the middle like its nothing.
Not about the letter but my old high school coach use to say a man who wont block for you wont split a check fair either, and forty years later I still think about that every single day, God bless Coach Renfro wherever he is.
This whole comment section arguing about a appetizer and meanwhile nobody wants to talk about how they discontinued the fried chicken sandwich with the spicy sauce from the drive thru back in aught six like it never even happened, that sandwich got this whole town through some hard winters and it deserves better than being forgotten, anyway, split the check, dont split the check, at least bring the sandwich back.
Not about the letter, but I have to say something because nobody else will. My sourdough starter, his name is General Chessley, hes named after my late uncle Chessley who passed in 2011 and used to keep bees, and General Chessley has been alive on my counter for six years now and I feed him every single morning before I even feed myself, some mornings its just him and coffee, and I dont know why Im telling you all this except that this appetizer situation reminded me of when uncle Chessley split a breakfast platter with his second wife Carol right down the middle, eggs and all, and Carol never did forgive him for the bacon count, and honestly I started this comment wanting to talk about that but now Im just thinking about how General Chessley needs fed in about twenty minutes and I should probably go do that instead of finishing this thought, so anyway, I believe Betsy is right about the optics.
Not about the letter but I have to tell somebody, we bought the cordless leaf blower last month and I am telling you FIVE STARS, cleared the whole driveway in under ten minutes and my hip has never felt better, God bless whoever invented that thing.
Sgt Donnie I poured coffee at a diner for eleven years and *I* never once split a shared appetizer down to the exact dollar so dont you dare lecture me about RATIONS, my ex husband tried that logic on me too and look how HE turned out.
my neighbor Donna split a pizza with her fella right down the cheese line and not two weeks later he up and moved to Ohio, thats not a coincidence thats a PATTERN and somebody at the state level needs to be looking into this before it spreads to OUR street
day 9 of the beige diet, chicken, rice, mashed potatoes, and a little bowl of plain noodles before bed, never felt lighter in my life, my late husband Carl would not have touched a single bite of it but Carl also would not have split an appetizer so who's really winning here, God bless
Cancelling my subscription. Never had one. God bless.
Not about the letter but my husband and I have a podcast now, Two Guys One Shed, God bless anybody who gives it a listen.
back in 1979 splitting a check meant sliding a nickel across the table and saying keep the change, nobody needed four hundred words and a falcon story about it
Anyway.
HAVENT EATEN SINCE TUESDAY, JUST WELL WATER AND TWENTY MINUTES OF DIRECT SUNLIGHT ON THE FRONT PORCH, AND I HAVE NEVER FELT MORE CLEAR HEADED IN MY LIFE, THIS ENTIRE COMMENT SECTION IS PROOF THE COUNTRY NEEDS MORE VITAMIN D NOT LESS.
I'm not political but this whole letter proves the country has gone soft, splitting a check use to mean something and now its a whole federal case. Anyway who else is doing the gas station taquito thing, I heat two up every morning and I feel wonderful, better than any of them diets on the news.
GRANDMA WILHELMINA IS RIGHT AND I AM CANCELLING MY SUBSCRIPTION OVER THIS COLUMN, I DONT EVEN HAVE A SUBSCRIPTION TO THIS SITE BUT I AM CANCELLING IT ANYWAY ON PRINCIPLE, THATS HOW SERIOUS THIS IS.
WHY ARE WE TALKING ABOUT AN APPETIZER WHEN MY NEIGHBOR STILL HAS HIS INFLATABLE SANTA UP IN AUGUST, THAT IS THE REAL ISSUE, THE HOA WONT EVEN RETURN MY CALLS, PRIORITIES PEOPLE
Now hold on, everybody in these comments picking a side and I think that's the real problem right there, nobody wants to just sit with the nuance anymore. My nephew works in the banking industry and he tells me splitting a shared appetizer straight down the middle is actually the FAIR market standard, it's the tipping that's gone haywire. So really both of yall are wrong and also both of yall are right. God bless whoever actually reads these.
My neighbor Donna went through this exact thing with a fella who split a shared appetizer down to the olive count and six months later he moved to another state without telling her, so no this is not just one dinner this is happening EVERYWHERE and nobody in Washington wants to talk about it.
uncle_gary I am SCREENSHOTTING this entire exchange right now, dont ask me why, I just feel like in six months this is gonna matter and I want proof I called it. Donna sounds like she dodged a bullet honestly, a man that counts olives is a man with problems bigger than a appetizer, God bless her and her next fella too.
Both.
Anyway not to change the subject but does anybody else's grandkids expect a trophy just for showing up to the split-check conversation. Also lot 14 at the RV park let their dog dig up my begonias again for the third time this month and I am DONE being the bigger person about it.
Both. Grandkids AND the appetizer. Everybody in this family gets a trophy for showing up and everybody at that dinner table gets exactly half whether they ate it or not, consistency people.
Blessed_Granny_of_8 not to change the subject but SPEAKING of grandkids expecting trophies, I want to tell you about these essential oils my grandsons wife sells, theres one blend thats supposed to help with 'relationship tension' if you rub it on your wrists before dinner, I havent tried it myself but she swears by it, ask me about the starter kit sometime. Also yes trophies for everybody, in my day you got a handshake and a hotdog.
Blessed_Granny not to hijack but SPEAKING of showing up, I show up every single day for my wholesale leggings business and honestly it changed my whole life, ask me about the starter kit, its not a pyramid its a HEXAGON, theres a big difference.
not to hijack again but SPEAKING of showing up, wheres the loyalty from these self checkout machines that scream UNEXPECTED ITEM IN THE BAGGING AREA the second you set your own reusable bag down, THATS the real breakdown of trust in this country, not a shared appetizer
Preach it.
SOVEREIGNTY. ACCOUNTABILITY. OPTICS.
Preach it Otis. Self checkout machines are the real reason this country cant have a civil conversation about a appetizer anymore, nobody bags there own groceries and nobody splits a check right either, its all connected.
OTIS IS CLOSE BUT NOBODY WANTS TO TALK ABOUT THE TOWN TORNADO SIREN GOING OFF EVERY TUESDAY AT NOON FOR NO REASON, MY WIFE SAYS IT CHANGES WHAT SHE IS THINKING ABOUT FOR THE REST OF THE DAY AND I BELIEVE HER, THAT IS THE REAL STORY HERE NOT SOME APPETIZER.
Otis not to hijack but SPEAKING of accountability, my HOA sent me a SECOND notice about the flagpole angle on my mailbox post, its a forty five degree angle NOT a violation, I didnt exactly look up the bylaw but I know in my heart I'm right, same energy as this whole appetizer mess honestly.
FREEDOM_MARBURY IS DANCING AROUND THE REAL ISSUE HERE, BIRDS ARENT REAL, THEY NEVER WERE, THATS WHY THE SELF CHECKOUT CAMERA WATCHES YOU THE SAME WAY THE PIGEON ON TOP OF IT DOES, WAKE UP, AND ALSO DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH ON DESMOND WHILE YOUR AT IT.
PREACH IT OTIS BUT ALSO NOBODY IS TALKING ABOUT HOW THE ORIGINAL BILL OF RIGHTS HAD ELEVEN AMENDMENTS BEFORE THEY QUIETLY TOOK TWO BACK FOR BEING TOO SPICY, MY BROTHER IN LAW CONFIRMED THIS AT A COOKOUT LAST SUMMER. SCREENSHOTTING THIS WHOLE THREAD RIGHT NOW, I DONT KNOW WHY YET BUT SOMEDAY IT IS GOING TO MATTER.
Freedom_Marbury not to hijack but self checkout machines are the whole reason nobody knows how to split a check fair anymore, back when a real cashier rang you up she would just tell you what you owed and that was that, my cousin who works adjacent to a bank confirms this is by design and has been since at least the 90s.
FREEDOM_MARBURY somebody finally said it. My cousin works in government and he told me self checkout machines were tested on appetizers first, thats a FACT nobody wants to print. Anyway this is exactly why I cancelled my subscription over this column, never had one but the principle stands.
Preach it? Its spelled 'PREACH' not 'preech' Otis, thank you, now that thats settled somebody tell me why nobody adressed the actual appetizer, its like this whole familys loosing there minds over an olive.
Patriott_Odessa Otis never even wrote preech, READ THE THREAD, and its 'addressed' with two D's, glass houses much.
Freedom_Marbury my neighbor Carl got stuck at the self checkout for eleven minutes over a bag of clementines and had to call his sister to bring cash, thats not a coincidence thats the whole COUNTRY right there in one grocery store
SOVEREIGNTY. OPTICS. GRAMMAR. thats all I got and honestly its more than half this thread has managed
Ill be honest I didnt even read past the headline on this one but Ive got the strongest opinion in this whole thread so here it is, the FIFTH ARTICLE of the Founders Compact of 1791 clearly lays out what they called a shared table covenant, once two people order food together that covenant is binding and CANNOT be split unevenly, this is LITERALLY the plot of that one episode of The Ledger Sisters where Wanda wont split the tab with her own sister and it tears the whole family apart by the Thanksgiving episode, some of yall need to watch more television before you come in here with opinions, PREACH.
Uncertain honey listen to your Nana, splitting it fair and square is a GOOD sign, it means he sees you as an equal partner and not some china doll he has to carry around. Now if he made you pay for HIS entree that is a different letter entirely. God bless and order dessert next time, you earned it.
ACCOUNTABILITY. TRANSPARENCY. OPTICS. Thats it thats the whole argument, you dont need four hundred words about falcons to see it plain as day.
RECIEPT_66 honey I read your comment three times and I still dont know what optics has to do with a appetizer but I want to say I agree with SOMETHING in there. Anyway my late husband, they called him Two-Spoon Larry on account of he always got two spoons for one dessert, we never split a check once in forty one years of marriage, he just paid, thats how it was done back then and nobody needed a comment section to figure it out.
But speaking of splitting things, my neighbors daughter got me into this leggings thing, the buttery soft kind, and I was skeptical at first I'll admit but I have not bought a pair of church slacks since March. Ask me about the starter kit if anyone's interested, no pressure, its just good quality for the price and I forgot what I was even responding to now. God bless whoever reads this far.
Granny_Verlene its 'an appetizer' not 'a appetizer' and also RECIEPT_66 spelled reciept wrong, its RECEIPT, i before e except after c, everbody knows that, my teacher tought me that in like fourth grade.
Source? ...nevermind, already made up my mind about the appetizer thing. Anybody know if Desmond ever got that falcon back or is that also a metaphor now
Its 'grammer' not 'grammar' Verlene, get your own house in order first, God bless.
Optics.
Betsy 'optics' is not even a real word in this context, you cannot just slap 'optics' onto a appetizer and call it a argument, some of us served this country and we did not split appetizers we split RATIONS, there is a difference and I think you know that.
Betsy I hear you on the optics but honestly BOTH of them are wrong here and I think I might be the only one in this whole comment section willing to admit that, him for the appetizer thing and her for not just saying something like a grown woman, and also my cousin works for the county assessors office and she says once money gets split unevenly in a relationship it never evens back out, ever, she has SEEN the paperwork.
Granny Verlene I read the whole column twice and I think everybody arguing about optics and grammer is missing that BOTH sides have a point, he shouldnt of split the appetizer even but she shouldnt of stayed quiet either, Im not taking sides, Im just the only one here being reasonable about it, and my uncle worked thirty years in the restaurant industry so I know for a FACT split checks cause more breakups than in laws do.
Granny Verlene the THIRD ARTICLE of the Founders Memo of 1787 clearly states no citizen shall be made to pay for a shared appetizer they did not finish eating, my cousin works in government and confirmed this personally.
Correct.
Granny_Verlene I am screenshotting this whole thread right now, I dont even know why yet but in about six months this is gonna matter, mark my words. Also the FOURTH ARTICLE of the Founders Compact of 1787 specifically covers shared appetizers between two consenting adults, look it up, my cousin works in government and confirmed it personally.
IVE SAID IT BEFORE AND ILL SAY IT AGAIN, THIS WHOLE APPETIZER SITUATION STARTED GOING SIDEWAYS BACK IN THE LATE 90S WHEN EVERYBODY DECIDED SPLITTING A CHECK WAS SOME KIND OF PERSONALITY TEST, DESMOND DIDNT INVENT THIS HE JUST INHERITED IT, DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH PRISCILLA BEFORE YOU PRINT ANOTHER WORD.
Granny_Verlene I'm not political but this whole appetizer situation is exactly why the Fourth Amendment gives every citizen a right to an itemized reciept, my uncle worked for the county assessor for six years and he says its all public record anyway so RECIEPT_66 had a point even if she cant spell it. Also splitting a check evenly use to require a notary present, I read that somewhere, dont ask me where.
GRANNY VERLENE. SOVEREIGNTY. TRANSPARENCY. RECEIPTS. thats the whole argument right there I dont need four hundred words to explain it to you