What do you call it

For the first time ever, someone in conversation this week said "ex-husband", by which they meant mine. For a moment I felt like I had been unplugged from what was going on around me, then the feeling passed and the conversation maundered on.

I have not said "ex-husband" much myself. Mostly I use his name, as most of the people I talk to recognise it. Otherwise, the default term is still "husband", out of habit. "Ex" sounds too trivial --- one in a string thereof, no different from how one would refer to an adolescent sweetypoohbear or a boyfriend who lasted all of one month. Not that one's age or the duration of a relationship alone mark the seriousness of a relationship, but I think being married to someone for seven-plus years quite clearly falls into a separate category of intimacy and dependency.

Then there's the "we/I", "our/my" conundrums that trip up one's speech. We used to have a car, but I don't have one now. It's our flat but my clothes that are in the cupboard. "The" becomes remarkably handy, filling in for any possessive pronoun that would otherwise draw too much attention.

What it boils down to, ultimately, is that I never thought "ex-husband" was a word that would be admitted to my personal lexicon --- but there it is.

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