The MRIs are done and the diagnosis is clear. "Two herniated discs", the doctor tells me, "you need to stay home for two weeks lying on your back". I cringe at my unfortunate fate as I get up from the examination table and head towards the door. I cringe more as I receive the bill for the ten minute visit and the one hour wait.

On my way home, in a taxi, I call my girlfriend to inform her of my prolonged sentence. "Can you believe what happened?" I say. Instead of sympathizing with me she answers, "Of course I can believe it, the way you work out with these heavy weights, why do you need to work out like this?" Adding insult to injury she adds, "But don't worry habibi, I will come and check on you every day if I am not busy." As I am about to be begging  for more mercy she goes on saying, "Habibi, don't get me the wrong way, but since you've injured your back you've added a few kilos and it does not look good on you; you should think of going on a diet." I cringe for the third time and put an end to the conversation. "Ok! I need to go habibti, bye". Why did I call her habibti, I think as I hang up my phone and hang down my head?

I arrive home and as I am about to pay, the taxi driver looks me in the eyes and asks me bluntly, "Was this your wife?" I look at him and not wanting to explain the whole "it's a complicated girlfriend thing" I reply, "Yes it was".  "I know what you feel like," he comforts me and goes on for a long ten minutes, while we are parked in front of the door to my house, telling me how his wife gives him a hard time all the time. He ends his diatribe with an affirmation "If I knew this was what marriage was all about, I wouldn't have gotten married." I look at him and smile as I pay him and leave the car.

Maybe the grass isn't always greener on the other side, I think, as I dial my girlfriend once more. She picks up the phone. "Habibi", she says. Habibti indeed.