"Other people's partners just know"

You've seen it at dinner parties. Your friend reaches for her glass and her husband has already filled it. He starts a sentence and she finishes it. She mentions that she's tired, and he says they should get going. You drive home in silence, thinking that some couples have this and you two don't.

I'd question the comparison before you draw that conclusion. What follows is my own reasoning.

You saw the result and you didn't see the process. You were there for three hours of a relationship that's run for twenty years. You saw him fill her glass. You didn't see the conversation in 2009 in which she said, "When we're out, I feel looked after if you notice my glass is empty." You didn't see the argument that came before it. When a couple seem able to read each other's minds, it's usually because they've told each other a great deal over the years. It looks like telepathy from outside because the telling happened in private.

You also saw a small sample, and one chosen to look good. People are attentive to each other in company. You didn't see the Sunday evenings. For all you know, she went home and closed a few cupboard doors hard.

You're comparing what you know from inside your own relationship with what you can see of theirs from outside. You know every missed signal in your own relationship, because you were the one sending them. In theirs you can see only the successes. If they were watching you two at the same dinner, they might well have seen a couple who pass each other the salt without asking and laugh at the same moments, and gone home thinking the same about you.

Films and novels have a lot to do with this too. The romantic ideal in most stories is a lover who understands without being told. They turn up at the right moment, and they know what the silence means. It's moving, and it's written by a scriptwriter who knows what both characters are thinking. Real people don't have a scriptwriter. A partner in a film who asked, "What would help right now?" would seem unromantic. In real life I'd call that person a very good partner.

There's a practical use for the comparison, though. If you know a couple who do seem to look after each other well, ask one of them how. I'd expect the answer to be mostly about talking. They'll say that they tell each other things, or that he asks, or that they sorted that out years ago after a terrible row. I doubt anyone will tell you they've never had to say anything.