How NOT to fight with your spouse on vacation

Just wait until you get home.

The quick answer is that I have no idea what will work for you in your relationship.

The long answer is that I’ll tell you what my wife and I do not to fight—and what works for us most of the time.  

So, here it is: We talk about it beforehand and agree, We’re not going to fight on this vacation.

I know, it’s simple. And you’re thinking: I’m gonna get us in a fight just by bringing this up. But do it with humility, self-deprecation, and grace—and you may be surprised with what you get.

We started this no-arguing pact on our 30th anniversary trip to Italy. We went for two weeks and made no hotel reservations for one of those weeks. Yes, it’s true, we voluntarily went to Italy, a place where we don’t speak the language or know the roads or know the hotels, and we winged it in the hotel reservation department (‘wung it’ sounds better to me?!?).

This particular wrinkle wasn’t my idea. It was my wife’s. She wanted to add some intrigue and excitement to the vacation. (Yes, I know you could go all kinds of places with that last sentence, but I’m going to stay focused.)

To her, it was a game she loved to play. We’d done it once on a long drive from LA to Monterey, when we arrived exhausted from the travel, had no place to stay, and sauntered up to a quaint little hotel next to beautiful 17-Mile Drive. We stopped to see if they had any room at the Inn (yes, just like Mary), and were told ‘no’…unless we were willing to take one that hadn’t been cleaned yet for the bargain price of $37. “Are you kidding me?” Joyce (my wife) exclaimed. “Absolutely we’ll take it.” And we did, with a view of the ocean and the golf course. To sleep in that place for that price brought one of the soundest nights’ sleep we’d ever enjoyed.

And it wasn’t about the money. We had the money for an expensive stay. Vacationing this way was about discovery and risk and the blood pressure rising excitedly and feeling just a little out there in our ordered, predictable, insured, double-confirmed lives. It was about walking into a room we’d just nabbed and our heart skipping a beat. It was about getting numerous ‘no’s’ from hotels and having the flash of a thought that we’d be sleeping in our car. It was about not settling for cookie-cutter, mind-numbing, predictable, linoleum-lined, membership-point-fixated hotels that make us want to gag.

So, when she suggested we do that with Italy, I was excited. But also nervous. This was a new level of risk.

And you talk about setting the stage for a good fight! We’d become quite good at fighting on vacation—it had become one of our superpowers. It seemed that all that extra time together and close quarters and focused energy and interrupted routines and extra food and extra wine brought out the worst in us. You would think we were saving up all our angst at home so we could let it out in Mexico. (or Italy)

After she brought up the idea of a no-res Italy trip, I asked if we could talk. I painted a picture of us sleeping in our tiny European rental car, seats reclined but not flat, very little legroom, vagrants peering in all night, and the rising sun waking us two minutes after we’d finally fallen asleep. “Are you sure?” I pleaded. “Are you sure we can handle this without us ripping each other’s heads off?”

Yup was her first word.

So we did it. Our first night was in Florence. After a 14-hour flight, an hour’s drive, and walking for what felt like ten miles (kilometers), we finally found a restaurant. It was perfect with outdoor late-night dining, with city buses zooming by about 10 feet from our table. We finally felt like we were in Italy. Then we searched for a hotel and found a quaint spot with a tiny third-story room with only a single bed. It had French doors that opened to a quintessential Italian courtyard, bordered by three four-story buildings, with Italians on their balconies hanging laundry, kids playing soccer down below, songs wafting through the air, the smell of prosciutto rising from the floor below us, and a just-opened bottle of Chianti breathing in our room. We smiled at each other. We’d found it and would never forget this find. If every other night was a dive, this was divine.

It's been eleven years since that night—and we still talk about it. It may be the best night of our forty-plus years together. 

But to be honest, we did get a couple dives on that vacation too. And it tested us. We got close a couple times—but we didn’t argue. Once I was tempted to air some grievances, but then remembered our deal and chomped down on my tongue instead. And I know she had a few moments where she wanted to launch about my impatience and selfishness and insensitivity…shall I continue? But I remember actually seeing her pull herself back from that tack and busying herself with something else to avoid an encounter. She, too, remembered our arrangement.

Could it be that something so simple makes a difference? I don’t know. Maybe simple is good? I have learned the simple power of talking about something before things get heated. I have also learned the simple power of people agreeing to something with no pressure and no heavy-handedness and no guilt-manipulation. People can do almost anything if they both want to—or both don’t want to.

I guess I could add that a safe word might help—one that once uttered stops the conversation from escalating into an argument. I could add that a forgiveness-pass might help in case of a flub-up. Or maybe how a joint meeting with a therapist beforehand might make a difference.

But for us, this has worked. We desperately don’t want to be that couple who argues on vacation; we don’t want to be that couple who don’t speak a word through dinner; we just don’t want to be that asshole couple.

If we’re going to argue, let’s wait till we get home.