When I was a boy, leaving the house followed the same script every time. My father would announce, “We need to go,” and head for the car. He would sit with the engine running, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel, while my mother finished whatever she was doing inside.
The engine was never really about warming up the car. It was a message. My mother heard it clearly, and it made her anxious and resentful. He was frustrated that she was taking longer than she should. She was frustrated that he was angry with her. By the time we pulled out of the drive, the emotional temperature in the car was higher than the one on the dashboard. We usually arrived on time. We rarely arrived happy.
Decades later, with my wife, I’ve discovered I didn’t escape the family script. I just rewrote it with better jokes. We’ve had long, surprisingly philosophical discussions about what “time to leave” actually means. Is it the time to start thinking about leaving? Or the time we’re standing outside with the door shut?
Then comes the sequence every couple will recognise: “I just need a wee.” “I just need to put my lipstick on.” “Where are my shoes?” I tried the obvious tactic of declaring “9.30 is when we need to be outside.” It rarely works, because clearly the two of us live in slightly different time zones while sharing the same house.
I know we’re not alone. Leaving the house is one of the most common everyday flashpoints I see in couples. It seems trivial, which is exactly why it’s worth taking seriously.
It isn’t really about the clock
When couples argue about leaving, they’re rarely arguing about minutes. They’re arguing about what those minutes mean.
For the partner waiting by the door, lateness can feel like disrespect, or like being made to carry the anxiety for both of them. For the partner still upstairs, being hurried can feel like being controlled, judged or not trusted to manage. Neither of them is wrong. They simply hold different relationships with time. Very often those were learned in childhood, sitting in the back of a car with the engine running.
So the first step isn’t a better alarm. It’s curiosity. Ask each other: What does being late mean to you? What does being rushed feel like? The answers tend to be far more interesting than the argument.
Is this a flight or a barbecue?
Not every departure deserves the same urgency. A flight, a funeral, a hospital appointment or a theatre curtain is a fixed-time event, and being late has real consequences. A friend’s Sunday barbecue is not. Arriving at 1.20 rather than 1.00 will almost certainly go unnoticed by everyone except the person who has been watching the clock.
Agree in advance which kind of outing it is. If it’s a fixed-time event, the more punctual partner’s needs lead, and the other one commits to that. If it’s flexible, the anxious partner is invited to loosen their grip a little. Many couples discover they’ve been treating every trip to the garden centre as if it were a flight to Singapore.
Make “leaving” mean the same thing to both of you
Most couples never define the word. Try agreeing a shared vocabulary:
- Getting-ready time: when you both start the process.
- Door time: when you’re both outside, door locked, keys found.
- Wheels time: when the car is actually moving.
Then work backwards together, out loud, including the known last-minute rituals. If there is always a final wee, lipstick and shoe hunt, that isn’t a surprise. It’s a scheduled item. Build in ten minutes for what we now call “the final five” (which, in fairness, has never taken five minutes).
One thing I’d gently discourage is secretly telling your partner you need to leave half an hour earlier than you really do. It works once or twice. After that it quietly erodes trust, and you’re both negotiating with fictional times.
Look at who is doing what
Here’s the uncomfortable question for the person drumming on the steering wheel: who is doing the invisible jobs?
Often the partner who seems to be “taking ages” is also locking the back door, feeding the dog, finding the present, wrapping the present, remembering the card and checking the oven. Meanwhile the punctual partner is ready because they only had to get themselves ready. Before blaming the pace, look at the load. Share it, and departure times have a habit of improving.
A word to the waiting partner
I say this with love, and with my father in mind: sitting in the car with the engine running is not neutral. Neither is hovering in the hallway jangling keys. Both communicate pressure, and pressure rarely makes anyone faster. More often it makes them flustered, which means lost earrings and forgotten phones.
Try instead to offer something useful: “I’ll load the car. Anything I can carry?” Or agree a friendly heads-up, say a call at twenty minutes and again at ten, that has been negotiated beforehand, so it lands as support rather than nagging.
If you are late anyway
Sometimes you will be. When that happens, agree one rule: no post-mortem in the car. The journey is not the place to relitigate who took too long. Arrive together, as a team, and if the conversation needs having, have it later, calmly, when nobody is gripping a steering wheel.
Bring back the fun
Of the six elements in the Relationship Paradigm, Fun is the one couples most often abandon under pressure, yet it’s the most powerful in these moments. Humour turns an accusation into an in-joke. We laugh about our debates over the meaning of “outside.” That laughter doesn’t make us punctual, but it does mean we arrive still liking each other, which was always the point.
The real goal isn’t arriving on time. It’s arriving on time together, in good spirits, with the day still ahead of you rather than already spoiled.
So which are you: the one in the car with the engine running, or the one looking for your shoes?