Marriage is:
Someone Who Believes in You
Girls have these weird things called hormones. When those IFAW commercials come on showing the starving kittens and begging for donations, it's the hormones that make girls cry. It takes a feeling like sympathy and tips the scale to tears. And last week, hormones turned my uncertainty about my writing into full-blown paralysis and a tear-choked throat. Squeakily I asked Dave to sit down and talk with me for a little while because I felt weird. And with that quiet assurance of his, he laid down on the bed with his arm around me as I clung to him, tears slowly darkening his light blue shirt. He waited until I was ready to talk, until enough of his warmth and strength had seeped into me to ask, "Do you think I have a shot at being a writer?" He rubbed my shoulder. "Of course I do. I wouldn't be encouraging something I thought was a pipe dream." He had cured me in fifteen perfect words.
About Honesty
Want a good marriage? Keep no secrets. Man up and talk about what's going on, even if you made a mistake. Are you really going to avoid a day or two of uncomfortable arguing at the cost of driving a tiny wedge into your relationship? Again, you must have that willingness to ride into battle for your marriage. Secrets are yours, they're not ours. That is the peril, the breakdown of the 2=1 formula. It takes a special courage to sit down together and work through problems, especially when you know it's going to be a difficult long-term project. But you're on the same team, you share the same goal, so act like it. Set that good habit now.
Being Silly
I've learned in the past few months that a good marriage brings out the silly side in everyone. If Dave comes home from work and starts joking with me, I know he had a good day. Another friend of mine said that her husband sings a ridiculous version of the "SexyBack" song whenever it comes on the radio, which confirms just how much she adores him. For Dave, the joking could come in a variety of ways. It could be playful chauvinistic questions about why I'm not in the kitchen, or sitting on top of me and blocking my view while I'm watching TV, even doing somersaults over my belly when I'm lying down. I always squall that he's being a little brother when he does that stuff, but I love every second of it, even if my only real defense is cheating and pinching him, hard. Sometimes my grandmother gets concerned when she hears about our roughhousing, but I flash her a grin and tell her how much I love playing with him, and she shruggs it off.
Someone to Hold Onto
Dave and I spent our first weekend apart a few days ago, and I wanted to spend some time feeling close to him before we left. All it took was laying next to him on the couch and watching TV with him for an hour before getting packed. There are also days when Dave will come home, quiet and distant. Those are the days when he takes me by the wrist to the bed and curls up next to me in silence. I'll typically pester him about why he's feeling down, but he doesn't always want to talk about it immediately. So I'll become quiet and still, knowing that all he needs right now is peace and his arms around me.
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