Monday, April 24, 2017

Questions I don't know how to answer

Someone asked me what marriage was.  I didn't know what to say and I almost gave the one-word answer of "persistence."

It wasn't a bad answer, but I was half-joking and it didn't really sum everything up.

Marriage is having someone in your corner.  It's coming home at the end of the day to someone who wants to know how yours was.  It's being yourself and being liked for it.  It's also being annoyed and even flat out angry now and then, but it's having enough humility to say you're sorry afterwards, or to accept their apology.  Even if they never said it aloud.  It's eating together, a lot.  It's being on someone's team and having them on your team too.  It's caring, it's being kind.

And it isn't half bad.

3 comments:

  1. I've always liked Jean (and liking the other person seems to me to be the basic marriage ingredient [forget 'love'])--I never tire of talking to her, never run out of conversational fodder, am always able to recycle ancient jokes no one else in the world would get, know we can usually read each other's minds, rarely find her habits annoying (or have come to the point where I can ignore most of the annoying stuff--though I certainly wish she'd screw the cap back on the toothpaste tube!) I've known her since I was 17 in 1963, and we've been an item most of the time since.

    But we've had terrible tussles too, mostly my fault. We've disagreed seriously over the most serious issues in a marriage or in a life. Perhaps we've come into a safe harbor now--I certainly can't imagine living with anyone else.

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  2. I know I can't get away with calling her "my anchor."

    :)

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  3. Haha, true!

    I agree about liking a person. If you can sit down and just enjoy being with them, that's a lot more meaningful than someone being a good kisser or especially attractive - the common view of what 'love' is.

    You two have been together since 1963! And some people look at me sideways when they learn I met Grant when I was seventeen.

    I think being married is also the terrible tussles, I haven't met a couple yet (married or divorced) that hasn't had them. The thing is to choose whether to become defined by them, or learn to move on, grow, and try not to bring them up.

    Those pesky words.

    :)

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