Isn’t love fun? Seriously? I am finding it quite a rush. I might be the only one, but since marrying my soul mate, I thought my love troubles would be handled. Okay, yes I am a hopeless romantic, and I mean the hopeless to the point that by now I don’t think that it can be fixed. So, anyways the past weekend my husband needed to take a work trip to California.
He left early in the morning and wasn’t supposed to be back until early the next morning. Since he has decided to invade my privacy and work from home too, we have had turf wars. It started when one morning I was going about my working day, and suddenly this loud noise invaded my flow. Grabbing my ears, I wandered out into the kitchen to find the source. There to my horror was our way too large TV blaring news!
First off, did I mention that it was still morning, and the TV was on? Ahhh. I didn’t know any hard working entrepreneur ever did that. It was working time not TV time. Second, the TV was blaring intruding into the peace an empty home was supposed to be emitting. Third, it was news!
News. Politics. I go out of my way to always avoid the news. The news is filled with horror stories that will only fill my mind with depression, bad headaches, and take me out of my protective zone.
I immediately braved the thundering noise and turned off the offense to find an upset husband wondering what I was doing? He declared it was breakfast time, at 10:30 am. (Isn’t breakfast over by then? That is getting close to lunch. Breakfast was at 7 am when we got up.)
I explained that noise stole from my creativity. He explained that the TV was his chill time, and he wasn’t going to make the mistake of overworking like he did when he was young, alluding to the fact I was just still very young, and haven’t quite learned his wisdom yet.
We looked at each other with a standoff. He eventually learned to take his breakfast to the bedroom, but when I wandered in there to do some of my best writing, and TV didn’t create good writing. We looked at each other with irritation. He had been used to working in his own garage and being a single man doing whatever the hell he wanted.
I, on the other hand, am suffering from giving too much to all those around me. I’ve never before had this cherish the quiet time. I have waited twenty-four years to reach the point where all the children are in school, and I could have a quiet house and have it the way I wanted. Finally.
Eventually, I found him in his shop watching TV there. When I saw this, I realized that this man didn’t want to change things to my way. The right way. He was going to have TV interrupt his psyche no matter how many lectures I gave him on what news does to a person’s outlook.
He’s a free man. He can do what he wants as long as it is not in my domain on weekdays from 7-4pm. I get to have quiet and no intrusive TV.
This silent war has been going on for months now so when he left for California, and I was home alone with my children for the whole day to have unfolded the way I wanted I was surprised at how healing and peaceful I found it.
My girls cleaned the house. I worked on much-needed deadlines, and then eventually we decided to go dinner. My girls spoke up and said what I was guiltily thinking, “We kind of like it without our stepdad here.”
I knew what they were saying. They love their stepdad and enjoy him but they were also remembered back to when I was single, which wasn’t that long ago. We used to have these lazy Sunday’s where I worked through the day, eventually exercised with them in-between them in the evening after Mom was rested, we’d jump in the car and go on an adventure, always with the radio on, and the music cranked.
Yes, when husband’s in the car there can be no music. He hasn’t learned to appreciate the modern music and the joy at rocking out. (Yes, he has the time for music and the time for silence all mixed up. 🙂
When I arrived home from playing with the girls, my husband was back surprising early. I put the girls to bed and snuggled with him. He told me that he missed me, but I knew that was only somewhat true. He had enjoyed the time away from me as much as I had him. How did I know this?
Mind reading? Nope. I gave up reading men’s mind’s long time ago. I knew because of one thing he said. He talked about what he missed the smell of fires that was always present in California. He mentioned that his windows were down when he explained this.
That one detail gave him away. Yes, we have turf wars over the car window. He wants to allow in fresh air, become one with nature. I don’t like feeling the wind against my face, and the noise from outside drives me bonkers.
As I snuggled into his comforting embrace, I asked him, “Why did we get married? Why didn’t we stay single but committed?”
He knew what I was really saying. Why did we change from having our own space to being together in one place where we have to constantly navigate our space?
He said, “Because we moved to Tucson.”
I nodded then thought about it. Relationships are so complicated. Or at least mine is. I love my husband. I adore him. I want to be with him, but then I celebrate not being with him. I am glad we are married then I wonder why we did.
I wonder why I gave so much of my freedom away to be with him. I worry that I give too much time to him and not my girls. I have a lot of happiness when I watch my girls play with him and see them curl up in his arms and rest their heads against him—trusting him. The safe, sane man in their life.
Oh, the complexities of a relationship. It forces a person to learn, grow, change, and learn how to navigate through the needs of self and the needs of other, and how to co-create into a stronger “us” even if the TV is flipped on during work time.
