Dear Matthew

Day 13. Issue a public apology. Don't worry, this will only be marginally uncomfortable for all of us.

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*he hates having his picture taken. It is physically painful for him.

Dear Matthew,

When you and I met over four years ago, you really had no idea what you were getting into, did you? And neither did I, to be fair. People tend to be on their best behavior in the beginning of a relationship, and then sometimes, as time passes and life happens, you start to learn some things about the inner workings of a person, the way they're wired, and sometimes you're really impressed and sometimes you're taken aback or concerned or annoyed or what have you.  All that's normal, of course. However, I feel the need to publicly announce how sorry I am that you got stuck with someone with as severe PMS and overall emotional instability as me. Of course, this emotional instability is only seasonal (approximately two weeks out of every month), but still. That's a good chunk of our life you spend juggling my mood swings, snappiness, random bursts of crying during Pedigree or ASPCA commercials, questioning the meaning of life, yelling at you, tired apathy, incessant complaining, and/or general moping about. I'm afraid that most everyone else gets the best version of me, and so often you're the only one that sees the worst. It's not really fair. 

The truth is that you are quite constant, even in your traits that drive me crazy, but I am not. You walk a precarious line, never sure which version of Jenni you'll face today. And that must be difficult. You're a saint for putting up with it and loving me anyway. I really am sorry for what I so often put you through, and I really am so thankful that you choose every day (every minute, sometimes) to love me anyway. I admire you so much, though sometimes your awesomeness only pisses me off more, in the moment, because it's hard to stand next to someone who stays on such an utterly straight and narrow path comprised of perfect discipline and go-getterness that I wish I had. Maybe over time your steadfastness will rub off on me, and some of my good traits will rub off on you a little, too. I see it happening a bit already, and it makes me smile. Hopefully we don't just drive each other completely bat-shit-crazy in the interim. Love, love, love you,  

Jenni

3 years of marital blish

No my friends, that's not a typo up there. I just made up a new word. It means bliss-ish. Kind of sort of bliss, but not really.  Read on.

Today is me and Matthew's three year wedding anniversary... we met almost exactly one year before our wedding, so we've been together now about four years. Four years! I know some of you lifers say pashaaww, that's nothing. But to me, it's something. It's now the longest relationship I've been in, which is pretty neat.

I get a lot of visitors to our love story, and a lot of emails thanking me for writing it. The other day I reread the thing in its entirety, and while it brought back some lovely memories and totally made me smile, I couldn't help but think how very incomplete the story is. How much has happened since. How much we've learned, changed, grown, and are still growing. And I feel like it's time I set the record straight on how I feel about marriage. Or mine, anyway.

When you're in a relationship - married or just dating - and especially if you're having some routine problems like most people do at some point, it's easy to look at other couples, or read blogs about other couples, and feel inferior. You start to hear this little voice inside that's saying "they seem happier than you do. more compatible. her husband is totally more handy than yours. more fashionable. more agreeable. more successful. they probably make a ton of money. they probably have sex five times a week. I bet they don't argue about the dumb shit we do. I bet she's a better wife, and never complains. I bet he's a better husband, and treats her like a queen." And so on and so forth.

And you know what? Maybe some of those things are true. Maybe they really are the perfect couple, and maybe they really are happier than you, at this moment in time. I guess I can't really speak for all those other hypothetical perfect couples. But I can speak for us. And let me tell you, marriage can get rough sometimes. You know all that stuff I said in our love story about the law of attraction? Totally still true, but it gets more difficult to implement that law when life starts chucking lemons at you, when the day in and day out gets real monotonous, when you have health issues, work issues, financial problems, the stress of continuing education (hello, law school!), family drama, personal problems, or when you find you disagree on major issues or the direction of your lives. What do you do then?

I'm chuckling to myself, because Matthew and I have been through it all these past few years. Only a few people know the full story. Just last year we were hanging on by a thread... there was lots of anger and tears and marriage counseling and tweaking this and tweaking that, and I'm only writing this now because I'm confident we've come out on the other side.  (oh, and you thought you knew everything about us by reading this blog? proof that blogs are just a peek, right here!)

But what is the point in telling you all this? Have we discovered the perfect formula for a successful marriage? I wish we did, folks, I wish we did. I wanted to express to you, though, that it's OK if your story doesn't look like a fairytale. Ours started out pretty blissful, but fairytales leave off at happily ever after, don't they? They never really get into the real stuff about cohabiting with someone, about traveling through life with them and taking the hard punches together, making babies together and the stresses that entails, changing together as humans often do, and continuing to love despite that change. So many marriages end in divorce because people are too quick to peace out when they get to the part about marriage is hard work. They think, "yeah, but not this kind of hard work. This is grounds for divorce, for sure." But the truth is that the hard work will look different for everyone. Maybe it will be harder hard work for some than for others, depending on circumstances. But as long as you still have real love for each other and are willing to accept a person as they are, you have what you need. The work part comes in changing yourself, almost 100% of the time. That much I have learned to be true.

I'm not advocating dysfunctional relationships. I'm not saying you should ever stay in one that makes you miserable and drags you down. Life is too short for that. But I remember when we were going through some of our hardest periods last year, and I would ask Matthew if he still loved me. Every time, he would choke up and say yes, without hesitation. And I knew he was worth it, and I knew I wanted us, and I knew he wanted us. When your hearts are in the right place, you find a way to make it.  Gold is only purified by fire... remember that.

*****

The following excerpt was read at our wedding. Ironic that I chose this piece. I love it more today than I ever loved it before.

When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you. Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth�.
But if in your fear you would only seek love�s peace and love�s pleasure,
Then it is better for you that you cover you nakedness and pass out of love�s threshing floor,
Into a seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears.

And think not you can direct the course of love, for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course�
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love�s ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise upon your lips.

~ from The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran 

Our first dance was to this song... still one of my favorites. :)

How far would you go to please your man?

photo credit

Now, now. I'm not talking about any kinky, Shades of Gray-ish nonsense. I'm talking about what you're willing to do, within reason, to be what is attractive to your guy. Personally, I never thought this topic would come up between Matthew and I--until recently, when the proverbial shit hit the fan between us.

First, let me premise this post by saying I was inspired to write it after reading a post by Raven titled "I dress for men." She claims that men hate cardigans, maxi dresses, bubble necklaces, red lipstick, and the infamous blogger topknot. While I tend to avoid generalizations and am sure that there are probably plenty of exceptions to this rule, I found myself laughing and nodding my head in agreement throughout Raven's entire post. Why? Because Matthew and I JUST had this fight conversation a couple months ago. Before that time, I probably would have been one of the girls that got a little huffy and said, "actually, I dress for me, and I should hope my husband loves me the way I am!"

And believe me, when this topic came up between myself and Matthew, I wasn't thrilled to hear his opinions on some of the ways I've been presenting myself lately.

Let me back up.

It was a sunny summer afternoon. I was PMSing. Already this is going badly, eh? I was feeling insecure and fishing for compliments from Matthew, but since men don't understand the whole no means yes and yes means no rule that automatically takes effect during PMS, he mistook one of my compliment-fishing questions for an actual, legitimate question, and made the grave error of answering me honestly. Long story short, it came out that he hates my hair in a bun, thinks I look absurd in red lipstick, doesn't like the vintage "frumpy" look to some of the clothes I'd been buying, and he also made several other points that served as daggers directly to the left ventricle of my heart. I did the reasonable thing upon hearing these would-be insults to my "style," and stormed off, stomping and slamming doors in my wake. How could he criticize something as personal as a woman's sense of style? How dare he act as though I should live to please him! This is two-thousand-and-effing-twelve, and women don't gravel at the feet of their men any more! How dare he say a word against my hair or clothes or choice in lipstick!

I spent several more days being furious with Matthew. I was afraid to tell anyone about this argument we had, because in my mind, it made Matthew look unforgivable.  But finally, I talked to a friend about it. A friend I respected and knew would give me honest feedback. I expected her to be angry with Matthew--to join sides with me on my "nail his balls to the wall!" campaign. But to my utter amazement, she only told me that she had gone through something similar with her own husband... something that resulted in the two of them going through her closet together, he pointing out what he loved her in and what he didn't. Bottom line was this: she didn't really care if it was "right" or "wrong" from a feminist's perspective. She wanted to please him, and to wear things that he found her most attractive in.

After I picked my jaw up off the floor, I started to come back down to earth after my several days of heightened fury with poor Matthew.  After hearing that something so similar had happened to another couple I looked up to, and their relationship lived to tell the tale, it all became... less horrible.  And then I talked to my mom about it, and it all became even more less horrible. Suddenly it made sense to me to know when Matthew found me most attractive and when he didn't. It seemed reasonable to wear the stuff he loves when I'm around him, and wear the fashion-y stuff that I like when I'm out with friends or in outfit posts or something. I decided that, when I'm around my husband, yes. I would dress for men. Not really men, though. HIM.

Still, I can see how this point of view would bother some women. Many would likely have the reaction that I first had and think "screw 'em if he doesn't like the way I dress or my favorite shade of lipstick!" But as for that mentality, I think I've just decided that maybe this is what they're talking about when they say a successful marriage is hard work and compromise and sometimes sacrifice. And it helps to know that Matthew would make changes for me, too, if I asked.  Bending your own will to please someone you love isn't always a bad thing, or a sign of giving in to chauvinistic male domination. But as a certain wildly popular erotic fiction series might suggest, maybe that's what a good chunk of us ladies are craving, anyway?

I'm not sayin' that, but I'm just sayin'.