About sixteen years ago, I met him for the first time. My trainwreck sibling brought home this adorable puppy he had no business adopting because he had not one thing in his life that wasn’t a mess. I was furious at my sibling – he didn’t even take care of himself, how could he drag
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November 23, 2016
Our marriage is half a decade old.
Anniversaries were always a weird thing for me even before we wed, but Mom’s death right on the heels of our wedding day has meant the memory of our wedding has been closely associated with grief. I’ve felt some kinda way about our anniversary for years. That loss, though I never held that “happiest day of your life” mantra, has haunted me.
How odd it is to join hands and pledge “for better or for worse” to one another and almost immediately call that pledge to the test by burying a beloved parent. How odd it is, to start your own, new, family, and a blink later, say good-bye, forever, to part of your own, old, family. Indeed, to say farewell to your old family entirely, when the loss of one pivotal person feels like the loss of everything.
We weathered that as we’ve done most everything else. Sometimes well, sometimes badly, sometimes together, sometimes alone.
Each year, as we celebrated our marriage and toasted the strengthening of our relationship, it felt a little like I was also drinking a glass to the still gaping maw in my heart. This year, after so many years of feeling the pain of her loss far more than the joy of our companionship, this was the first year I had a little hint of peace.
Grief doesn’t play nice, or give you a discount on burdens carried because you just buried your grandma, your best friend’s dad, your dear friend’s mom, and your classmate within months of each other. It’s the same crashing denial, guilt, and mourning, over and over.
But it also gives you remarkable opportunity to learn to trust your new partner, your new family, in ways you’d been terrified to try before.
Truth? I never wanted to be married. I never needed a husband to complete me. A career, couple of dogs, warm comforter, I’m fine. But, given an extraordinary person like PiC, I’d have been a fool to refuse because it “wasn’t in the plans”. And I’m proud to say that there is a limit to my foolery. I’m also proud to say that we’ve learned so much about each other and how to make things work well. Imperfect though we are, we’ve figured a lot out.
Relationships are work
Never doubt that relationships and marriage require work to make them work. The work should not feel like a never-ending slog, but it is work, and both parties have to be committed to doing that work together.
The number of people who have told me they thought they had a fairytale relationship is the same as the number of people I know who were divorcing or were staying in an unhappy marriage because at least one of them didn’t expect to have to compromise, actively communicate, or be self sacrificing in some way. That was always the other person’s job, and I suppose magic was going to do the rest?
I’ve never heard a happily married or strongly committed couple pretend that it didn’t take work, compromise or sacrifice to stay that way. If someone says otherwise, do NOT buy that bridge they’re selling.
Mom and Dad never fought in front of us so I didn’t learn from them how to fight civilly. Worse, it was incredibly bizarre to see when they disagreed right out in the open because I had never seen that as a kid. Thankfully, they never pretended that it was all popcorn and roses. Mom also taught me that it’s also not THAT hard. The struggle should have a purpose and a resolution. If you find someone worthy of you, you must approach disagreements with compassion and kindness. Even if you’re angry, you’ll still remember that because you love this person, the goal isn’t to grind them into dust for the win. That’s abusive. No kind of abuse whether it be emotional, mental, verbal or physical, was acceptable, but it was important to differentiate between being mean, snippy, or a plain ole jerk and behavior that rises to the level of abuse.
Patience: learn to have it, learn to use it
These haven’t been the easiest five years, personally or professionally, and as a result we traveled a bumpy road on the way to building patience. Where one or the other might have been snippy over an inconsequential thing going wrong, a misplaced set of keys or forgetting to prepare part of a meal, we’re much better at taking a step back and taking a breather BEFORE letting the snark roll.
It’s one thing to snark your friends mercilessly, without heat. It’s another to snark your spouse over an honest mistake because you’re tired or in a bad mood.
I expect PiC to treat me with respect even when he’s not feeling at his best, as he has the right to expect from me. It doesn’t mean to pretend to make nice all the time, it means that you remember when you feel like crap, you lash out, and then learn not to do that to those closest to you.
Know your fear, learn how to let it go
I’ve always refused to admit weakness. See how I’ve only admitted to chronic illness occasionally on an anonymous blog? Yep, that’s completely indicative of how I’ve dealt with it in offline life. It helped me professionally where fear typically leads to paralysis. It was terrible for our relationship, in the trust department. More specifically, in the Where’s the Trust? department.
My family had, over the years, taught me repeatedly not to trust adults to make good decisions. With PiC, I had to undo all that history and figure out how to trust him.
It starts with understanding that we two are built pretty differently from each other. We respect that isn’t the end of the world, and then find room for compromise.
I’m obsessive about money and sticking to our spending and saving plans. Obviously. PiC is not at all obsessive. But I have accepted his premise that spending is actually good at times, and he’s accepted that I’m going to make That Face when spending happens.
PiC makes some interesting decisions about time management. I’ve learned to nod and say he’s an adult, he can deal with the result. It’s not my job to make him do it my way (even if I’m right) because it’s not me doing the job. He’s learned to live with the consequences of his choices and change if he doesn’t like those consequences.
We don’t just tolerate each other, what a terrible word to use for someone you care about! We accept that we have our differences and work with them instead of insisting that we do everything the same way.
This is the beauty of trusting your partner: their job is not your problem, it’s their job. If you don’t like how it’s done, then debrief for a better next time. Except for PiC in the kitchen, this is why he’s only my sous chef or not allowed in the kitchen at all if I’m Head Chefing. It’s for the greater good.
Communication: it only works if you’re both listening
We have a running joke that we don’t listen to each other. It used to be one-sided. I would repeat information five times, in answer to PiC’s Dory-like questions. It mildly annoyed me but eventually I found myself doing the same. We’ve developed a terrible habit of only half listening, you see. But since being annoyed about it changes nothing, we’ve had to confront that both with humor and the aforementioned patience.
It’s made an enormous difference that we not only talk to each other, we talked to each other about how we talk to each other, and what’s working and what’s not.
Fight with your gloves on
If you must fight, and we all do at some point, do it well. Again, with the respect. Just because you disagree over something to the point of arguing or fighting it out, that doesn’t mean that your basic respect for this person with whom you share your life goes out the window. For me, that means eyerolling is out, and don’t ever use the dismissive “Whatever”. For him, that means hearing him out and not interrupting until he’s finished explaining what’s on his mind.
Here’s to many more…
We don’t have all the answers, but we’ve got enough to keep our marriage running with just a few tweaks now and again, and that makes me feel pretty good about the choices we’ve made. It’s not that we see eye to eye on everything, but that we’re willing to make the effort to understand each other that has made it all work.
Case in point: We didn’t even agree on how to celebrate this anniversary at first. We went around and around trying to find a good compromise, talking over logistics, and what was important to each of us. He wanted to do something more than just dinner together at home. I felt like dinner together at home was perfectly fine, I didn’t want to spend $1000 on a weekend trip.
It could have been several fights. Instead it was several discussions and we eventually landed on a great compromise that felt just right and may become our new way of celebrating. Perfect!
:: What’s a significant anniversary for you? What are your most powerful memories? Who do you miss the most?
November 21, 2016
Between the election, hosting guests, and other demanding personal events, open enrollment flew right by. We scrambled to update our selections on the last day of the period instead of the first day like I like to do. I’m super glad PiC caught that because my attention was elsewhere and I would have been ticked as all get out if we’d missed it.
Most things are staying the same: medical, vision, dental, long term disability, life insurance, dependent care FSA.
We’re increasing our FSA allocations to the maximum possible $2600 in the hope that PiC will be an eligible candidate for LASIK, as much as the idea of having his eyes operated on horrifies me, because we’ve discussed it for years and objectively, if they can do some good, we should go for it.
I found a goof from last year’s open enrollment though. Can anyone tell me why I added JuggerBaby to our vision and dental plans when ze didn’t have teeth yet? I s’pose I didn’t know ze wouldn’t have to see the dentist at all this year but my child was toothless as of last year’s enrollment period and that was a curious waste of money. It wasn’t a *lot*, probably around a few dollars a month and possibly I chose to pay it just in case ze needed dental care early, but it’s unlike me to waste any money if I can help it.
My company shed a ton of benefits in the past few years, so we rely on PiC’s employer’s great benefits. This puts me on edge, in light of the possible threats to the ACA, because I feel like we’re just one job loss away from serious instability. Not only would be we be out half of our income, we would lose access to the remaining 401(k), FSA for health and dependent care, medical, vision, dental, and disability and life insurance benefits. We do carry private life insurance for me but not for him. Our costs would increase at the same time as halving our household income, so I’m considering how I might want to deal with that if he were to be injured or out of a job.
:: What benefits do you have, or miss? What do you wish you had?
November 16, 2016
What’s yours is mine and mine is yours
We’ve entered a phase where JuggerBaby really wants us all to be doing similar things. If I’m not eating, ze doesn’t want to eat. If I AM eating, ze wants to eat too – but ze wants to eat the thing I was about to take a bite of. So we go halfsies on a lot of things. Except yogurt. Ze will eat all of my yogurt if I’m not paying attention.
Ze is really into family time, sitting on the floor mat, and pointing at a spot next to zir very emphatically: SIT HERE. Ze has us pretty well trained and is doing zir darnedest to get Seamus to cooperate. He’s no fool, though, he keeps a safe distance between them. Unless carrots are on offer. Then they’re buddies.
Imitation isn’t exactly flattery
You think the kid’s not paying attention to you until you’re woken up one morning at FinCon by a badge-wearing bundle of energy holding your cell phone to your ear yelling “Yeee-yooo?? YEEAAA-YOOO!!”
I don’t sound like that! How rude.
Self defense from the womb
I don’t know when it happened but JuggerBaby has a brilliant set of self defense skills. Ze is a complete klutz, like zir bemused and vaguely proud mama, but if you come in to pick zir up against zir will, or try to tickle attack, ze goes into a guard position that would make a quarterback and linebacker proud. You’d have to look twice to be sure ze didn’t have the pigskin tucked under the right elbow as ze fended you off with the left hand sweep.
And try, I dare you, TRY to grab zir belly when ze doesn’t want you to. Ze sweep-blocks your hand like ze is a wushu master and follows up with an elbow to the throat. I can almost hear the Mortal Kombat “FINISH HIM” in the background.
I had to train for years to get any kind of feel for this sort of self defense. Apparently I passed it all on through the umbilical cord?
Parenting skills: baby chores
Several months ago, I was pretty sure we had a budding fluff and folder here. Ze would help me take the washed clothes out to put in the dryer, piece by piece, usually licking it before handing it over. That’s apparently become boring, though, so we’ve upgraded zir jobs.
Ze helps PiC unload the dishwasher in the morning, only licking the occasional utensil, and only sometimes dumping all my silverware in a hidden spot. After work, ze is responsible for taking socks and other laundry to the laundry basket or the washing machine, and for throwing away any trash ze might find.
If ze is balky, I can always bribe zir with the offer of letting zir give Seamus treats. Works like a charm. We think it’s important that ze learns to contribute to the household!
Surprising things about parenting
Still licking everything!
Why are we still telling JuggerBaby not to eat the soap, lick the dog, the butter, the floor, our shoes….??
“Ze has licked worse” shouldn’t still be such a regular part of our daily conversation.
Things we are loving
Favorite books
Where the Wild Things are, Maurice Sendak
I’m at least a little wary that this is such a favorite right now. Especially when ze is stuck on the wild rumpus part and still wild rumpusing when we’re 3 pages past. But it’s amazing how many read throughs ze will sit for when you remember that usually you can’t even get through one page before ze chooses the next book. It’s a fun read, though.
Favorite bath toys
Empty Luxury Lane jars: toddler’s top recommendation. These are the best for catching water and dumping it on my head. Ze will occasionally dump it over zir own head too, then fling back zir head in squinty-eyed disgust at being splashed in the face.
November 14, 2016
I had some thoughts about money but they’re hiding under my sadness right now. I’m still heartsick by the elevation of someone who is supremely unqualified to the office of the President.
I don’t disagree that politics as usual has been terrible for some parts of the country nor that we haven’t done nearly enough to address those ills. Some of my dear friends live in those economically depressed areas and I’ve spent a fair bit of time in medium-small towns, enough to see how wholly devastating it would be when the primary source of employment shuts down and leaves you with next to no choices. And I have tons of firsthand knowledge of how much being poor in America sucks. And because I understand all that, I particularly can’t see why anyone thought that DT would actually do anything to fix that. He’s certainly the brick through the window of the Washington establishment, I can understand a resentment running so deep that you’d do anything to express it. Remember my dad? But then what? If you’re wielding a vote to Show Them, should you be putting your vote into the bucket of a con man? Is he really the guy who’s going to help your problems? Or is he going to carry on blustering about unconstitutional changes to make it seem like he’s addressing your resentments? He’s a reality show host, a failed businessman who by his own admission hasn’t paid taxes in many years so hey when you wonder why we can’t afford to properly educate our kids he’s part of that problem. He’s all about flash and celebrity. What could possibly pass for a reason to have faith that this person would actually address that which ails the working poor? When I was holding down three jobs, and sick, with a sick grandmother at home, tended by a sick mom, and an unemployed dad, things were pretty damn tough. I didn’t love where the Bush economy went and I struggled mightily under Bush policies. There weren’t enough hours in the day to cover the bills. I for damn sure couldn’t afford health insurance for my family and if I was no longer able to work, there was absolutely no way I was going to get insurance coverage or have the means to live a marginally useful or tolerable life. At any time during those years, had someone proposed DT as an answer, I still might have just thrown up on them.
Note that I am aware that HRC is an imperfect choice. But guess what? Any career politician would have been. It’s the result of having spent your life in public service that you have a record to be judged by. When has DT ever served in the government or military? Half my family is military. I was military bound as a teen, if my body hadn’t betrayed me.
All that said, I’m not going to say “not my president”. I’m not going to say he IS because I’m not there yet either and I may never be but I’m not going to do what Obama haters were doing all eight years either. If the American experiment is to stay alive, if we are to continue to have a peaceful transfer of power, we have to respect the process even if I cannot respect the man. Not that I could blame anyone who is saying that because part of my soul is still hollering NO NO NOPE.
We have midterms in two years. We need to work towards breaking the stranglehold in Congress. I don’t say this as a Democrat, I say this as a thinking person who doesn’t think it’s good for either party to hold all three branches of government, no matter who it is. That’s too close to absolute power for my comfort.
My grandparents witnessed the rise of fascism and communism, my parents lived to escape it and gave us a shot at better lives here. Now I hold my child close as I observe an awful lot of parallels between DT’s rise to power and Hitler’s: rising to win the election by preying on unrest and discontent, fomenting hatred, making sweeping claims to make the country great again. There are plenty more if you’re looking. It’s enough to give this history student the shakes. “…make the trains run on time”, indeed.
Edited to add
Nicole and Maggie published this today, and it’s timely considering what I’ve been wondering we need to do: Getting an oxygen mask on: Protecting oneself monetarily
And while I’m working on that in the background, as much I can without tipping over my boat, I’m reaching out to metaphorically squeeze a shoulder, tell a friend I’m here for them, tell another friend I’m thinking of them and promise to help in any way I can. I need these bright spots of positive to help me deal with the dark.
November 11, 2016
My absolute favorite fish dinner is a whole oven roasted fish, with the skin on, crispy on the outside, moist and flaky inside, flavored with a homemade tamarind sauce, served on a bed of lettuce with a side of cucumber, rolled in rice paper wraps, and dipped in a lemon fish sauce. We would have that at home and it was culinary heaven.
That is not this recipe. Sorry.
Someday it will be. But I tried making it once without a recipe or guidance ten years ago, it was a horrid failure, and I haven’t had the nerve to waste another fish trying it again.
This is a suitable substitute, JuggerBaby approved.
Ingredients
2-4 fish fillets, I like tilapia or catfish
onions
oil, salt, pepper
Baby bok choy
Sesame oil
Diced garlic
Steamed white rice
Directions
I usually steam the white rice first, earlier in the day, since we use a rice cooker and that’s just an easy win. If you need help making perfect white rice, let me know in the comments and I’ll do a little snippet on that later.
The fish and bok choy are ridiculously easy – the fish fillets are placed on a large sheet of foil, sprinkled with oil, salt, pepper, layered with sliced onions (sometimes tomatoes or lemons if I feel like it), and the foil is pinched shut like a little packet. This goes into the toaster oven at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. It’s my cheater version of Fish en Papillote.
Meanwhile, the bok choy is washed and cut up into smallish pieces. This is tossed into the saucepan after cooking the garlic for a minute, tossed to coat the bok choy with a bit of oil and garlic, and covered for a few minutes on medium-low heat. I add a little drizzle of sesame oil and toss again, then leave it on medium-low heat for a few more minutes. Since JuggerBaby seems to think that ze can’t chew up vegetables that aren’t a bit on the soft side, crunchy like I prefer them, I cook it a little longer than if I were just serving it to adults. Cooked this way, ze will happily munch on bok choy all through dinner.
Total time from prep to serving: 35 minutes.
November 9, 2016
Over at Ask a Manager, one of the threads touched on the fact that non-parents need to have scheduling flexibility, just as much as parents do. I had noticed people tend to assume that flexibility applies to parents, mostly, or that the reasons tends to be related to kids.
And it’s true that we need it as parents for when our kids get sick, or when our kids get us sick, or they have doctor’s appointments, school plays, break an actual leg, get called to the principal’s office. (In other words, for totally unfun things.) But there are plenty of times my schedule flexibility is important for entirely non-kid related reasons.
- Seamus has a vet appointment.
- I have a dentist or doctor or physical therapy appointment.
- We desperately need groceries.
- My body just completely gave out and I might still be typing but it’s all gibberish.
- Sometimes, you just need a 3 hour lunch.
- I have a secret mission that PiC can’t know about, almost always a surprise for him.
PiC also enjoyed schedule flexibility long before we had a kid, and will always love it for:
- Midday workouts.
- Craigslist purchases and sales.
- Taking the car to the shop
- Meeting up with a friend who’s in town just for the day
- Bringing me donuts.
- Making his Halloween costume.
- Sometimes he has to take a 3 hour lunch with me.
None of these reasons have ever negatively impacted our work over the long run. We don’t abuse the ability to do our work on our own time, and it makes our lives a lot easier, which makes us happier people. Happier people overall means happier colleagues in the workplace and how isn’t that a good thing?
:: Tell me, do you have any schedule flexibility with your work? How did you get there? What do you use or need your flexibility for?
I had another post for today but first I’m sitting here with the Election doing what it’s doing and I’m wondering how we live in a country that would rather put a Hateful Incompetent Blustering Serial Liar in the highest office of the land over literally anyone else you could think of? A person who has made a campaign promising to deport citizens based on their religion, who considers many citizens of this country including women, disabled people, people of color, LGBTA, veterans, and immigrants as less than dirt to be trod on? When he incites violence against those who disagreed with him, invoked the Second Amendment in reference to his opponent – how are we to expect anything different from him if he’s then installed in the Oval? How precisely is he meant to lead and represent this country when his view of the nation is one that would be better off if most of us were gone?
Some of us have kids to whom we’ll have to explain how a bully and a predator was elected to the highest office in the land. How a man can brag about sexual assault and have multiple accusers of sexual assault and still be elected President. Some of us have daughters to whom we’ll have to explain how no matter how experienced you are, no matter how much blood, sweat or tears you’ve invested in the process and your career, a blustering man with literally no credentials or perceived competence can still win over you. Honestly, none of this was new, it’s just that much more obvious now.
I already knew I’d have to explain this to JuggerBaby someday but I had held to this frail hope that it could be in the past tense when ze was old enough to understand.
Add to the list of explanations: why are they telling us to “go home”? Because that’s nothing new either, but it’ll happen more frequently after the election, just as it was becoming more obvious during the campaign.
I was thinking earlier today, is this how it felt in Germany after the elections? A sense of foreboding, and impending doom, and wondering how many of your friends you can shelter from the coming storm? How long you can hold out?
The blistering racism, festering sexism, and ever-present xenophobia that’s pocked this country had me prepared for a close race, but I had held out hope, based on all the good, decent, and kind people I know here, that it wouldn’t come out in favor of hatred and bullying. This didn’t even come down to warring conservative versus liberal values and agendas. For me, this was about basic human decency and he didn’t even meet the minimum bar for that.
It’s not been called yet but I’m worried for the many who are even more vulnerable than I.
I don’t feel it yet, but I can say that I hope that when we wake up, it won’t be as bad as all that. That it isn’t the beginning of the long slide. I hope.
Nov 9 update: The person I couldn’t believe was the Republican nominee is the President-Elect now. It’s an outcome I knew was to be feared and the repercussions will range far and wide. It’s too early to try and hope again, today’s a day for resting, regrouping, and then we’ll pick up again. We’ll stand up to protect ourselves, defend those who need help, and be the best possible people we can be. That’s our job. And in two years, we need to do what we can to change the fact that all three branches of government are held by one party. The checks and balances can’t work when there’s no aisle to reach across.