Valentine's Day is upon us and there are a handful of corporate bigwigs sleeping easy tonight whom most likely have plans of lavishing their loved ones with rooms full of rose petals and dinner at the hottest restaurant which of course will include the very best wine because in their real life they can afford it and we here in the lower realm of the world settle with a $5 Hallmark card, dinner at a chain restaurant and the $8 bottle of Moscato that was on sale (Don't judge on how we do fancy!)
I struggled with Valentine's this year because frankly without a "real job that includes a paycheck at the end of the week" I felt immense pressure to secretly save and come up with an amazing gift to show Bryan just "How Much" I love him. I have been pacing back and forth and endlessly google searching "Best V-Day Gift Ever....on a budget" needless to say nothing I could find was suitable and finally I woke up and slapped my head and thought to myself "Your an Idiot!"
There is no material object out there (except maybe like a Castle or an Island or Aston Martin...joking!) that could put a value on our relationship. The mere fact that I have even been buzzing around flapping on about it has made me feel slightly embarrassed. When did I become someone who feels even for a second that a material object means I love you this much?!?!
It is so easy to fall in Love, it really is I have done it a few times in my life to prove it and that is why we are such suckers for Corporate Americas version of Valentines day. Falling is easy, the hard part is what comes after the fizzle and ya-ya or rah-rah or what have you. After the late night conversations, after the 200 text messages a day fizzle down to a single picture message of "Does the baby's poop look odd to you?, after the gifts and flowers and romantic gestures that are just because its Tuesday, after the long obnoxious gazing and you get the gist! If anything falling in love is nothing more than a minor obsession of ourselves, of feeling wanted and important and it is 100% blinding sometimes and I truly believe it is 100% of the reason we often end up with others that we have nothing in common with and this can be the most amazing part of a long term relationship or it can be the most detrimental after we remove the beer googles (I was going to change that to Love Goggles but Beer Goggles is really just funnier and makes me laugh, so there). For this reason we should really be putting the celebration and value into our relationship with the person and not us as individuals.
This is not the first relationship I have been in that I am very opposite of the other. However, without respect for not just each other but for our relationship to work though, above, under and around those differences, failure is inevitable. Bryan and I have a very special relationship and marriage because we work very hard on the actual relationship itself. I learned in a very special time of my life and earlier than most my age that to make my relationship with this man really amazing that I have to care for "the marriage" as much as I do the man because Love really will only carry you so far. Bryan and I with a lot of luck have easily managed to grasp this concept early in our marriage. If we are upset, it is not always an answer of what will make me or him happy but what is better for our marriage? We are not perfect by any means and it sometimes takes us as individuals a bit of time to come to this conclusion but it has made our relationship in such a short amount of time capable of flourishing into something that takes years and years for others to achieve.
We are not perfect as individuals, we are both selfish, sinners, hard headed, foolish and wrong. Some days he does 10 things in the morning that make me welcome his exit to work but because I know he will do 20 more things that I adore that day I instantly miss him as though he's been gone fore 3 years at war the second he pulls out of the driveway. He does things Im not fond of and Im certain I do things he doesn't like. We have had the best days and we have had the worst days, we have each had financial highs and we have each been top ramen for a week broke, we have had tears and we have had smiles so big it makes your cheeks sore, we have gone to bed giggling and we have gone to bed silent. Our marriage is not perfect but is strong, it grows every day and it has provided us both gratification every day no matter how upset we may ever get. We are 100% respectful of each other and most would probably laugh at our "idea" of fighting which usually goes something like "Well your a butt head and you should feel pretty embarrassed about it, so there" and then he pulls my pigtails and we call it a night! but because we both believe in our marriage first and our feelings second it has given us a different perspective and allowed us to Love bigger and better than either of us could've imagined even after the rah-rah of initially meeting. We have the best relationship I could ask for that is just challenging enough and I am so grateful and that is something to celebrate and what I will definitely be focused on tomorrow!
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