Craig and I recently passed the 6 month mark! We had a mini celebration of Greek dinner and beers. However, while 6 months is longer than Ms. Kardashian, it is not very long when compared to my parents (24 and 23 years respectively) or grandparents (60+ years and counting). I definitely do not have wisdom to pass on yet, but I do have some thoughts on marriage and newlywed life that struck me today.
Craig and I lived together for 3 years before we said "I do". The day we got married, we already had joint credit cards, joint bank accounts, a lease together, joint insurance, a joint cell phone contract, and a lot of other similar ties. He has supported me financially for the past 2 1/2 years as I have endured law school. In these respects, you wouldn't expect much to change the day we got married. Of course, something did change. Something I can't find a word for, but something that is good.
The "honeymoon stage" (which I assume most people define as the stage where you are blissfully happy because you don't know any better yet) never really existed for us. We came back from our wedding extravaganza, and went straight back into real life... bills, rent, law school, stress, immigration, etc... We weren't happy because real life hadn't hit us yet; instead we are (and work hard at being) happy every day despite real life. While I would consider us blissful, it isn't because we don't know any better.
I know everything about Craig, in fact. I knew the day I married him the things that would drive me crazy and the things I would adore. I also knew that relationships, and marriages, are about compromise... "picking your battles" is the cliche for this thought. There are a few things which irk me about my dear husband. For example, when I walked in the door to my house today, there was, as there always is, Craig's sunglasses and I pod, (as well as anything else he has decided he doesn't want to forget when he leaves) sitting on the ledge of the window in our entry way. I cannot count the number of times I have asked Craig to not put junk on this ledge. If you consider we have lived here for 3 years, and guess that it has been an average of once a week, we would be looking at minimum 156 times. Why is this such a pet peeve, you may wonder? Because I think it makes our house look messy. If there needs to be a "junk drawer" or something of that nature, I want it to be hidden from our guests. I have tried putting picture frames and candles on the ledge, but the stuff still manages to take up the rest of the space. The flip side of this, of course, is that I always move the stuff when people come over, and then Craig cannot find it, and we inevitably bicker for a couple minutes about why I moved the stuff, and why the stuff was there in the first place.
After our "I dos," I think something hit me--maybe something like this isn't going to change and now we are married so it's realllly not going to change. I have officially realized that no matter how much I nag, he is going to place his stuff on the ledge. And I am officially am ok with that. First of all, I do not want to spend the little time we have together arguing about this ledge. Second of all, there is so much good that Craig does, that I realize the good outweighs the bad (by 1000). Third, I must remember that Craig also has his pet peeves, and has found a way to let most of them go.
For example, I always forget to grab a towel from my room when I go take a shower. I don't know why, but I never remember this simple step in the shower taking process. This leads to me exiting the shower and running through the house soaking wet to retrieve the towel. Then Craig enters, and is annoyed that there is water all over the floor. I vaguely remember him requesting a couple times that I not forget the towel so that there would not be water on the floor every day. However, I still forget. So instead of nagging at me every day, Craig now goes to retrieve my towel and sets it on the toilet so that I have a towel when I get out of the shower. It has come to the point where if I exit the shower, and a towel is not magically sitting there, I am quite surprised and yell "Honey! Where is my towel?"
Craig accepted that I would continue to do this annoying thing, and adjusted his actions to make it less annoying. I, in turn, will give into his minuscule but annoying habit of leaving junk on the ledge, and set my sunglasses on the ledge right next to his when I come into the house. As they say, such is life... but I love our life.
Craig and I lived together for 3 years before we said "I do". The day we got married, we already had joint credit cards, joint bank accounts, a lease together, joint insurance, a joint cell phone contract, and a lot of other similar ties. He has supported me financially for the past 2 1/2 years as I have endured law school. In these respects, you wouldn't expect much to change the day we got married. Of course, something did change. Something I can't find a word for, but something that is good.
The "honeymoon stage" (which I assume most people define as the stage where you are blissfully happy because you don't know any better yet) never really existed for us. We came back from our wedding extravaganza, and went straight back into real life... bills, rent, law school, stress, immigration, etc... We weren't happy because real life hadn't hit us yet; instead we are (and work hard at being) happy every day despite real life. While I would consider us blissful, it isn't because we don't know any better.
I know everything about Craig, in fact. I knew the day I married him the things that would drive me crazy and the things I would adore. I also knew that relationships, and marriages, are about compromise... "picking your battles" is the cliche for this thought. There are a few things which irk me about my dear husband. For example, when I walked in the door to my house today, there was, as there always is, Craig's sunglasses and I pod, (as well as anything else he has decided he doesn't want to forget when he leaves) sitting on the ledge of the window in our entry way. I cannot count the number of times I have asked Craig to not put junk on this ledge. If you consider we have lived here for 3 years, and guess that it has been an average of once a week, we would be looking at minimum 156 times. Why is this such a pet peeve, you may wonder? Because I think it makes our house look messy. If there needs to be a "junk drawer" or something of that nature, I want it to be hidden from our guests. I have tried putting picture frames and candles on the ledge, but the stuff still manages to take up the rest of the space. The flip side of this, of course, is that I always move the stuff when people come over, and then Craig cannot find it, and we inevitably bicker for a couple minutes about why I moved the stuff, and why the stuff was there in the first place.
After our "I dos," I think something hit me--maybe something like this isn't going to change and now we are married so it's realllly not going to change. I have officially realized that no matter how much I nag, he is going to place his stuff on the ledge. And I am officially am ok with that. First of all, I do not want to spend the little time we have together arguing about this ledge. Second of all, there is so much good that Craig does, that I realize the good outweighs the bad (by 1000). Third, I must remember that Craig also has his pet peeves, and has found a way to let most of them go.
For example, I always forget to grab a towel from my room when I go take a shower. I don't know why, but I never remember this simple step in the shower taking process. This leads to me exiting the shower and running through the house soaking wet to retrieve the towel. Then Craig enters, and is annoyed that there is water all over the floor. I vaguely remember him requesting a couple times that I not forget the towel so that there would not be water on the floor every day. However, I still forget. So instead of nagging at me every day, Craig now goes to retrieve my towel and sets it on the toilet so that I have a towel when I get out of the shower. It has come to the point where if I exit the shower, and a towel is not magically sitting there, I am quite surprised and yell "Honey! Where is my towel?"
Craig accepted that I would continue to do this annoying thing, and adjusted his actions to make it less annoying. I, in turn, will give into his minuscule but annoying habit of leaving junk on the ledge, and set my sunglasses on the ledge right next to his when I come into the house. As they say, such is life... but I love our life.
