Another Valentine’s Day has passed. I survived. Sort of. As I wrote prior to the fateful day, Guys Hate Valentine’s Day. Why? Because it tends to be a lose-lose for us. We tend, in our caveman ways, to bungle it even when we have the best of intentions.
Did you read the GREAT article by Elizabeth Bernstein, Meet the Marriage Killer? I thought is was SPOT ON! Stop nagging! I also think that Nagging will be an excellent topic for #DadChat and have invited Ms. Bernstein to co-host with me. We are discussing it right now and I sincerely hope she can and will – sometime next month.
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While on a recent vacation, my wife and I had a stimulating discussion with friends about friends. We were enjoying a meal with two other couples and one of the men asked the question, “Have you found many couples that you are friends with and, if so, how have you met them?” Do couples need couples to survive?
What followed was a spirited discussion about friends–same sex friends, friends as couples, and opposite sex friends, when you’re married (or monogamously involved). The conclusion was that it is not simple.
I love my wife, I love my boys, and I love my dogs. In that order. As I re-married after a contentious divorce, the blending of my family—my two boys, my two dogs, and me with her and her one dog, was a challenge. She had to deal with more adaptation, without a doubt, but we had to deal with a woman in our midst and one that, surprise surprise, actually cared about cleanliness and order.
For me, the biggest challenge in dealing with the mostly positive changes in our all male household, was giving up the warmth and companionship of my dogs, in bed with me. They were there, for me, in the darkest hours of my separation and divorce, when my boys were with their mom, when our then large home felt cavernous and terribly quiet and empty, and I literally think they saved my sanity.
Is it ever okay to keep a secret from your spouse? If so, what secrets are okay and which are not? I would suggest there are times where a so-called “white lie” is a good thing while most of the time honesty is truly the best policy.
An example of a good “white lie” is the ubiquitous situation in which a wife asks her husband, “Am I looking fat?” or “How do I look in this dress?” We men know there’s only one answer, really: “You look great, Honey,” or some version of that.
When does being friendly cross over to being flirty? Can a married man ever be “friendly” with another woman without it being potentially misinterpreted or, worse, being hurtful, dishonest, or even non-sexually unfaithful to his wife? I struggle with this, given my out-going nature and my wife’s somewhat reserved nature.
So, my first wedding anniversary is right after Christmas and my wife and I will be alone on separate continents. We didn’t plan it this way, but it turned out just as we planned.
We celebrate both Hannukah and Christmas, so at least we’ll have a couple of days of Hannukah before they leave. I’m quite conflicted doing both holidays, but I’ve had to let that one go–part of the compromises of marriage and a strong-willed, stubborn wife. Or course, I’m not the least bit stubborn.
Clichés are clichés because they’re usually true. They say the biggest arguments couples have are over sex, the kids, and money. True? You bet. At least in my house it’s restricted to just one of those – $money$. Maybe I’ll just do future blogs about the other two subjects ‘cause you know I’m lying about money being the only issue we ever have.
But, this time, we did get in a heated argument over $money$. I think that second marriages are more complicated on most levels as each partner does bring more history, more literal baggage, and potentially kids, to the marriage. I brought the baggage of an ugly, angry, costly divorce in which my ex also abandoned my boys. My present wife has often stated that she feels she’s paying for the sins of my ex. And, to some degree, she is right.
