For the most part yesterday went pretty well. I got home a tad earlier than normal ( I left 15 minutes early since it was slow) and noticed my wife was resting. She had taken the Golden to the surgery center to have the sutures for the surgery removed. The main center was closed, so she had to go to the one in Dallas. My wife and I really dislike going into the city. No matter how hard we try, we just cannot adjust. People are in far too much of a hurry and are quite rude to those who are not as familiar with the area as they are. That is exactly what happened to my wife.
She packed up the dog in the van, got directions to the center from Mapquest and started her journey. She missed the turnoff she needed (Mapquest was not 100% accurate) and in the process of trying to get back to where she needed to be, invoked the wrath of a driver or two in the North Dallas Tollway (AKA Dallas Speedway). After several minutes of frustration, she arrives at the center and gets things taken care of with the Golden.
She gets the dog home and attends to its needs, then she starts vacuuming and cooking. After the first round of food was cooked and half the house is vacuumed, she lays down...to rest.
After I got home she got up to finish cooking. She tells me that she will work fast because we have care group tonight and we still have to stop buy to pick up a starch...the leader says we need to bring corn chips. It seems we are having chili as the main course and I am happy about that. To bad my wife isn't. She was not in a chili mood.
I finish vacuuming for her and notice there is nothing left for me to do until we leave, so I go update Acemoney like I do every day (enter receipts and pay bills online) and listen to some music and check out movie trailers on Apple's web site. at 6:30, I go see how things are coming in the kitchen and I notice that my wife is done cooking, but she is now prepping more chicken. I am not sure why she is doing this since we do not have time to cook it before we go to care group. She looks at the clock and with a sigh tells me to go without her. People who know me understand how much I dislike two things; being late and going someplace without my wife when she is expected to join me.
I ask her what is wrong and she gives me her infamous, "Nothing". I know when she is upset and if I ignore it, she will wake up at two AM and want to talk about it. At two AM I am not coherent enough to discuss anything so I try to get her to open up, at least a little, about what is bothering her. She refuses, so I tell her that we need to stop letting the little things get in the way of good communication. We both have read the books and seen the videos...we know how to do this. She agrees. She is a trooper.
At about 7:10 make it to care group and things are pretty good. My wife is still a little "blah" (and others notice) but she is not bringing us down as a group, so things progress normally. We eat (my wife only has salad) and chat, then we go into our lesson, which was taken form first and second John, regarding the antichrist. One of the people in my group, who I consider a "baby" Christian, had a lot of questions about our relationships (as Christians) with those who are not Christian. I (as well as others) told her that as Christians, we are called to live life a certain way and if we go too deep into the culture/values of others, even if they are our friends, we risk falling away and living a life that is not Christ-like. She seemed a bit troubled by that, judging by the look on her face, but I think once she hits the scriptures a bit more, she will understand.
We broke up about 9:00 PM and we were back home by 9:30. After a quick walk with Little Man (my wife took the Golden on a short walk as well) we came home and watched "Jericho"...still enjoyable but very under rated show. After that was over, my wife said she had things to do so I went in the bedroom to read until I fell asleep.
I woke up felling really good...no aches or pains and my sinuses were pretty clear. I walked and fed Little Man and made sure he had fresh water. After my coffee was finished I logged on to check my e-mail. I had one in my gmail account from a name I did not recognize with Ron Arlt's name in the subject field. This person was asking for more updated info on Ron and, after back tracing to verify that the e-mail came from where it said it did, I responded. The person seemed sincere and asked if I would keep them in the loop if I heard anything more about Ron.
If you are new to this blog and want the history of Ron, then search blogger for a post entitled "Illusions". There are three posts (Illusions 1, 2, and 3) that give info about him.
After my normal routine of coffee, e-mail, bible, and shower, I headed into the kitchen to get breakfast and saw the mountain of dishes my wife left after she cooked yesterday. I am not fualting her. The agreement is that the person who cooks does not have to clean. Early on in our marriage, this was fine by me...I love to cook but hate to clean and my wife was just the opposite. Now she enjoys cooking for us and I do 90% of the dishes. While I do not like it, I do it nonetheless. A promise is a promise.
After that chore was done, I realized that I did not have time to eat breakfast, so I grabbed a package of instant oatmeal and packed my lunch so I could head out to work. After that was done, my wife got up and stated that she did not sleep well. She was bothered by dreams and did not sleep soundly after 2:00 AM. As I was brushing my teeth, minutes from leaving my wife starts to tell me the things that are on her mind.
I try to be considerate of her feelings. I know women are wired that way, but sometimes her timing does not work. Either I will be on my way out the door when she wants to talk or it will be 2 :00 AM and I am sound asleep. Good luck getting an intelligent conversation out of me then.
As much as the little things can drive me up a wall, I will never forget how much she loves me and how much I love her. Part of being married is learning to work through things like this, but so many people just give up at the first sign of problems. I am glad my wife didn't.
All couples have problems communicating at some point. Sometimes it is early on in the marriage and sometimes it happens later on. My wife and I do not have a good history of communication, but we have done a great job over the past few years learning more about the differences in communication between men and women.
Well, I guess I need to get back to the grind...
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