Friday, December 19, 2014

Why I love you...

"Why do YOU love ME?"


My husband and I had a fight the other night that ended with both of us asking this seemingly ever present question. We are so different. So very, very different. He's logical and doesn't speak my emotional, crazy person language. I want to talk about my dreams and he wants to talk about the here and now. It feels like we are from different islands. When we don't get along, it's because the ideals of those islands, each with their own emotional cultures, are clashing. I speak my native tongue, only to be met with a cockeyed, head tilted, glazed-over gaze. He tries to speak about something that seems like it's not a big deal and my eyes well with tears. Our mannerisms go over each other's heads.

But we have this bond. This undeniable, inexplicable bond that drives us to WANT to try to understand. This magnetism that pulls our islands together into the Pangaea that is our marriage. Our family. Our everything. So I am writing this, right now, before I forget all the whys again.



Dear Jude,
I couldn't answer the other night, because I was on the spot and the parts of my island that didn't know you hated you. Now that I've thought about it a little bit, and while I'm vacationing on the sands that very much do love you, this is why.

You make me talk about things that upset me, even when I don't want to. You drag me out from inside myself and force me to say more than, "I'm fine." When I cry and tell you not to hug me, when I push you away, you still try to wrap your arms around me. Actual intimacy is hard for me, and you know it, but you still try. And even when I don't like it, I love you for it and it means so much to me.

When I freak out, you fix things. I come to you and fall apart and you create some sort of logical life hack that makes everything all better. I sit in the corner, blowing into my brown paper bag, while you take over and snip the wires on the bomb. I am a dreamer and a planner, so I don't do heat of the moment. I can't stand the pressure and you help me make sense of things. I never really have to fall all the way down and completely lose my shit because you find a way to ditch the bomb and catch me before I do.

You look at me with those big, brown eyes and I get lost in flecks of gold. I see how you look at me. I feel your eyes on my body from across the room sometimes and I wonder how you could look at me like that. How anyone could ever look at me like that and mean it. But you make me know that you mean it. You make me see myself through your eyes and feel like the most beautiful woman in the world. I know that when I'm around, no one else exists for you. Even when I razz you, or get jealous, I know there's only me. The world stands still and everyone else falls out of focus.

You are a genius. Like, a literal fucking genius. You are the metaphorical manifestation of what would have happened to the world if Einstein possessed the power to Google things. You taught yourself to computer program. You taught yourself how to fix cars. There is nothing you can't figure out how to do. You are taking over the world, one Google search at a time. And it makes it that much cuter when you mispronounce pomegranate and I get to be the smart one for a second.

When I'm around you, I laugh harder than I've ever laughed before. You inspire me to be funny and together, we are the epitome of hilarity. We will have that reality show someday and millions of people will buy "Werewolf Mask/Finger Penis" and "Has DC Comics Done Something Stupid Today?" t-shirts. I know that no matter what happens, we will always find a way to laugh.

You work hard. You go out every day and provide for our family and never ask for anything in return. You don't make me feel like I've failed if I haven't cleaned the house, or done the wash, or the dishes, or anything for that matter. You come home, happy to just sit and watch The Daily Show and The Colbert Report with me. You even pay my massive student loan debt and don't give me flack about it. You're a goddamn saint.



You let me fall asleep on your shoulder, even though it hurts your back. You get up and get me things when I get comfortable and don't feel like getting up. You get out of bed with the kids when I decide that I'm sleeping until noon. Or two. And then you don't give me crap about it. When I decide that something is important to me, you try to make it important to us. Even when I try to screw myself out of things in some weird guilt related martyrdom, you still make sure I do things for myself.

You let me be me. I talk about seeing ghosts and having visions and you believe me. When I say that I have an amazing idea for a book I might write five years from now, you listen to it. When I talk about how I'd like to move to Norway and go off on a tangent about distant relatives, or when I talk nonstop about Facebook group drama, or make you listen to Thom Yorke for an hour, you indulge me. I talk about how life is going to be when we have houses that we don't have yet, and how we are going to be with our grand kids. And then I say that maybe we will sell all of our possessions and sail around the world. I fantasize about the big, creative things that I want to do and when we get there, if you tolerate me long enough for us to get there, you can help me make them concrete. You tie my strings to the ground so that I don't float away. Without you, I would soar until I gasped for air and burned up in the atmosphere.

I ask you why you love me and you say you don't know why. You just do.

And I never want you to clarify.

Because I am not logical, therefore, our relationship is not logical. It's a leap, and one that you have to choose to keep making all the time. Just being with me goes against the things inside of you that you are comfortable with and I know that. You are reaching out and tapping into something that you feel and acting with your heart and not with your brain. I'm sure your brain would tell you to leave and never look back. I know that I'm difficult. I know we think differently. But we are able to see things differently and try to help each other learn and grow as people. I don't know the hows, I suppose you can fill them in, but I do know that I can't wait to sit on our porch as 80 year olds in rocking chairs, smoking a bong and yelling at kids to get off of our lawn. If I jump off of my island and into the water for you, it's going to be scary, but I want to do that. Let's build our own place, our own safe space to grow, just for us. I want to put the same amount of faith in us that you do, so I'm just gonna close my eyes and jump.

And just for dreaming sake, let's say this new place has legal weed. I'll leave you to the details.





1 comment: