Our anniversary is this weekend. On the 7th we will have been married for seven years. People sometimes wonder what makes a successful marriage ... I have no idea. Mine is working out, mostly because we just like each other. We rarely get super pissed at the other one and even when we do, we usually end up laughing about it somehow. And liking each other comes in handy because even when we do get frustrated, which always happens in relationships (romantic or otherwise), we don't want to hurt the other's feelings so we try to be nice, and barring niceness, we apologize. We always say please and thank you and we always do little things for each other. If he asks me to get some water, I will. If I ask him to do the dishes, he will. We try hard not to take advantage of each other, to treat the other like property. We make a big deal out of the
good little things. He always thanks me for making his lunch. I always thank him for cleaning the toilet. We laugh and laugh and laugh. Sometimes when we lay in the bed, me facing him, him facing me, he'll have his eyes closed. But he can hear me smile and he knows that I'm looking at him. He'll tell me that I have to roll over unless I stop looking at him and I say, "I'll roll over if you give me kisses." Then the kisses come and sometimes I have to hug him tight because my heart is bursting with happiness.
Yesterday he asked me to stay home from ballet so we could just hang out. So I did. I was wavering, thinking that I should go, then he reminded me that it's almost our anniversary so we should start celebrating early. It's a tradition that we "celebrate" for the days surrounding our anniversary even if we don't do anything more than say, "it's almost our anniversary" and then smile and kiss and hug. Tom and I have been together for a decade now and I can honestly say the longer we're together the more I like him, the more I understand him. I've heard it said that married years are like dog years; you multiply by seven. But for the most part, ours have been blissful. My one piece of advice to anyone in a relationship is to continuously make the decision to be together; don't ever become complacent, don't ever think you're immune to problems -- that way, when the problems come (and they will) you won't be surprised and not know how to handle it, you'll just start working hard to fix it. So often as human beings we lack the will power to get what we want because we push away happiness with both hands. Instead, we need to hold on. And keep holding.
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
-- Sonnet 116, William Shakespeare
I just watched Cold Mountain. Again. It's sort of a horrific movie, and incredibly sad. Too sad, really, to make it anything more than beautiful. I would not say that it's one of my favorite movies, but for an inexplicable reason I am drawn to the characters. I am drawn to the place, the story, the tragedy. And let me add that I love the book; that is definitely on my favorite list. Frazier (wonderful writer, wretched reader) weaves the tale of Inman and Ada with the land and the war so well that they are inseparable. Inman and Ada are practically strangers when they part. They've had only moments. As Inman says, "A thousand moments! They're like a bag of tiny diamonds glittering in a black heart. Don't matter if they're real or things I made up. The shape of your neck. The way you felt under my hands when I pulled you to me." So much of love is the resolve of the heart. The mind of the lovers. The connection. The smallest thing can become meaningful. Ada and Inman feel their separation acutely. She begs, "If you are fighting, stop fighting. If you are marching, stop marching. Come back to me. Come back to me is my request."
