You are currently browsing comments. If you would like to return to the full story, you can read the full entry here: “love.”.
meg fowler tripp dot com
You are currently browsing comments. If you would like to return to the full story, you can read the full entry here: “love.”.
Mostly, I agree with you; though I have yet to find the ability to ‘drop’ a disagreement pre-party. here’s hopin’…I really believe in, “Have you told them that? Because if you haven’t, you shouldn’t tell everyone else.” As a very wise, happily-married, long-time Keats’ nurse said to me once, “Be loyal to your spouse–when they’re in the room, and when they’re out of it.” Let me just say that that is perhaps the most relationship-saving advice I have ever been given. Also, avoid IKEA when you’re in a rough patch, or if you have children in tow. Have you ever counted the number of marital squabbles happening simultaneously in that place???
Heh, the cat advice at the end is a good one. I had to tell my boyfriend that, when he felt he wasn’t allowed to get up because my cat was lying on his legs. He was like, “but I’ll wake her up!” and I had to ask him if he’d ever heard of a cat who had trouble sleeping.
“You don’t always have to be right. Or get to be.
Going to bed angry is not the end of the world.
Accepting anger as a way of life might be, though.
Sometimes, you’re actually the jackass.”
Thanks for that — sometimes I forget the first and last so much that I end up stuck on the middle two. ;-)
Forewarning you of the sheer, scary, and impressive quantity of cold medication coursing through my bloodstream is only fair. You’ve been warned.
“A lid for your pot” vs “Deciding to make it work”
I think it’s both. Because I think there are a small number of people who really are perfect for you, they really are the lid to your pot. But as with all lids, it takes some care and attention not to mess up when putting the lid on the pot. The lid can be upside down, as indeed can the pot. We all, as pots, need lids that fit really, really well. And they’re insanely and incredibly rare and when you find one, hang on to it. But you must still work at it, and it must still be a conscious choice every day.
I won’t over-stretch the metaphor, but do you get my point?
In either-or questions my answer is usually BOTH. I don’t know if that’s easier or harder.
I’ve stopped telling people about my relationship. It’s no one’s business but mine and my husband’s. People judge and I’ve found that if I go to others for advice (friends, for example), they tend to file things away in their minds and then claim to know what my marriage is about when in actuality, they haven’t the faintest idea. Isolated incidents are just that…isolated.
It’s hurt me more than once and hurt a friendship. What happens in my house and between me and my husband stays between us.
Love is grand. It feels good but you are right…it also takes work. And compromise.
Also? It’s snowing here. Jealous? You can have it! I’ll take 75 degrees and sunny. Deal?
I love your list :)
All good things take some degree of work, not always hard work, but work none the less.
And look what you get at the end of the day – some one to love and that loves you right back!
As a thirty-two year veteran of marriage, I can say that you have a pretty good handle on what makes relationships.
P.S. HIMSELF did go the doctors for the snoring problem several years ago. Turned out to be severe sleep apnea. It kept me out of the marital bed for years – just to get a decent night’s sleep. One surgery and a CPAP breathing machine later, we can snuggle and fall-off to neverland in the same bed, unless I am having trouble falling off because of my own mid-life issues. Ugh. Life goes on….ob la dee!
Isn’t that bizarre how all of the coupled- (or used-to-be-coupled) people tend to ask the famously/eternally SINGLE people for advice?
I’ve never been able to understand it…
man.. i always love coming to this place and reading your posts. Its so refreshing and nicely worded that it makes me sometimes feel quite jealous.
Also, i would have to say that I HATE going to bed angry, it just doesnt help my sleep, i usually wake up feeling worst.
But that list, hit just about everything.
I will be sure to talk about it in mine tomorrow.
Amen. You hit the nail on the head with this post.
I hate that the generic advice that goes around at every bridal shower I’ve ever been to is “Never go to bed angry.” There are so many worse things to worry about, and sometimes it takes some down time (or unconscious time) to work out a tough issue.
Totally good advice, all the way through, Ms. Meg!
The cat one is hilarious, by the way, as is the comment from Gillian about cats with insomnia.