OK, while we were living together, we had a few big fights, joking about red heads tempers and letting fly with targeted insults and actions. So by the time we got married, when Greg said, “just a warning, I won’t ever think about divorce,” and paused dramatically, before concluding, “murder maybe, but never divorce.” I was pretty confident that I could handle the worst he had to offer and that he loved me even at my worst.
But we still had some doozies. I had been bullied as a child and was insecure and often afraid to admit to wanting to be included until I was specifically invited. So sometimes I stayed home when he went out just because he hadn’t said the right words to ask me. And my mom had similar memories, having told me once that she remembered her Dad asking her if she wanted to come along to the next town and she said, “no.” So he went without her. And she curled up on her bed and cried for the afternoon because she had definitely wanted to go, she had just wanted him to want her badly enough that he asked her again.
In my family we didn’t say what we wanted directly, often circling it in what my husband came to call Beightol-ese. My maternal side of my family would say, “I remember going to that ice cream shop up above Yellowstone.” And everyone knew to get in the car. But after 40 years of marriage my husband couldn’t figure out, or ignored, the times I pointed out a favorite place as we drove past. Then he couldn’t figure out why I was mad that he hadn’t turned around and gone in.
This picture. Our first home together. He took the photo of me retrieving something from the trash. I’m not sure what it was that time, but I’m sure I threw it away, tore it up or something because of a moment of frustration I had no words to express. I threw my wedding ring away once and when he dug it out of the coffee grounds and washed it - threw it away again. Looking back I can’t even remember why but probably because he’d smoked a joint or had a margarita with friends. I had an unreasonable terror of anytime he had anything like that. And it became a test of “do you love me more than you need a drink.” And mind you, he wasn’t an alcoholic. I saw him hungover a few times before we were twenty and once he stuffed a baby food jar of marijuana in my lap when he was pulled over for speeding, but as college freshmen in 1982, he was nothing out of the norm.
As we got older we argued less, and they were less volatile. Once I threw a plate at the door as he walked in at 1 in the morning from closing shift at Dominos pizza, and our downstairs neighbors jumped from their bed wondering what had woken them up. Once he stomped on my cassette tape because I ordered him to get it out of his car, because I wanted to play it in the house. A few times we screamed insults. I called him a “fuck head idiot” and after that he started signing love notes and birthday cards, “from your FHI”
I always figured I would have divorced everyone else in my family at least once if that were a real, quick option, so I just pretended it wasn’t an option in marriage either.
Love your candid history but you’ve weathered it all & bringing up a granddaughter so all turned out very good. It sounds lively & never boring! I think we could all tell a tale if we felt like it, stuff we did in the past might feel different today. Times change! Love the comment about no divorce but might be murder!!
You are both so lucky to be with each other..l