Getting comfortable with one another.

Last night something blatantly obvious knocked me over the head. I'm not sure that there's a word or two for it, though, so I'll describe the scenario:

It was a long, fun day at an amusement park to celebrate Bebe's 8th birthday. We'd come home, put the sleeping children in their rooms, and were going about the evening's tasks (prepping lunches for the next day, making quick small dinners for ourselves, etc.). D and I were both in the kitchen. I was packing lunches and he was making soup in the crock pot for tonight's dinner. I placed a container for Bebe's lunch on the counter, went to the fridge and opened it to grab a few items. Left the fridge door opened, to return to it for more after putting things on the counter, and as I was walking to the counter and D was walking from the kitchen to the dining room, he nudged the fridge door shut with his foot. No big deal, I re-opened it, and got out what I needed, and closed it again. Went looking for a knife to cut the bread with, and saw D had left a tomato-juice-and-seed-covered knife on our white tile counter. I deposited it into the sink and wiped off the spot. Not two minutes later, the toaster oven dinged, and D came in to get his toast. "Where's my knife?" he asked. "What knife?" "The one that was laying here. I was going to use it to butter my toast." Whoops.

I remember reading a book when I was a teenager that spoke of a couple who was so in love that they "finished each other's sentences." I thought it was SUCH a sweet concept. But now when D finishes my sentences, it pisses me off. Why? Because 80% of the time, what he completes my sentence with is NOT what I was going to say! I confess, though, that I do it to him, too.

We also seem to "complete" each other's actions, as mentioned above. Sometimes, though, our motivation is not loving but critical. Last night when diapering Dois in the car before heading home from the park, D put his diaper on too loose. Without giving him a second to adjust it, I reached over and started to fix it. I ASSumed he wasn't going to. I made the inference that D never gets his diapers "just tight enough" and if I want it right, I need to do it. After coming home from work/school/daycare, I leave the laundry bag of dirty diapers from daycare at the bottom of the steps. The plan is to bring them up on my first trip up, which is usually when putting Dois to bed. Well, D comes home before Dois is in bed, snatches up the bag with a huff and runs it upstairs. He ASSumed that I wouldn't bring it upstairs on my own.

Our chores every weekend are divided easily between D and I. With yesterday's trip to the amusement park, all of our weekend chores needed to be done on Sat. AND we had to go to Mass. AND D had promised Bebe a trip to the pool to try out her new snorkel. The day went by SO FAST and when it was done, two tasks usually designated for D were not done. These are tasks that I HATE to do (and he knows that, which is why they're his!) and task that, honestly, could've gone un-done for another week with no problems. But on Saturday night I was on a roll, and decided to do all the things I needed to do, as well as his tasks as well. The result? Me feeling accomplished, and D feeling elated (his love language is Acts of Service) when he came home to see EVERYTHING was done.

It's easy when you're so USED to a person's actions and mannerisms to feel like they're so predictable. But assuming they're predictable can hurt if you don't give them a chance to ever show if/how they've changed.

I'm so glad that D and I have reached an acceptable level of comfortability (yes I made that word up) for us... as long as he stops trying so hard to complete my sentences!! 

(I loved this post so much, I decided that I'd like to blog more about marriage. So keep your eye out for a new series I'm calling Marriage In Mind Mondays!)