No, It Isn't At All Like the Movies

Our friend Libby says that Herb and I are perfect for each other because we both have that "urban hipster" appearance . . . but it is a mere disguise for our down-home, mid-western sensibilities.

It's true. Herb single handedly led our block into a "barn raising" this week . . . he has been out in the ally for two weeks, chopping the 8 inches of ice with an ax. Eventually, the other men whose families share our ally began to come out and help him. By Sunday, we had four men out chopping . . . and I brought out a pitcher of water while another wife scurried inside to retrieve a plate of homemade cookies.

Despite my nose ring, my charming cynisism, and my tendancy to be a "christian cusser", at the end of the day, I like having my car door opened for me, baking cookies, and I look forward to being a (mostly) stay-at-home mom in a few years. And while I would love to be like my cooler friends who can say, "Valentine's Day is just a holiday made up by vendors to trick piss-poor husbands into spending way too much money on one contrived day to make up for their aloofness during the other 364 days of the year", I just am not that cool.

The thing is, my husband is not aloof. He is sweet, and kind, and funny, and home every night for dinner. He makes me laugh. He is faithful. He is a hard worker. He shovels the snow and makes me a smoothie any morning I am running late. He repeatedly plays my favorite dice game with me even though he has only ever won twice!

But I still enjoy the idea of being over-the-top romanced for no reason at all!

As it stands, Valentines's Day has been a bit of a sore subject in our house the past few years. I really love the idea. A day to be showered with romance and affection. Herb is not only disinterested . . . he is actually turned off and fairly disgusted by the whole thing. And I totally get that! But it makes the days leading up to February 1-4 a little tense around here.

After a few tears, some unkind words (on my part), and some last minute planning for this year, I think we finally negotiated it for next year in a way that will please us both. There will be some sort of reallocation of the 14th to another, non-commercial, non-publically celebrated day. And that is fine with me. See, it only took us three years of Valentine's to figure that one out!

Before we offically canceled Valentine's Day for the future, I did a little cupid-ing of my own . . . but because I do not care to look or feel like this:


I will in fact, NOT be wearing this tomorrow:


I guess I learned my lesson about buying into cliches.

To my credit (I hope), it did not look like this AT ALL in the pictures when I ordered it. It is not quite what I had in mind for accomplishing a romantic valentine's day look. In fact, I think my sister and I had some jammies for our Barbie Dolls that looked pretty similar to this. But, Herb did give me a good laugh by trying it on for me before I mail it right back to where it came from!!!!

In other Herb news, please note our casual breakfast conversation from today. While looking at the blisters on his hands from all of the shoveling and chopping of snow and ice this winter, the man said (with a straight face) . . . "It's a good thing I wasn't in prison back in the 1920's . . . I don't think my hands could have handled being on the Chain Gang. Or in France during the time of Bastille."
To which I replied: "I get the Chain Gang thing . . . but, France?"
Herb: "Oh, I am mostly basing that off of Les Miserables"

At this point, my ice chopping, snow shoveling, ugly pink liangere tutu wearing man began singing the first song from Les Miserables . . . complete with ax swinging sound effects.

Love is sweet. You just sometimes have to look for it in places other than roses and wine. In the end, I much prefer his silly humor and his faithfulness to me over a box of chocolates. It all just takes a little readjusting of the expectations!

So, sometime in the middle of April or October . . . you might find us unavailable . . . because we just might be off spelunking or taking a couples karate class . . . you know, to celebrate our Non-Valentine's Day!

Attitude Check and The Best French Onion Soup Recipie Ever

Around 12:30 this afternoon, I decided to make a menu for the week, complete with grocery list. The idea was to then go to the grocery store and get my supplies for the week so that I will be prepared and perhaps even a bit more relaxed this week. Just think, when I leave the hospital at 4pm, I can be home by 4:15pm instead of stumbling around the grocery store trying to think of something to make for dinner. Lovely.

And yet, it is 3pm and I have just completed my list. It is like I can't let myself do something useful to give myself a hand up for the rest of the week. I could have been to store and back by now. I could have already done the one other task I set out to do today and be reading or doing something creative. But here I am. Still on the couch. And now I will rush around to get all my goals completed before we go to church in 2 1/2 hours.

I can still go to the store. And I can still be prepared for the week. I mean, I have a great menu planned . . . french onion soup and flank steak, fish tacos, and this yummy concoction of chicken, artichokes, mushrooms, kalamata olives covered in a yummy red pepper cream sauce - and the best part is, it is a Cooking Light recipe, so I can feel good about pouring the half and half into the food processor because the elves at CL have found ways to let me use yummy ingredients while watching out for our health at the same time! Bless 'em!

When I was single, I think I probably fantasized about Sundays like today. I would have loved to have a second person to plan meals and cook for. Going to the grocery store while he was snug on the couch with the football game as the backdrop of his dreams would have sounded like heaven to me.

But here I am. It is reality now. And while I enjoy planning meals and going to the grocery store, I don't feel all that different than I did back in my basement apartment, sitting on my hand-me-down fouton - wishing I had a partner to share life with. I still feel discontent sometimes. I still wish I was different - you know, less sensitive and more disciplined. I still get "stuck" sometimes . . . unable to do things I want to do in exchange for widdling away my time and then rushing around later.

I have been studying certain women around me lately. Some live nearby, others are friends far away . . . some are strangers whose blogs I "monitor" on a regular basis. What I am learning is that circumstances inform our experience of life much less than I would like to give them credit for. I have always thought that if circumstances are the barometer, then when I don't feel the way I want to, I can just daydream about different circumstances that might someday bring me the experience and emotions I want.

But I know better than that! I am a therapist, for goodness sakes. I knew in the back of my mind that marriage would not solve all of life's problems . . . my mom told over and over again that a man was not the answer to any pain I might have in my heart. And I replied with an indignant, "I KNOW that mom! But I still want to be married!" But she was right. I hate it when she is right. But she is right . . . a lot . . . especially when it comes to me.

I have the man now - a great man! - but my heart still feels empty sometimes . . . okay, more often than I would like to admit. So I won't.

The point is: the women I have been studying have a variety of circumstances: some are single, others have had tradgedy, some have sick children or struggle with their own health, some have awesome marriages, others struggle financially. But they all have something in common: a strong faith in Christ and a daily choice to look for the positive and enjoy what they have.

So, I will stop my pity party and my daydreaming about being a different person and go put MY shoes on. Because really, despite a few scuffs and the fact that I trip and twist my ankle when I wear them sometimes, they are good shoes. Then, I will kiss my sleeping husband on the forehead. I will go to the store. And I will be thankful.

And now, the soup!

Frech Onion Soup

1/4 cup unsalted butter
6 large onions (about 5 pounds), thinly sliced (**** I find my food processor cuts the prep time for this recipie in half!!!)
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup brandy
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
6 cups beef broth, homemade or canned
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
12 (1/2-inch thick) slices French bread, toasted
3/4 pound coarsely grated Gruyere

Heat the butter in a soup pot over moderate heat. Add the onions and cook, stirring frequently, until caramelized, about 40 minutes.
Add the garlic and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 1 minute. Remove the pot from the heat and add the brandy. Return the pot to the heat and cook, stirring occasionally, until almost dry. Sprinkle the onions with the flour and cook, stirring, for 3 minutes. While stirring, slowly add the broth. Bring the soup to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer, with the cover slightly ajar, about 20 minutes. Season the soup with salt and pepper.

Arrange a rack about 4 inches from the broiler and preheat.

Arrange 6 ovenproof crocks or deep soup bowls on a baking sheet and ladle the hot soup into them. Arrange 2 slices of toasted bread on top of each soup and sprinkle with the cheese.

Broil the soups until the cheese is melted and bubbling. Serve immediately.

(***This soup can be made the day before - it tastes even better after it has been around for a while!)

Marriage: A Tool for the Depraved? VOL. 6

When Herb and I were going through pre-marital counseling, we were asked by our counselor to think about the areas we might struggle in. We replied that while we knew there would be difficulties, we could not answer that question until we were in the middle of it.

Well, we are in the middle of it. We are in a relationship with the least amount of boundaries that there can be between two people. Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, our close friends and roommates have stumbled across the occasional glimpse behind the curtain. They make their way back until the inevitable happens. They stop. They reach a point at which, despite their love for us, they can go no further. You know what I mean. We have all seen parts of our friends that we just don't want to approach. Their drudge. Their junk. We see it. Clearly. Often, we are even affected by it. But to really address it often requires that we pay a cost that is far too high - it is incongruent with the actual value of the relationship. Instead, we navigate and negotiate the relationship and our boundaries so as to be the least impacted while avoiding all unnecessary conflict.

This is not what we desired in our marriage. We have done our best to blur the lines between where one begins and the other ends. Our goal has been to combine ourselves, our things, and our hearts as much as possible in order to make it impossible to separate us from each other. We wanted the other person to see "everything".

In taking down all of the curtain we have with other people, we are exposed. We have given another person the privelage to not only go behind the curtain, but to take it down, fold it up, and put it on the top shelf in the linen closet . . . that infamous shelf where we put things we don't want to throw away, but we know we will never use again. Without the curtain hanging their to protect us, everything is fair game. We are being seen like never before. Feedback that nobody has ever dared to share is being heaped on faster than we know how to process it.

We are frightened. We are angry. What we see is difficult. And being seen is even more difficult. I don't think we realized that creating the deepest type of intimacy that we are capable of creating during the first months of marriage would hurt so badly.

Blending ourselves means that what's mine is yours. So, in addition to acquiring my witty sense of humor, an all access pass to the fruits of my kitchen skills, and my quirky view of the world, Herb got all of the sour stuff too. The student loans, a wild set of in-laws, and an old Honda Civic. Wait, it gets better. Herb gained the baggage that comes from being a part of a broken family, having a mild case of depression, and the world view of a narcissist. Who would have guessed all of that was wrapped up in that pretty white dress and gauzy veil?

The reality is that "having and holding" one another is a big job. "Having" always seemed like a good thing. "Sure, I would love to have some ice cream." Having has never so much seemed like "choking down" to either one of us. There is a lot to have and a lot to hold and it takes more than nine months to learn how to do so. Our new marriage is not strong enough to hold the weight of "having and holding" all that has been presented to us by the other. So we wait, endure, fight, and make-up. Rinse and repeat. It is disheartening, sometimes, to see the commitment to your love turning out to be the hardest thing you have ever done. And, again, it is harder to see your love struggle so hard to love you.

In my most dramatic, selfish, and fatalistic moments, I want to walk down the street, pass the park, and forget how to go home.

Last night I happened to glance at my wedding vows. They are posted on my laptop but I try not to look at them because they do little more than make me feel like a complete failure as a wife. However, this little line stood out to me, "I will journey, explore, and adventure alongside you - even when the path seems uncertain and the outcome is unkown."

I have no idea how to get to where the path is leading us. Most days, I can't actually see the path. I often want to sit in a corner in the basement and wait for the hard part to pass. I want to fast-forward us about 25 years. In this fantasy, my hair will be cool - wirey silver ringlets. I will have a huge ass and I will wear a lot of velvet tunics and bangle bracelets. Herb will have a gaggle of neighborhood teenagers that follow him around for no aparant reason and call him Chief. He will chase the neighborhood cats with more urgency than he does now. He will develop an odd laugh and call me "Queenie" and pinch my huge velvet clad ass in front of our friends and neighbors to make them squirm. And we will like each other. Really like each other. We will banter in the kitchen as kids and dogs run between us. We will see the other's junk and we will call them on it without personalizing it.

But my wedding vow was prepared for the present reality and prescribes a different approach than a sojourn in the basement for a "Sex and the City and Sudoku party" scheduled to last until the year 2031. "Journey, explore, and adventure". Three very strong verbs. A verb is an action word. This means I cannot sit down and wait for this part to end. It means I have already committed to staying actively engaged. So I I come out of the basement and come alongside of Herb; verbing as much as I can.

Until I Can Figure Out How to Get My Dang PIcture to Show up with my Screen Name . . .

Here is what I love about this picture: It is so real. It shows my huge front teeth, my gummy smile, my squinty left eye, my baby face dimples . . . but I think it is so beautiful all at the same time. It was taken last month in Germany by my sweetie. I would love to tie in that behind me is part of the holocaust memeorial . . . but I am not quite that awake yet.
Yes, I just posted a picture of myself and wrote a whole entry about it. If you are uncomfortable about that, don't be . . . see post below.