Maria's Random Rants

Here are the top 5 lessons I’ve learned being with the same man for 16 years.

1.       You will contemplate divorce seriously once or twice a year. A couple times you will even go so far as to pack your bags, skim through the yellow pages for an attorney, or mentally start a getaway plan and calculate the division of assets in your head. Eventually you change your mind and a week later you forgot what you were so worked up about anyways.

2.       Sex stops. You go from frequent to infrequent and then finally to exclusive special occasions only, which is far less than the ten federally observed holidays. Each of you will go through the mourning period separately but then gradually get used to it.  I have heard that some couples rediscover it after the kids are all out of the house. By my count that means I have quite a few more years of abstinence ahead of me.

3.       If you don’t figure out early on that the grass is actually greener on your side and not the neighbors – you’re screwed.  There are always going to be those “picture perfect” couples that make you feel like your marriage must be in bad shape or that single friend who has the freedom you’re envious of. Better believe that picture perfect folks are usually full of sh*t and being single isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Stick to what you got. Cherish your own marriage, with all of it’s imperfections and inconveniences.

4.       There is an extremely thin line between love and hate. You can love someone more than yourself and still manage to hurt him or her with a contradicting callousness. You’ll promise never to hurt one another but you will and if you’re lucky you’ll forgive each other and stay because unconditional means exactly that. You learn to forgive the unforgivable just when you thought you couldn’t.

5.       Relationships have a shelf life. If you don’t work on it daily, yours will expire. This doesn’t mean you have to buy extravagant gifts or celebrate everything under the sun, just show up. Be there. Listen. If my husband eats dinner with me every night and listens to me gripe about work or gossip about people he doesn’t even know, I’m a happy girl. In return, I’ll go to that overpriced sports bar and watch a game that bores me to no end just to keep him company.

In short, marriage is hard work. Sometimes it’s boring, other times painful, and most often downright tiring but if you can find the right person it really is worth it!

Rolling  credits for the night.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ju8Hr50Ckwk&ob=av2n