It's funny how being with someone for a long time can make it both easier and harder to find things to talk about. There's a kind of shorthand that persists and makes conversation a bit stunted, but that is a part of knowing someone so well that you can predict their reaction with relative ease. You know how they think and you have so much shared history that conversations are Cliff's notes. You are in the know...
So, how do you keep talking about things without it becoming rote? How do you keep the conversation from being stale and boring?
Shockingly, the answer is that you have to keep yourself from being stale and boring. When you stop growing, you have nothing new to offer, and no new ways of offering yourself. You have to be able to meet one another from new angles and with new experiences.
When my husband began teaching just as I stopped, I found myself having more understanding of his job and how he dealt with it, and the stress, and the actual work, in a totally different way. When he was working in a PR agency, I really didn't understand what he did all day. I'd had limited experience writing press releases and calling newspapers, but the culture of his office, the way he spent his time, how he dealt with clients... they were all mysteries to me.
Grading. I might just as well have typed, Poop. It's the part of teaching that I hated the most and I'm pretty sure that Josh feels the same way.
Students. I might just as well have typed, Monkeys. Okay, that's not the most accurate way to put it, but I can say for sure that Josh and I are equally amused by students, though we don't always see them the same way.
My point is that we have a new way of interacting, new things to talk about and news ways to talk about them. It's kind of weird having an understanding of his job, that (at first) he did not. It's even weirder now that I'm teaching and he has an understanding of my job that I do not.
But it's nice.
So, I keep thinking about the ways that I need to keep myself from becoming stagnant. You could call it my to-do list to shake things up between us and keep myself growing.
Tuesday, February 22
Sunday, February 20
new and improved
I haven't posted in a while, and it's partly because I feel like I don't have much to say. Nothing new anyway. The weather has warmed up and we've been spending time outside, as much as possible. My classes are going well, and I am looking at the possibility of teaching a storytelling class in the fall. I'm probably going to visit my sister in North Carolina for Spring Break, and Sweet Caroline will get to take her first ever flight on an airplane, and I will get to meet the fabulous Ruthie the Dog.
No matter how angsty I get about life, and my current circumstances, or how suddenly enlightened I become, or busy, or distracted, or just lazy... life just moves on. It keeps going whether I'm caught up or not. Caroline will learn to walk, and Jonah will calm down (right?) and the rhythm that we've created will become a regular beat to the music that is our life. I am learning to improvise and harmonize and relax into the melody a bit. I spend time remembering who I am and how very far I have come. And I've been spending more time with the One who has led me this far.
I remember a few years ago writing a post called Things I Would Never Post in which I listed off a few topics that I would never really get very explicit with... one of the topics was about some anger that I still had that really frightened me. I'm happy to say that I don't feel anger toward that person anymore, and that anger doesn't frighten me. I think I had to feel it to know that I felt that I was a worthwhile person.
So that anger is gone but sometimes (maybe this should be in the category of things I should never post?) I feel anger toward my children and my husband. My whole life is wrapped around being the one who takes complete care of their needs: laundry, dishes, meals, appointments, naps, activities, snacks, happiness... these things have become my responsibility, but no one seems to have taken on the responsibility of MY needs. I realize that it is selfish, but occasionally I get prickly about it and worn out (usually when I haven't had a lot of sleep) and that anger frightens me.
Maybe in a few years I will be able to look back and know that my anger was just my own way or reasserting to myself that I am a person who is worthy of having her needs cared for.
Philippians 4:19-20 And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus. To our God and Father be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
No matter how angsty I get about life, and my current circumstances, or how suddenly enlightened I become, or busy, or distracted, or just lazy... life just moves on. It keeps going whether I'm caught up or not. Caroline will learn to walk, and Jonah will calm down (right?) and the rhythm that we've created will become a regular beat to the music that is our life. I am learning to improvise and harmonize and relax into the melody a bit. I spend time remembering who I am and how very far I have come. And I've been spending more time with the One who has led me this far.
I remember a few years ago writing a post called Things I Would Never Post in which I listed off a few topics that I would never really get very explicit with... one of the topics was about some anger that I still had that really frightened me. I'm happy to say that I don't feel anger toward that person anymore, and that anger doesn't frighten me. I think I had to feel it to know that I felt that I was a worthwhile person.
So that anger is gone but sometimes (maybe this should be in the category of things I should never post?) I feel anger toward my children and my husband. My whole life is wrapped around being the one who takes complete care of their needs: laundry, dishes, meals, appointments, naps, activities, snacks, happiness... these things have become my responsibility, but no one seems to have taken on the responsibility of MY needs. I realize that it is selfish, but occasionally I get prickly about it and worn out (usually when I haven't had a lot of sleep) and that anger frightens me.
Maybe in a few years I will be able to look back and know that my anger was just my own way or reasserting to myself that I am a person who is worthy of having her needs cared for.
Philippians 4:19-20 And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus. To our God and Father be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
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