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On my second marriage, 8 years on Monday. The first one only lasted 33 years and a few months, but it was in the 32nd year that my now-ex failed the test Soul-Glo’s passed (well, a similar test).
For me, the small things that seem to matter in the moment really aren’t worth getting upset over - at the same time, being small, they should be easy to change. If my wife tells me she doesn’t like me clicking a pen over and over, for example, I think I could stop. But I am kind of addicted to breathing.
I have a mental role model, since my parents were a terrible couple marriage-wise. The model is a bit romanticized, but it is the couple that owns a corner market 100 years ago. They work the market all day, then go upstairs to work the house, taking care of the kids, and possibly parents, all the while. They don’t complain, don’t have social security, don’t have much. But they have each other, family and, to them, a good life. I think to myself, if they could find peace and happiness and enjoy life together, surely I can do the same with the many economic advantages I have over them. Maybe that is the problem: the economic advantages and their pursuit gets in the way of a good life.
My wife has her quirks and annoyances, and I tell her gently about the ones that get under my skin. She tries to do better. But I won’t let them, or my reaction to them, come between us. And if she mentions one of my legion of faults (some of which I can acknowledge), I try to do better.
I’ve been working at home 2 days a week and at the office 3 since March. My home office fortunately is a separate room in the basement (lower level if you have money, I’m told). I don’t see her much when I’m working, so it isn’t very different from my office days.
I’m going to retire soon, and she is concerned about too much time together, which might be the core of Lups’ concern. We are going to sell the house and move to a smaller place at the beach, but I’ll be active in some, or many ways. That will give us time to our selves as well as time together, which really is rare and precious when I’m working (and traveling) full time. The new house is big enough for us to have “separate corners” - one of her requirements, and a good one.
The little things, petty annoyances, should flow like water off a duck’s back. There is really no reason to let them change my attitude and ruin what otherwise is a very good life.
But Lups, neither of us is an engineer and I can’t imagine that horror. I work with engineers all day and that is surely enough penance for whatever sins I committed earlier in life!
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