Sunday, April 29, 2007
Life
One hundred minus one day
“Some single, young tart rear-ended me today”
By Lisa Baron
“Some single, young tart rear-ended me today,” my friend reported breathlessly on the other end of the phone. “How do you know she was single?” I asked, knowing that it was unlikely that these two went for mani/pedis after “the tart” rammed her Honda up the tailpipe of my friend’s SUV. “Because,” my friend continued, “when she got out of her car to talk to me she said, ‘I’m so sorry, this was totally my fault.’ No married woman would ever start with, ‘It’s totally my fault.’” She’s right. When it comes to mea culpa, I fight until the last possible moment, before admitting defeat and throwing up the white flag—the alternative would be sitting on a white couch in the marriage counselor’s office.
And while I’m not using my space this week to admit fault or to prematurely apologize for something I’ve done, I do want to say how grateful I am for my husband—a declaration that I will probably come to regret the next time we have a marital showdown and I want to point out how selfish and inconsiderate he’s acting. But during my entire pregnancy—minus the time I told him I was pregnant and he angrily responded with “How did that happen?”—my husband is the best partner any girl, anywhere, could ever ask for. I’m married to a man who has a heart that knows no bounds and a soul that runs deep and wide. And I love him with every extra pound in my ever-expanding body.
I sometimes wonder if I could ever return the amount of love he’s given me in the form of an unrivaled life and years of intangible gifts. Since fertilizing my egg, my husband has: run out to CVS at midnight to get me an industrial-size bottle of Tums, painted the nursery green, spent hours running around Atlanta’s suburbs finding the perfect chair for the nursery and slowed the car down to 30 mph so I could more comfortably vomit out of the passenger-side door.
He also shares in the cooking responsibilities, sometimes surprising me with breakfast in bed, cleans up the kitchen without being asked, makes coffee every morning, picks up things I’ve dropped on the floor (I can no longer see over my bump to know that I even dropped something on the floor), sympathizes with me when I don’t feel good, has yet to put the kibosh on an “Oh goodness I weigh more than Michael Vick” pity party until I’m good and ready to shut it down, suffers quietly through my morning moodiness, offers to accompany me to every doctor’s appointment and has asked me only twice how much I weigh. And instead of retreating to the guest room to escape my new bear-in-hibernation style of snoring, he went out and got himself a pair of earplugs. And he has never once laughed at me as I lay on the floor crying because I outgrew yet another set of maternity clothes.
He has performed each of these tasks without one single complaint, treating me with such kindness, empathy and nurturing that being his wife reminds me of one of my favorite “Winnie the Pooh” moments: “If you live to be 100, I hope to live to be 100 hundred minus one day, so I never have to live without you.”
I'm at a loss about how to show him how full my heart is. For the time being, I can’t even pick up his wet towels off the floor or see to it that his clothes match before he walks out the door. I can, however, offer him support in his moments of unease. I can love him for everything he is, everything he will be and everything he wants to become. I can ensure that our child is raised in Jimmy’s tradition of compassion, integrity and honesty. And I can let everyone know that my decisions, both to marry him and to have unprotected sex during “that time of the month”— when I was ovulating—are totally my fault. And I surrender.
Lisa Baron is a communication consultant, which you’d think would be helpful in a marriage. She lives in the suburbs with her husband, Jimmy. E-mail her at lisabaron@sundaypaper.com.