Happy

 

Hello, friends! Just a quick blog from yours truly this week. It’s been over three months since Larry and I were married in beautiful St. John. We’ve had a busy summer and have just started reuniting with people whom we haven’t seen since our wedding celebrations. It’s been nice meeting back up with folks, reminiscing, saying ‘thank you’ again in person, etc but that’s not the point of this post. The point of this post is to talk about the question I’ve been getting the most lately (almost as much as the obligatory “how are you?”) That is:

“How’s married life treating you?”

I struggle with answering this question.

First of all, neither Larry nor I are overly emotional, excitable people. For the most part, we are pretty private. There are many aspects of our relationship that we both believe are just between us. We’ll hold hands in public and show other displays of affection but we aren’t that couple that is going to be shown on the kiss cam or the couple that is going to be shouting our love from the mountain tops. It’s just in neither of our personalities. So when people ask me this question, I FEEL like I should be effusing about everything that’s great about being married but that’s just not me.

Second, not a lot has changed. Larry and I lived together BEFORE we were married and had a house together before we were married so it’s not like we are adjusting to living with each other and his/her routines, habits, etc. We were already used to the chores that somehow became our respective chores and we had already adjusted to each other’s timelines, quirks, annoyances, pet peeves, messes…you get the point…that sometimes you can only learn by living with another person. Further, minus the rehearsal dinner, we paid for the entire wedding by ourselves so we had already adjusted to a lot of the first financial challenges and discussions surrounding those challenges that many couples may not have to deal with until after the wedding.

So to most people I have been simply responding with “It’s good. Not a lot has changed but it’s good.” I kind of feel like this is a piss poor answer. Even though most people who know me realize I’m not the type to gush, I still feel like I’m not telling the truth. Because the truth is, after reflecting upon this question, I have realized that something actually HAS changed. I realized this after talking to my girlfriend Naomi recently and telling her that lately I just want to be at home. I love my job and all my other extracurricular activities but most nights I just want to rush to get home to Larry and our puppy Daphne. I had this feeling of just wanting to be home before the wedding (it’s not like I avoided being home) but it’s even more intense now that we are married and have our own little family with Daphne. For the first time ever over a drill weekend, I was truly a bit homesick whereas in the past, I would have just been so concentrated on working over the drill. So why is this? I guess I don’t know. I think it’s partly because as I stated above, we have our own little small family with Daphne so I not only want to be home with Larry but I also want to be home to care for and spend time with Daphne. But I also think it’s because now that all the planning and rushing and events related to planning not just a wedding but a marriage are over, we finally have time to just relax, be, and enjoy our time together. For me, I think I am just really content right now. And maybe I don’t need to explain why or try to understand “why is this?” Maybe I just need to be content with being happy and start telling people the truth: married life is happy…no gushing or effusing required.