show me the most beautiful woman in the world…

You know that horrid saying?

You know the one.

“Show me the most beautiful woman in the world and I’ll show you a man (or woman) who’s tired of sleeping with her?”

Yeah, that one.

I’m thinking about coining a new one.  How do you like this?

“Show me the most loving woman in the world and I’ll show you a man who believes she is a raging bitch”

attention world, there is stock photo of this.  yowza.

BFO and I are fighting about my upcoming move (and child care and money and his time with spiderman and all sorts of important stuff).  And initially (I’m talking about like an hour ago–fresh!) it was REALLY painful.

Like… shockingly painful.  But then I realized that this is our pattern.  We’re fine when everything is just flowing, but if there are decisions to be made, something new to figure out, or compromises to be had we fall apart almost instantly.  It’s amazing to me that you can live with someone for 10 years and in 6 short months be completely unable to work with them.  What kind of denial were we living in then?  Or maybe now?

The painful part was realizing that he sees he me in a very unattractive light.  And I don’t mean physically, although probably that too…  I mean, he seems to think that I am horrid.  An awful bully who doesn’t care what other people think.  It’s completely the opposite of the image I have of myself.  To be even more specific, the painful part was remembering that I used to share that same vision of myself.  I’m grateful not to any longer, but still… ouch.

I was always in charge in our marriage.  I made all of the decisions… and I actually thought I was doing him a favor by being that way.

Note to self: people want to have a say in their own lives even if it appears they don’t because their pace is different from yours.

Really, I do know that by now, but we were way past the point of no return and even if we weren’t, we just aren’t “right” for each other.

So, I was young, and anxious and reacted by trying to control…  but here we are now exchanging unpleasantries and I am horrified by how he sees me and can I feign innocence?  Not really… I probably see him through a horrid lens too.

Ugh.  The worst part about this whole thing is that it really sucked the joy out of the day yesterday.  I couldn’t even post about my daily joy/silliness for the challenge because I honestly couldn’t recall any.  I’m sure there was some… but I was blinded to it.  It was freaky.

I witnessed at least two miracles this week:
1. A boy whose mom I know from an online group of women who had babies due in June 2007 got a new kidney after years of painful and terrifying treatment for atypical HUS (a disease that destroys the kidneys when the immune system is stimulated).  I got to see the power of prayer lift this family into light from the moment they found out there was a potential match all the way through a successful transplant.  They still have a long road ahead, and the road will be bumpy, but they are scheduled to go home next week.
2. At Spiderman’s Spring Program I saw two preschool children reach out to another child in kindness and invite him to hold hands and “twist” with them when his assigned partner was unwilling.  No one told them to… they, as 3 year olds, were able to see his need and offer him comfort with a simple gesture.

These are the things people are talking about when they say “there is only love.”  Everything else is only an illusion.

So when I flounder and flap around shrieking (in my head) about not knowing what to do about a fight with BFO and how to make this better, that root of love is probably a good place to start.

And now is always a good time, isn’t it?

Things to love about BFO:

1. He loves spiderman, with all his heart
2. He has been and continues to be a master of play.  He shares with him a spirit of playfulness that I not yet been able to harness in myself.
3. He is tender and comforting to our sweet boy when he needs it
4. He is clever
5. He is loving
6. He is an excellent arguer/debater/convincer
7. He is persistent and committed
8. He is fun
9. He never raises his voice
10. He’s a great cook