Philip and I had a rough week last week. We were away for a little while for a wedding and road-tripped for a LONG time and when we came back we were really close. That much time alone in the car made it feel like we were getting to know each all over again. But, then real life came and slapped us both in the face.
Philip is still settling into his school routine (he LOVES his new school!) and I've been working a lot (2 jobs that I LOVE, but that can be very time-consuming and stressful at times). Money has been stressing us out as we have a couple of big things to save for (nursing school being one of them, and since I haven't even been accepted, I have a complicated relationship with saving money for this). We also need to find a new place to live by the end of the month. So this week, on top of normal work stress, we viewed 2 homes that were dead-ends, my truck died and will most likely be a few hundred (if not more!) to fix, and Philip's car has an electrical problem that no shops in our town seem interested in fixing.
I don't handle these things well. I get angry and sad and I cry and I say mean things. Philip handles things differently than I do. He kept telling me things would work out. But, in my anger and frustration, I just wanted to know HOW. How is it going to work out? How are we going to be a one-car family if my truck isn't able to be fixed? How are we going to pay for plane tickets to Pennsylvania if we have to spend so much money on other things this month? How are we going to save for nursing school? What if I don't get in? What if we can't find a place to live in time? Why can't we just have a day off to deal with all of this?!
This is where I get to be a big sister, and be a little sentimental. Yesterday, after things had settled down (translation: I settled down), I realized how happy I was that I had Philip to deal with this stuff with me. I have a lot of friends that just got married or are getting married soon. So, my advice is: Marry someone who makes you happy, even when NOTHING in the world is making you happy. That doesn't mean you have to like them all the time. Sometimes when everything sucks, I don't like anybody. And through no fault of my sweet husband, he falls in that category. But he never stopped being there. Marry that guy. Marry the guy who doesn't leave when you blame him for things that are entirely out of his control. Marry the guy who lets you get your frustrations out, but doesn't let you walk all over him. Marry the guy who just keeps telling you it's going to work out, not because he's just trying to calm you down, but because he truly believes that the two of you will figure out it.
To my single friends, when I was single, I loved it. But I also thought, every so often, that life would be easier if I were married. It's not really true. Life is hard, no matter where you are in it. Life was hard sometimes when I was little. Life was hard sometimes when I was in college. Life was hard when I was a single young adult. And life is hard now that I'm in a very different place in life (and it's hard in new and challenging ways!). The only difference now is that when something bad happens to me, it will, never again, happen just to me. It will always happen to us. And, the same with him. Pessimists could look at this as doubling your chances of something bad happening. Or, you could look at it as being half as bad because there's someone to share the burden.
We still have no clue what's going to happen with my truck. We still have nowhere to live after September. We're still waiting to hear about nursing school. We still have unexpected expenses that will rock our plans. And even though we (I) don't always handle it in the best way, we handle it. And we always will.
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| Courtesy of Richardson Fry Photography |
We got this, Boone.
yay!
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