Day 28: The Dull Days

Somedays it just doesn't feel that special. Days like today. There's no need to analyze why, I know that today we're not trying to make it special. I know this. I'm keeping my hands on my own lap. The dog is chewing on what used to be a tennis ball and Rich is flipping through a cataloug full of things we can't afford. Somedays it just feels like a lot of nothing. I'm still in my coat and my nose is cold. It doesn't feel poetic, it just feels annoying. His shoes are on the couch and I want to snap at him or shove them off. I just glance at them multiple times thinking maybe he'll get the hint. He doesn't.

This afternoon I saw a young couple who were so obviously in love. They were arguing about who was going to pay for lattes- the kind of fighting that is made with smiles and playful jabs. He grabs her credit card and holds it above his head where she can't reach it, while he pays for the drinks. She is jumping at it, but then gives up and wraps her arms around him- but not before sending a quick jab to his shoulder. They hold on to each other and wait for their drinks. The people around me roll their eyes and wish the couple to move along, but I wish they would stay for a minute. I watch them and I wonder how long they've been together. Do they know that they're in love? And how long will it be before their debit cards becomes one and noone cares who slides the card because it's all the same anyway? Maybe that's a good thing. I mean, what girls wants to spend the rest of her life jumping for her debit card?

He asks if I want a glass of wine, I just shrug. I don't really care. I want to want a glass of wine. Or maybe I want a glass of wine to be more than just a fruity drink. I want it to be romance and low lighting and whispers. Bubbles and heady feelings. But in the end, wine is just old fruit, so I settle for a glass of soy milk and change into my pajamas. Is true love really this dull?

I think of a couple we once knew, on another coast. Married for 45 years, they were incredible. She'd say things like "Let's all pray for Ed to lose some weight, 'cuz these are the last pair of pants that fit him!" He would fall asleep in the middle of her sentences- an open mouth kind of sleep that can't be so easily ignored. I love these people and I wonder how many dull days they've had. How many dull days does it take to make a marraige work? When you're in it for life, do you jump around to find the romance, or is it better to just fall asleep?

I don't know, but maybe tonight I will have that wine.

Day 27: I am His Croissant and He is Mine

I made croissants today and they came out perfect. That is one sentence I never thought I would write. As you know by now, I spend my free time baking breads. For nearly a month I've been working on croissants- I've used three different recipes and half a dozen techniques I've never heard of. The first batch never rose, the second batch didn't flake. But this morning I pulled one dozen exquisite buttery crescents from the oven. Some were stuffed with ham and cheese, a few were filled with an orange chocolate, but most were perfectly plain.

If you've known me during my earlier years, this should be a gaping shock. I had a reputation in college and shortly after that was derived from my ability to mess up even the easiest recipe. I couldn't make a grilled cheese sandwich without burning one side. When I married a chef, my girlfriends laughed at the irony. But three years later and I am bent over a slab of dough- rolling it out to 3 millimeters, cutting precise triangles and egg washing the tops. These croissants took 18 hours from flour to cooling rack, but they flake and they shine and they smell like warm butter and yeast. I cram one in my mouth while it's still hot, and I can feel the pastry slide into my stomach. A bit heavy for so early, but I'd better try another. Rich intercepts me before I completely undue a month of diet and exercise and we pack them carefully to give away. In 15 minutes my 18 hours is reduced to smudges of grease on two cookie sheets.

I can't help but compare everything around me to love and life and marriage, so maybe this is a stretch. But is it possible that I am his croissant and he is mine? Perhaps we are creatures of time and flavor. We are layers of texture that cannot be understood completely at first try. We need time. We need to be kneaded and needed. Turned and chilled. We need to be wrapped- airtight and into each other. Patience and time add the flavor and love is the yeast that makes us rise into each other. And some recipes for marriage will never work. But some- most, I say- just need the touch of the Baker's hands.

Day 26: Love is a Family

Take a glance into my mother's kitchen this Thanksgiving and you might be surprised at what you see. There is my sister, an urban twenty-something who smokes and wears ridiculously high spiky red heels. In the house. She's very cool and I always feel a bit mousy beside her. My mother is a fifty-something who radiates a sort of organic glow that probably comes from her standard diet of salad and green tea with lemon. Next to her is my father, a small man with spectacles and a beard. A man who I always remember as taller, most likely because he is clearly the center of us all and his wisdom is not easily forgotten. Nate and Aimee are scattered between their three little ones- like beams in an solid home. They center their girls, giving shape and values to their family. And then there's Rich and I- he watches more than speaks, both of us feeling a bit soft around the edges but inspired by these people who gather from different sides of the State to be together for 24 hours. There's a sadness too, my older brother and his young family are four timezones and more miles away than I'd like to picture. We wonder out loud at how he's doing and wish for him to come home soon.

Love is a family. And I hope this year that you have family around you- people who bring up all the embarrassing thing you did when you were 12. People who notice every pound you've lost and none of the ones you've gained. I hope you have people who will crowd around you at a dinner table and scoop food onto your plate, whether you want it or not. Because it's the love of a family that demonstrates for us an unconditional love.

So when my four year old niece turns to me as we're walking down the stairs and says I love you, I understand the gift of being loved not for who I am or what I am, but because I am. It's Day 26 and today I say that I will love my husband not for the kind things he does for me, or the way he makes me feel. I will love him because he is. He is here and he is mine. And together we make our own family.

Day 25: Travels with Richard

Halfway across Lake Champlain, next to an eighteen wheeler on a ferry built for cars, I had a meltdown. Here's what happened.

Our trips start with so much hope and inevitably end with metaphorical sound proof glass between the driver and passenger side. We've been planning this trip to New York for weeks. This morning the skies were bright, and the roads were clear. We purchased enormous coffees from a local gas station and began the trip home- a meandering 7 hour drive that would turn into 15 hours, a dozen aching muscles and two charlie horses. But he earned both of those.

Let me tell you about Rich and how he drives. He starts out fine. He is focused, he watches the road. But Rich loves to look around him and everything catches his eye- from ponds to pine trees. The problem is that Rich's hands follow his eyes, so when he sees a particularly nice looking stream that is undoubtedly stocked with fish, he does a double-take and the car swerves toward the stream. Micky (who is perched in the back seat) slides, banging his head against the window, I get a jolt of nervous adrenaline and start swearing which prompts Rich to lecture me about my language. At this point I pull out the sound proof glass that I have stored in my closet of facial expressions and we ride in silence for 15 minutes. Until someone says they're sorry and the other person laughs it off. We've been through this scene a dozen times, in nearly every trip we take together. What was once an adorable trait has become something that makes me so crazy I can't laught it off and it ends up leading to a charlie horse.

The Crown Point Bridge over Lake Champlain is closed. It's the only bridge across and he heard from someone that the Ferry cost a hundred dollars each way and that the wait is over two hours. So we spend the next four hours driving up and down the Vermont border, looking for a bridge to New York. There isn't another way and eventually we end up grumpy and on a Ferry, which ends up being a ten minute wait and completely free of charge. A dozen dogs circle the boat, sending Micky into a frantic state of raised hairs and low growls. But my meltdown happens when a couple of men squeeze by the car- they are headed to the railing and press up against the windows, their puppy in tow. Micky loses his mind. He is howling and jumping around the backseat of our Yaris, trying to leap forward and coughing in a strangled way because he's leashed to the backseat. I expect Rich to jump in and save the day but he doesn't do a thing. He looks the other way and lets Micky continue in his tantrum and this sends me into a silent fury. Trapped on a small ferry in a tiny car, I have a moment. I am standing outside of myself looking into this vehicle and I realize that I want to be somewhere else- anywhere else. I don't want to be with this dog. I don't want to be with this man. And I certainly don't want to be on this boat headed into the dark to look at properties I don't know how to find.

There's not much to do but stare ahead as the dock lights come into view. The car stalls as I shift into gear and pull off the ferry into the night feeling a little lost and still annoyed. But we're back on land and I'm the one driving, so everything will be okay.

Day 24: Home

No matter where I've lived or who I've lived with, home has always been a little yellow house on a hill, pushed into the woods. Whether in Oregon or Boston, in a 3 bedroom house or studio apartment, home remains the place of my childhood- 20 acres Upstate. Home has always been a place with trails my feet remember and stories that are written across the gravel drive and carved into the maples. Now I'm starting to think that maybe Home is not this place, but rather the gathering of people who love each other. Maybe home can be anywhere. Maybe home can be a bundle of well-read letters or an hour-long video chat. Maybe home can be a hospital room or a creaky bench in an old forgotten church. The grip of a grandfather's hand or the unabashed kiss of a little one. Maybe home is knowing that there's someone, somewhere who is watching for your headlights to turn up the drive. Someone who is straining to hear the slam of your car door.

I am blessed to have had love around me all the days I can remember. And I love my husband because he has literally made my family his own. There's no competition for affection. There's no guilt about who we see when and for how long. He says my family are his kind of people, and I don't know exactly what that means, but I think it has something to do with a woodstove and a barn and a quiet kind of living. My family is my core and by joining my family, he has become a part of my center.

Tomorrow we'll drive the 6 hours home. I don't know what time we'll get there, but I do know that my dad will be waiting by the door and my mom will be inside, tidying an already emaculate house. No matter how tired they are, or how early they have to get up the next day, they will be waiting. Because when you love someone, you wait for them to come home. No matter what road they take, or how long they take to get there.

Day 23: Run-ons and Dirty Dishes

OK, fine, I admit it. I am not the perfect pick-up-your socks-as-they-fall-off-your-feet, keep-a-scented-candle-burning kind of wife. I let the laundry go until the weekend… and then sometimes only do enough to scrape through the week with clean socks and underwear. Crumbs on a counter don’t bother me. I can rinse out a dirty coffee cup and fill it right back up. But when I find a lead buried in a thesis paragraph I am in a tizzy. Randomly guess on multiple choice questions and I am out of my mind. This is how I ended up rewriting Rich’s homework assignment on a Sunday night, while he moved about the house organizing and washing dishes. It was supposed to be the other way around. And I know he was mad at me because he moved through the house at warp speed- scrubbing down counters and throwing day-old baked goods in the trash. When I heard him downstairs doing laundry, I knew it was serious. After a good 45 minutes, during which time I had rewritten his paper and begun to edit a second, he tossed himself on the couch and said, “Why don’t I just quit my job and stay home then, if all I’m good for is cleaning.” Wait, isn’t that my line? Aren’t I supposed to be the one annoyed at housework and feeling less than valuable? I never know what to do in these circumstances.

The truth is, if I were to do the cleaning, it would take me twice as long and wouldn’t look half as good. And if he were to edit his own papers, or worse- have me sit there and explain every edit and grammatical error, not only would we be up all night, I would inevitably end up making him feel stupid and we’d both walk away angry.

How do you love a wife who’s no good at cleaning, or encourage a husband who can’t write a decent research paper? It may sound silly, but this is something that we are seriously working on. I tell him that we truly are the other part to each other that makes up a whole. But what if you don’t like the part you are- or worse, the part your partner is?

Day 22: Alone Days

I first saw the Ocean when I was three years old. Not far from the shores that I now wander, my parents suited us up in Ogunquit where the beach, even 24 years later is miles long with the softest sand. They say I was terrified of the waves. That I crept toward the water only to scream out loud and rush back as the salty surf hit my toddler legs. And then I would turn around and do it again. From that day forward I've felt the combination of excitement and fear of the Ocean.

Naturally, I chose a College just a few miles inland on Cape Ann's rocky coast. Less innocent but no less intrigued, I would skip my classes and wander up the shoreline, climbing over boulders and dancing across private property. All to see the cresting waves and feel my heart race when the sudsy waters crashed up at me, soaking my clothes. I would smoke Black clove cigarettes until they left a bitter residue in my mouth and feeling very creative and mature, in a lonely sort of way, I would scribble in a journal, staring out at the water half-wishing I could shriek out loud and run for shore again.

The water has never removed it's hold on me. On afternoons like this one, when Rich is working and I am home alone, I feel the pull to wander down the sand. Che Gueverra in his Motorcycle Diaries said that the Ocean was his greatest confidant. That he could yell his secrets to her and she would carry them away in silence. I don't yell at the waves, but I do feel comfort beside them. I feel answers to questions that I cannot put into words, to questions I didn't know I had.

Today I wandered down to the cove beside our house. The homes around us are mostly summer cottages, nearly all of them empty until June. This beach is mine. Today there's a family on my beach. A grandfather, two children and a man and wife. They also have a well-behaved dog who sits beside them. Who doesn't charge at the water or try to stare down the tide. I wish they would leave. I know it's selfish and not very loving, but I have claimed this cove. I wander toward the far end, where the rocks lead out to the river's jetty scanning the ground for bits of whatever- smooth glass or busted shells, waterlogged wood or colored rocks. When I look up I realize that I've wandered nearly into the surf and the waves pick up speed, covering my shoes (and socks) with salty (cold!) water. I dash back up onto drier sand, remembering my first encounter with the Atlantic. I wonder why I'm still a bit afraid.

Day 21: Setting the Oven on Fire

So, tonight I set the oven on fire. I've been baking all day and apparently a little bit of everything I've made- the sugar glaze, the olive oil spray on a sheet tray, several raisins and apple bits- they all made it on the bottom of the oven where they sat marinating in oil and heat. I came up from the basement with a load of laundry to check on my last batch of cookies, when I noticed a sliver of smoke hovering above the kitchen doorway. Even with the hood system, smoke was pouring up from the range. When Rich opened the oven we both saw flames. He slammed it shut and we stared at each other with our what-in-the-world-do-we-do-now faces. "Milk!" He cried and grabbed the quart of half and half which he promptly dumped straight into the oven. While he poured, the fire shout out at him; two quick flashes before dying away.
In a kitchen of adrenaline and smoke he turned to me and said, "You're done! No More Baking for You!" as we opened cabinets and doors, looking for oven cleaner and fresh air.
Micky started running around the house, ducking low and looking for an escape route. When I opened the front door he bolted onto the porch and even now refuses to come back inside. I guess we know he's not the dog to come back to save us, in the case of a more serious fire.

Our house is filled with smoke. And there's half and half all over the floor. And Rich is in the kitchen, cleaning out my filthy oven mess. He's just preheated it to 350 and we'll try those oatmeal cookies one more time. Because we're never done- not with baking, not with loving. Even when we just want to sit on the porch with the dog.

Day 20: Loretta

Loretta is an old woman. She walks the streets of our town bent over so low her face is parallel to the earth. Her shoulders are hunched, as though she is carrying a bundle on her tiny back. Some people say she has nothing except the down jacket she is huddled in. Some people say she is rich and hoarding her wealth. People who've lived here longer than us talk about a fire that destroyed her home and killed her family. They say she's never been the same, that the enormous weight of losing everything has literally crushed her.

Tonight Loretta was in front of us in line at Wal-Mart. Actually, Loretta came running back into the store looking for a Dr. Pepper that she lost. It had fallen out of her cart and I located it resting on the bottom shelf, propped up by Doritos. So she cut in line ahead of us to pay for her soda. I could smell the sweat and urine. Her frizzy head was bent so low as she searched her pockets for the dollar fifty. Rich wanted to pay and he's not always subtle about these things, so I asked him to put the cart back, as a sort of distraction. Three minutes later Loretta is still digging for that dollar fifty that she knows she's got in there. I caught the cashier's eye and signalled that we would pay for the drink, but the cashier shook her head. What was there to do, but wait, in quiet humiliation for this tiny old woman who's chapped red legs poked out of sweatpants two sizes too small. We waited. Finally, Loretta gave up the search for the dollar fifty and instead reaches into another pocket and pulls out an enormous wad of cash, so thick the rubber band wouldn't stretch off. Rich and I stare at each other incredulously. She pays and hobbles away. The cashier explains that she always has money and she's always incredibly slow and she always throws a fit if someone tries to pay for her groceries.

I don't know the truth about Loretta, I don't know if what they say is true. But it made me think about what people really need. So she has money, does this mean that she is okay? Does she have anyone who will sit beside her just to talk? People may care enough to try and pay for her soda, but who will walk next to her when there's no one around to notice? I want to be the kind of person who can see past the outfit, even past the stories that are told. I want to be the kind of person who's not afraid to look a stranger in the eyes, even if I have to stoop down low to do so.

Day 19: Love is a Jamaican Beef Patty

Every weekend I bake all kinds of things. I’m practicing. The plan is to open a café/restaurant within the next few years, and I’ve been assigned the task of baker, so I spend my days off cutting butter into flour and measuring yeast. It’s the best. But at the end of the weekend, we always have baskets of baked goods waiting to be consumed. I’m embarrassed to admit that the mistakes usually end up in the dumpster, but most of my pastries are given away. We bring bread to the neighbors and the rest goes to work where we pawn it off on co-workers. It’s true that we give away food because we know that we’ll end up eating it all if we don’t. But there’s more. When I give a loaf of bread to someone from work who I barely know, I am giving them flour and yeast and over 3 hours of my weekend. Without saying a word, I am telling them that they are worth something. The hardest of all hearts soften up (without a milk-wash) when presented with a paper bag of chocolate croissants. And you should see the things we get in return. We’ve been given fresh Canadian Walleye, even fresher Frog legs, and last night Kevin gave us 6 enormous Jamaican Beef Patties, straight from Brooklyn. We love Jamaican Beef Patties- flaky crusts and spicy meat; they are literally happiness that you hold right in your hands. But here’s the thing, we’ve never given Kevin anything. I’ve never thrust a bag of baked goods towards him. I’ve been trying to figure out why he thought to bring us those Patties, and I think it’s because when you give out love to people in tangible ways, other people see it and they want it and they start to give out love of their own. This is why love will always be the greatest thing, because it’s something that all of us want. And all we have to do to get it, is give it away.

Day 18: Storming it Out

We don't fight often, but when Rich and I fight, it is a thing to behold. Like last night. I won't go into details, but... actually, I will go into details.

We were talking about buying a house and how much mortgage we could afford. I was arguing for taking out a higher mortage and using the extra to start a business. Rich wants to take out separate loans for a business and mortgage. He says we should use other people's money to start a business, in case it fails. I said that he was already betting on us failing and that he was a scaredy pants, and other things that wives shouldn't say to their husbands. He kept going with it and I got so mad that I reached out and pinched him as hard as I could. I don't know what's going on with me and pinching, but lately it's been my way of expressing frustration. Mind you, this is not playful pinching; this is grab and twist pinching. He tried to pinch me back, but I twisted away and he ended up grabbing my arm, which hurt a little, but mostly made me angry. So, he's yelling at me to never pinch him again and to apologize right now and I am yelling at him to stay away from me, with angry words I've never heard myself say. It's quiet and we go our separate ways- me to the couch, him to the bedroom.

But I can't stay on the couch all night because it's cold out there. Remember, heat is not allowed after 11pm. Micky, being the traitor that he sometimes is, has chosen Rich and they are pow-wowing in the (warmer) bedroom. I know I have to go into the bedroom and make up. I'm still mad enough to pinch, so I don't say anything, I just go sit on the end of the bed.

We ignore each other for a moment, then Rich starts to laugh, this is our signal to make up- it means that we're ok, that we don't mean whatever just happened. I laugh back, but we're both still eyeing each other suspiciously. Like two half-drunk gamblers in the Wild West- each suspecting the other of cheating at cards while trying to conceal the ace we've hidden up our own sleeve. For the first time since we've started this experiment, I really do not want to be intimate with my husband. But I do, even though I am still angry. We make it through the night, barely touching.

This morning I woke up to the smell of coffee. Rich tackles me on the bed and asks for his 100 Days of Love wife back. I promise not to pinch anymore and not to swear so much and he says he'll listen to my ideas more often. (How many times does a girl hear that?) It's Day 18, after the storm. And we're ok.

Day 17: Searching for the Stitching

We took Micky to the Ocean today. Not the beach, the Ocean. The beach is warm sunny days with soft tidal waves that slide across your sandals. The Ocean is a totally different place. The Ocean is gray waves slapping the sand and moving rocks as big as your fist. A sound I can hear, even now, in the safety of my living room. A rumble, like sneakers in a drier. It was in between tides when we took the dog to play. Micky is a lot like the Ocean on an angry day. He's all energy and noise and not completely pleasant.

So we're standing at the edge of the earth. Rich threw a baseball out into the water, the usual routine. But the ball was waterlogged and sank, as Micky charged in after it. He's looking and looking for the ball- running up and down the short beach until he finally stands and faces the water. I can still see him standing there, glaring down at these foamy gray waves that pull up to his chest. I was ready to go get another ball, but Micky doesn't move; he's daring the Ocean to keep his ball. He stays like this for thirty seconds, maybe a minute, just looking at nothing- looking at everything, searching for that red stitching. Then a wave, larger than the rest, crashes over my dog's head and he's soaked to the fur, shaking and without a ball.

I look at this crazy mixed breed of a dog and I absolutely love him. This is a dog that I have dreamed about putting to sleep, that I have bruises from. This is a dog that instigates most of the arguments in my household. A dog who snaps at everything- from people to mosquitoes. But I watched him take on the Ocean for a moment, as if he could bully the waves into giving up his ball.

And there was something in the ridiculous tenacity of his stare down with the Ocean that reminded me of love. Maybe love- or our partners- are a little bit like that red-stitched waterlogged baseball. They starts out precious to us, we play with them all the time, so much that they are marked by our kisses and affection. But eventually they become older and worn. They don't look so shiny anymore. And when they're thrown into the ocean of our lives- the crisis, the craziness- how many of us just want to go look for another?

No, we need to be like my crazy dog, who even now refuses to get off my feet, even though I've lost circulation in both of them. We need to face the Ocean and look for those red stitches. We need to stand there, even when life crashes over our faces. We must stand by the person we love. Because they are ours. Because we chose them.

Day 16: The Things We Lose

Someone stole our Tom Tom. And every loose wire in our car, from the MP3 hook-ups to the cell-phone chargers and other random connectors whose use we've forgotten. My passport is gone too- but it was expired and I only kept it around because it was a decent picture. This is the fourth time that in the past three years that someone has broken into our vehicle made off with our loot. We've lost a total of 2 Canon manual cameras, a zoom and wide angle lens, a cell phone, the keys to a private school in Medford, Oregon, two sets of gym clothes and now Tom. I don't care about the stuff, really. Stuff is stuff. But I can't help feeling betrayed. Maybe we're just careless, but I think it's more that we want to live in a place where everyone can be trusted. And every year we're let down. They say don't leave your doors unlocked and eventually we do and then we're emptied out.

Maybe it's all this talk about love, but I can't help thinking how similar this is to so many of our hearts. We leave them open because we want to trust, and then, when we don't expect it, we're abandoned and left with nothing. But the thing is, our hearts aren't just stuff. They are everything we have, everything that sums up who we are. Cameras and GPS systems can be replaced over the weekend, but how long does it take to replace the contents of a broken heart?

Day 15: The People Who First Love Us

I think we learn how to love from the people who first love us. For me, this was my parents. I remember my mother gathering me on her lap. She used to say, "you are my treasure." I now know she was referring to a proverb that says "where your heart is, there also will be your treasure." But as a kid I used to picture my brothers and sister and I, each a different jewel (I was a ruby) packed into this precious treasure chest that my mom carried with her always. I felt so valuable. I knew I was loved because I could visualize, with my eight year old imagination, what I was worth to my mother.

I remember sitting in the truck, in a Shaw's parking lot, listening on the phone to my mother crying. She had my letter in hand- the one that told her we had eloped. And I knew she didn't understand. I knew she thought she was losing me, that we would never get back to the treasure-chest days. I was walking away from 24 years of love toward a man I knew for three months.

I didn't understand then, what I know now. And that is that it is possible to do the right thing the wrong way. Rich is right for me. I know now more than I have ever known that he is my one. But I broke a few hearts in the process. When we choose to turn away from the people who first love us, our hearts never quite return to the way they were before. Sometimes I wonder if this childlessness is the result of that quick decision. When we don't honor our parents, do we lose the chance to become parents ourselves?

Day 14: Sitting and Being

If you were to walk down Lower Beach road tonight and look in the window of house number 28, you would see us sitting on the couch. I am bundled in a blanket, wearing two sweatshirts. Rich is sitting beside me and we're both facing the TV. But it's turned off. I'm scribbling in a journal and he's working on homework. We're not talking about our day. We're not flipping through channels or surfing the internet. We're sitting and being. It's taken three years of noise to get to this quiet place. It's a place where we don't have to fill the silence between us with words or questions. It's a place of breathing. There's a quiet clink as I set my wine glass down. He smiles when I slide my hand into the warmth under his knees. And like a battery that's nearly drained, I feel myself recharging in the silence. This is good.

Then Micky discovers my glass of wine and knocks it off the coffee table while trying to get a good sniff. I leap up and knock over Rich's homework binder in the process. There is noise now, the sound of life- yelling and running for towels, laughing and groaning at the rose colored splotches in the carpet and on my socks. I don't mind. I change my socks and while I'm at it toss in a load of laundry. Rich puts on music and I grab the laptop and chatter away as I check e-mail and such.

The quiet is gone, but we had it for a moment, and that moment was good.

Day 13: Surrounded by Silent Acts of Love

I said, "We need to work on really loving each other. This hundred days is supposed to bring ephiphanies and new levels of commitment. it feels like we're the same old people- just a lot more tired." He didn't say a word, just handed me a pile of clothes- fresh from the drier and mostly folded.

Later on, as I was folding chocolate squares in pastry dough, I continued with it; "I mean, you haven't kissed me once since we got home. I guess that means I haven't kissed you either. maybe we're not going to change." He looked up from the counter where he was scraping crusted flour and butter off the formica and shook his head before turning to gather my baking dishes.

That evening, after editting his Psychology paper and adding APA citations until my head spun, I stared at the laptop screen in frustration. "Rich, I'm a fake. I have nothing to say about love today. I have nothing to say about marriage. It's Day 13 and we're no closer to each other than on Day 1. And I just don't feel like doing this anymore!" He stood at the bedroom door and gave me the look he gives me after I've said something ridiculous. The look that says, wait, are you listening to the words that are coming out of your own mouth?

He said, "First of all, no excuses. If you're going to do something, you need to see it through." I started to interrupt, but he just kept on going. "And haven't you been paying attention? I get up 30 minutes before you everday so that you can wake up to fresh coffee. Because I'm trying to show you that I love you. You made me chocolate croissants- for 5 hours on your day off, because you love me. I scurry after you cleaning up your croissant making messes and folding the laundry because I want you to know that I love you."

At this point he was increasing in volume and I looked down at the blankets, a little bit embarressed. "And did you not just spend an hour fixing my Psychology paper? Naph, we're more in love than every, you just have to stop looking for these huge moments and you'll start to notice the good stuff. The real stuff."

And he's right, of course. But I hate being told like that, and I'm the one who's supposed to be noticing all of these details. It makes me wonder what else I've missed- not just with my husband but with everyone I love. Why is it that the more we love someone, the less we notice that love in action? And how much richer would our lives be if we really looked and realized the extent to which we are surrounded by love?

Day 12: A Tale of Two Wedding Rings

We lost the Wedding Rings again. And by we, I mean Rich. And by Rings I mean mine.

His was already lost.

We lost the first ring on a camping trip in the Adirondacks. Rich was collecting sappy firewood and the ring caught and slid and was gone. We realized the next morning. And so for the next year we shared my ring- it was a bit too tight on Rich and a bit too loose on me. He wore it for a few days. We soaped it off his finger and I wore it for the next. This year, on our anniversary, he bought me a new band; simple gold that fit snugly. Later that night we sat on the steps leading into the backyard, twisting our rings, sipping fruity wine and feeling very married. Without any notice, the ring that began as mine but was acquired by him slipped across his fingertips and through the open steps. I said, let's wait until morning, but he shined the flashlight in ever direction, tearing up each blade of weed and grass under those three small stairs. Nothing. Sometimes we still go out there and poke around, but it's gone.

My new ring doesn't fit on his finger. We tried to jam it on, but the knuckle caught. Until yesterday, when the air was particularly dry. Rich was bemoaning the fact that he didn't have a ring and I offered to loan him mine (it's a familiar routine). This time it skinned past the knuckle and is stuck on his finger, indefinetly. We're sharing, again.

I wonder, what does this say about us? If we can't manage to keep a pair of rings, how can we manage to keep each other? Then I think of how we react to losing symbols of our marriage. I realize that I'm not angry at him for losing BOTH our rings. If fact, I'm quite the opposite. I feel blessed to have a husband who loves me enough to jam a ring past his knuckles leaving scraped skin behind, because he wants the world to know that he belongs to me. And there's something about sharing a symbol of our union that makes it a little more precious.

Day 11: so you will always know

There's a note tucked in the bottom of the glove compartment in Rich's truck. It's shoved beneath old insurance cards and receipts, registration forms and wrappers. Some days, like today, when I'm feeling just a little bit lonely, I pull it out and read it again. I wrote this note to my husband on our Wedding Day. If you open the small envelope, smudged with well-worn creases, you can read what I wanted him to know.

Dear Richard,

On the morning of our wedding, 2 hours before I take your name, I'm sitting in the breath of silence between what was and what will be.

And I want to tell you that I love you. I want to write it in a place that cannot be forgotten so that years from now, when our whispers have been silenced, your heart will remember that this heart belongs to you. Today I say that your dreams are my dreams. I look not to find my own identity, but to carve out a life for you and I. I will fight for you and take care of you. And when you're hurting, I'll take half, so that together we make it through. I promise to be faithful to you, for all times. I now belong to you and no other...

And the letter continues, in the way that romantic letters do, promising everything despite all manner of circumstances. I reread the letter, even though I've memorized its better lines. I reread it because I want to feel what I felt on that morning. I want remember, in ink on page, what it was like to feel so much for him that metaphors weren't enough.

And now that I remember, I can go back to washing the dishes. I can fold another load of laundry on my day off, even if all of it ends up being his clothes. I know that love is in the details, in clean towels and a freshly made bed. I know this, but I never want to forget why.

Day 10: Baking Bread

I've been baking bread on the weekends. Half a dozen loafs each Saturday, trying to practice and perfect this dietary staple. It's part of a greater dream that we're following, one that has yet to make it into these posts. Regardless, on Friday nights I skim our miles of cookbooks and settle on a recipe. The Bacon and Onion Fougasse turned out flavorful, after three attempts. The pepper and onion flower-pot breads were an instant success. The Farl took two weeks, but ended up tasty, for a British bread. We bring the loaves to our neighbors or friends at work, carrying them around in parchment paper, like little warm packages.
I've fallen in love with baking bread. It's true that I have a new 6 quart professional kitchen-aid stand-up mixer that does all the hard mixing and kneading. But I've fallen in love with baking bread because of the process. The rising process. I read that the longer the yeast is activated in the bread, causing it to rise, the more flavor the bread will have. Take the Fougasse; the first time I attempted this bread I used quick-rising yeast. The recipe called for 4 hours of rising time and I was looking to cut corners. And so I used quick-rising yeast, one that is balanced with chemicals to make it rise in half the time. Within an hour the bread was done rising and I was pumped. But it tasted like nothing. The texture and the colors were perfect, but the bread tasted like a day-old biscuit. The Fougasse is a beautiful bread and so I tried it again, this time using fresh yeast. It rose for 4 hours. It rose for two more after that. An entire day spent rising and in the end, the bread was filled with flavor. We tore off pieces and ate it for days. We didn't give any away. You see, the only difference between this Fougasse and the first, was the time that I allowed it to develop.
And isn't that the way we are as husbands and wives? I want Rich to be a quick-rising husband. I want the recipe for a perfect marriage and I want it in half the time. But I am learning a thing or two during these 100 days and one of them is that marriage is a lot like bread. It's in the time spent rising- the down time, the long hours, that the flavor of our lives is developed. We can rush our marriages and they may end up looking great with perfect texture. But if we want a love that is rich in flavor- a love worth tearing off in pieces, then we must wait and watch and let love grow in it's own time.

Day 9: Headache Wife

Today was one of those days. The kind where you stumble into the house at 5pm with a blistering headache. Tylenol can't even touch it. And all you want is the biggest glass of wine. The glass you've been thinking about ever since the long meeting this afternoon.

From the front door I can see the bottle of wine, empty, next to a pile of dishes. My husband is sitting at the table, next to a now-empty wineglass, resting from his own even-longer day.

100-Days-of-Love wife would sit on his lap and ask about his day. She knows he got up at 5:30 this morning. She knows he drove six hours today. She would notice the tired in his face. But tonight I am not 100-Days-of-Love wife; tonight I am Headache wife. Headache wife doesn't want to hear about anyone's day. Headache wife is eyeing the cooking brandy, wondering if it will numb the explosion behind her eyes. Headache wife curls up on the couch under well-worn quilt and buries her face in the pillows. She snaps at every question, glares at the dog for breathing too loud and grumbles that the lights are so bright and the TV so loud.

But Rich knows Headache wife, and somehow he loves her too. Where I'm straight up mean, he calls it fiesty. He turns on the heat (miracle of miracles!) and peals off the quilt, hauling me into his lap so he can rub my head. And for an hour- two hours, he rubs my scalp, cramping his own body to take away the pain in mine. I fall asleep and he sits with me in the quiet.

It is Day 9 and for the first time in these 100 days I can actually see love at work. When there's no passion. When there's no romance or sexiness. I see love in purest sacrificial form , I feel it at work in the tired hands that rub my aching head. And I'm thankful, to the point of tears, that this love is mine. Undeserving though I am.

Day 8: Politics

I said, "I'm not a liberal, I'm just sensible."
He said, "What's that?"
I said, "My point exactly."
He said, "No, really, there's nothing like that on the ballots."
I said, "My point exactly."

Driving home from work tonight we're talking about politics. It's election day. Rich and I talk politics all the time- usually one of us is shouting and we've rarely agreed on an issue. You see, when you elope with someone after only knowing them a few weeks, you don't find out certain things. You don't learn about how they see seatbelt laws as the government overstepping it's bounds. You don't find out that they secretly love conservative talk radio (and agree with almost everything that's said) or that they despise the welfare system with an uncommon anger. These are the pieces of a partner that you discover in layers. One heated debate after another.

I wonder, would he have called me back if he knew my last car was covered in hippie bumper stickers? Would I have continued to date this guy if I knew he supported the war in Iraq? Would he have asked me to marry him, if he knew how obsessive I was about seatbelts?

But when you're married to someone, you don't walk about the door because you think she's a bleeding heart liberal. You can't refuse to see him again because he thinks hunting is a sport. Because you're united. You are one person. And so we fight it out. I tell him he's being ignorant ( again) and he tells me I should move to Vermont and eat granola.

Eventually we laugh about it because in the end our core beliefs are the same. We're two people who want to know that the people we love - that the person we love-is taken care of. Love is at the core of our politics, which is why we can be so different and still remain the same. Together.

Day 7: The Keys

This post is not about the keys to making a marriage last. This post is not about the key to keeping passion alive. This post is about the keys to our Toyota and what they tell me about my husband.

I should start by saying how blessed we are to work at the same location. Rich and I both work at a University, with relatively similar hours. We carpool everyday, which is wonderful. Accept for the fact that the keys are mostly lost and we are usually running late. It's not that we're unorganized- we have hooks for the keys by the front door, we have tiny cute bowls for the keys in the kitchen. We have baskets for the keys in our bedroom and even a jar for the keys in the bathroom. Last year we had a key alarm that sent out beeping noises when we whistled for it. But the batteries eventually died and our we both were sick of walking around the house whistling angrily at every basket of clothes or jacket. See here's the thing. Rich usually drives and when he drives he always puts the keys in his pants pockets. Looking for the keys in the morning usually isn't much harder than figuring out what Rich was wearing last night and digging through the laundry pile to find it. This morning was different. This morning was different because I was the last one driving and when I lose the keys (rare though it may be) there is no sense of reason to their location. We looked. And we looked. We retraced my steps from the car- to the mailbox, through the living room, to the refridgerator, to the computer, back to the refridgerator...nothing. We were digging through open boxes of spaghetti and searching through jackets I haven't worn in months. After forty minutes of searching, we found them tucked in a novel, like a bookmark. There they were, on the coffee table, holding page 44. Figures.

I said I rarely lose the keys, and it's true. But I'm guilty of all kinds of angry words when Rich loses the keys (which is nearly everyday). I mean I get angry and pouty. I stomp around and snort like it's some great crisis. But today, when my patient husband was running 30 minutes late for his class (and there was a quiz!) he doesn't even frown at me. He kisses me like I'm a champion after spotting them and drives to work in as merry a mood as ever.

He loves me. My husband loves me and that is why he doesn't huff at me when I use the car keys as a bookmark and then forget all about it. He doesn't get silent with me when I make him a half hour late to class, because he cares more about my heart than his own tardiness.

Now, if only I could get him to use the key hooks... or the bowls... or the baskets...

Day 6: Pulling Apart

I don't know why I can't talk to Rich about our infertility. No, that's not true. I do know why, I'm just nervous about writing it out loud. I'm afraid my husband isn't that strong. What kind of wife thinks her husband is weak? But it's true. When it comes to things like this; things that society says determines whether a guy is really a man, Rich is sensitive. The ability to produce babies is definitely one of those things. So I can't look in my husband's face and explain to him that my heart is broken with dissapointment. Because I don't know if he can stand up straight after that kind of blow. And so I don't say anything at all.

Today we went to church. We sat in the back pew and listened to the Pastor speak about broken people. Near the end of the service, he was talking about different kinds of brokenness. He said, "to the couple who cannot have children, they need to let it go and use it as a way to have compassion on others who cannot have children." I started crying, big sloppy tears and in my heart I was angry. I thought; no way in hell am I going to let go of this. I am holding onto this and I am fighting for this. If I let this go, it's like giving up.

But in my spirit, I know that this Pastor, who I've never met, is right. I mean, everyday I see people who are holding on to brokenness. They clutch onto their addictions and their hurt and all the bad things that have ever happened to them, forging some kind of bitter identity from it all. I don't want to be this kind of person. I don't want to hold this infertility as a badge that I cling to. But I'm not ready to move on, either. I don't want to talk about what our options are, I want to rewind back to the day when 14 year old Rich Maynard started smoking pot and I want to shake him really hard and tell him what happens in 15 years.

The service ended and we left. Rich noticed my eyes were puffy and asked if I'd been crying. Seriously? We were sitting side by side, listening to the same words, and not only is he unmoved, but he doesn't understand why I am upset.

And so I pull into myself and become embarrassed. I say, "no, I'm just tired and my eyes are itchy, I need to take out my contacts when we get home." Because I can't say the truth; that I'm dissapointed. That maybe the love we have between us isn't enough. How do you say that without crushing someone, even as you feel yourself pulling apart?