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.