Day 56: That Point

“I thought we were at that point!” He’s defensive and I’m all silent fury.

It was a lazy Saturday a few weeks back and we were going shopping. I said I didn’t feel like doing my hair and makeup and did I look ok? He said, that actually I looked a little bit scary and why don’t I just fix myself up real quick. He would wait. “What?” He says as I ignore him for the next thirty minutes. “I thought we were at that point!”

Or last Christmas, when he bought me fuzzy white pajamas that made me look alarmingly similar to a polar bear. Micky growled and I shouted “I hope you kept the receipt.” He looked annoyed. “What?” I continued, “I thought we were at that point!”

But we’re never at that point, even when we are. That point is the place where you stop pretending. The place where you don’t hesitate to speak the truth. But who wants to live in a home where everything is stated. Where there’s no mystery, no internal cringing at the muscle shirt he wore on our first date. Where no one has to pretend the rice and beans are “very cultural,” (gulp) with “lots of flavor.”

I understand the whole point of marriage is for two people to become so tightly connected that the filters between them fall away. That love, in its truest form, is always brave enough (perhaps crazy enough) to speak the truth. And even though it doesn’t feel all that romantic, I’m learning that romance is about perception and feelings. Love is about who the person is after the candles have burned away.

So, yes, we’re at that point. The more-make-up-less-beans-save-all-your-receipts point, and not to feel bad about it, because it means we’re still in love.