#11: The "no good" list

A few moments ago fiance asked why I had not bothered to clean the cat box in the past few weeks, leaving him to scoop the poop nearly every night.

Me: I keep forgetting.
Him: If I were gone for a week would you just forget to change our kids' diapers? 
Me: (no answer)
Him: Or would you forget to feed them?
Me: (no answer)

And suddenly the following list pops up in my mind:

I'm just no good at...

• follow-through
• consistency
• keeping my word
• discipline
• schedules
• remembering

And then, with eyes already closed, fiance crawls under the covers and says in a groggy mumble: "But I don't hate you."

Know why he said this? Because he knows that the more strongly I feel a difficult emotion, the quieter I get. (Yup, introvert here.) And so he knew that in my silence I secretly felt hated. But not by him-- by myself.

In 75 days I am going to be somebody's flighty, moody, sensitive, fickle, coach potato, head-in-the-clouds wife. It's frightening and depressing to know that I will (on some days) be a disappointment to him. It only highlights the simplicity of the single life-- a time when I could keep my worst flaws somewhat tucked away, on a leash, and under control. I don't think any person (not my mother or my best friends) has ever had hand-to-hand combat with my flaws quite like my partner has.

But there's no turning back now. I've already signed up for the vulnerability and no-holds-barred kind of relationship that marriage is. So Brian, brace yourself--because there's no telling what ugly junk will surface from now until our golden anniversary.