shishnit.org

I have considered and reconsidered writing about this topic, but since it’s affecting my life at the moment, I am going to delve in and write about it.

About a week and a half ago, Rick went to the ER. Why? Because he had a lump on his back and it was oozing a type of mucus or fluid. It was of course concerning. It turned out to be a skin abscess. This is something I was totally unfamiliar with and trust that it took me nearly a week to find anything appropriate about it online.  Google was not my friend, I don’t care about Cat skin abscesses dear Google gods!!

For those that are brave information seeking souls, or medically interested…you can read about it here or here.

I am in affect changing the “packing material” in his now open wound. This takes place twice a day. How in the hell did I learn what to do and what medical supplies to buy to avoid paying doctors extreme amounts of money to provide wound care you ask?

I asked my brother in law’s girlfriend who is a nurse. She drove Rick to the medical supply place and then they both came back and she took the time to teach me how to provide “wound care” to Rick’s wound all by myself. She even lent me her tools.

I’m basically removing a big band-aid, pulling out packing material (that’s sold in a bottle full of long stripping of packing material thread like bandages), and pushing new stuff inside. This requires a lot of alcohol wipes on the two instruments that Chrissy provided me with, both look quite nursey (nursey is that a word), no NOT nursey, they look “medically technical”, and then I take a long cotton swab, much like a long q-tip, and push the new bandage threading inside the open wound allowing some hang out for drainage, and then I put on a new BIG band-aid. And then I spend a few moments scratching around the Bandage because apparently it’s uber itchy.  I’m sooo attentive as a nurse to the husband.

The packing material looks like the below..imagine grabbing this long 1/4 inch stripping with long tweezers from a bottle where it’s all coiled up inside like a mass of thread worms and removing it, cutting it to size and then pushing clean new stuff inside with a long q-tip.  Trust me when I say finding the end of each time is not easy (from inside the bottle that is).  I have problems sometimes judging the length I will need and then after shoving it inside his wound on his back, I must use my nursey scissors and cut it shorter after it’s inserted.  I’m not a nurse but I play one for my husband twice a day!  I love you honey and I’m gonna fix your boo boo.

First and foremost….thanks for getting it regarding my son and his choice of jeans…it’s truly so not important in the big scheme of things.  My biggest worry has always been, “Does he feel loved?”  I think a child that knows and feels that they are loved..is a blessed child and that is what I want for my son. Now my post… 

Everything in life seems to be about adjustments and changes.  Some are small and you barely notice them and then you think, “Geez, I used to always give myself pedicures between those professional pedicures, why’d I stop?” or it could be “I never used to think that it was bad to buy myself a cup of coffee, why do I think that now?”  And then some changes are bigger and come at you full force like a train off a track.

Like my recent job change that required a work schedule change.

Last week I spent the majority of my free time at work (and yes…I have free time at work because yes I have free time at this position, it’s a well known fact) pining away for my husband.  I didn’t realize beforehand just how much I would miss spending time with him.  I think it’s been equally challenging for him.  This past weekend while shopping for School clothes for my son (and thank goodness I have my shit together because the baby Daddy had not a dime for school clothes this year!!!), I picked up things for Rick.  I bought him quite a few t-shirts and a new pair of shorts.  I didn’t plan to buy him things but I often buy myself clothes here and there and sometimes I go through phases where I don’t buy things for Rick.  And since Rick is a man, he doesn’t buy himself clothes. 

I got off track there.  Changes….sometimes they are small ones that go unnoticed until later and sometimes they are big ones that you notice immediately.  My change in working hours has been more difficult than I anticipated.  I love my husband and apparently really enjoy spending time with the big lug.

About a week ago the battery in my Fossil watch stopped.  This is the Fossil watch that Rick bought for me on our honeymoon.  So after a few trips to places I’ve always purchased watch batteries from before it turns out that only a Fossil dealer can replace a Fossil battery.  (nice pain in the ass coincidence Fossil!)  Rick was off from work today and so while I was sitting at the front lobby desk of where I work in he walks into my workplace (something he never does!) carrying my watch in a zip lock type bag from a jewelry store.  He took it to a Fossil dealer and got my watch battery replaced.  His doing this for me really made me happy down to my toes for several reasons.  I haven’t been able to resolve the problem myself, he noticed I had a problem, and he fixed it.  Love that!  We decided to go to lunch together…late lunch for me, probably an early dinner for him.  It was nice to see him midway through my workday and it was a surprise.  It’s also nice to have my beloved watch back on my wrist right where it belongs.  He also paid to have my watch cleaned, he bought a warranty service on it and of course it now has a brand new battery.  The cleaning part really rocks because you don’t realize how dirty a watch gets until they clean it.

I suppose what’s been going through my mind over the last few days comes down to this
“After you have a sucky marriage..you view everything good that comes after it differently.  I imagine it must be much like a prisoner getting out of prison and going to Disneyland.”

Rick is my Disneyland….  Even when change comes and I must adjust, it’s rather nice to know that I actually “miss” my husband….missing someone means you love them. It means you find their company to be enjoyable.  Yah this is not rocket science…but I am glad that the novelty of love never wears off for me.
 

I used to spend hours online late at night talking to strangers or writing blathering’s into my blog for attention from strangers, or simply just falling apart in the context of text, which was the only thing I had for an extremely long time.  Text, words to strangle or tangle myself up in.

Tonight it’s after midnight and I just spent a few hours online working on my film class.  I also scrolled around looking for a reading light for my bedroom so I can ditch can the clip on version because I bought a new bed for the new house.

I just had a moment of clarity.  Some would say I haven’t gotten over the past…they would be almost all wrong.  Yes, there are prickly things in my past that I struggle with, the former marriage is not one of them.

I am happy.  I am content.  I am overwhelmed at times with how marriage can be.  How good it is meant to be and is for me now.  There are small moments like now when I am munching on a late night bowl of cereal when I think, “Damn this is all so good, thank you!” 

I don’t know who I’m thanking since I struggle with my spiritual beliefs…but if it’s merely the universe or luck…I am full of gratitude.

I used to stay up staring at this blaring bright screen late at night to avoid…tonight for the past few hours I have lulled my aggravation with school and spending time at it…with thoughts of “when I get done, I can go curl up next to my man”.  The fact that I find reward in that is something I don’t take for granted.  Rick is not perfect, heck I’m not perfect….

But when I go lay next to him and listen to him breath in the middle of the night and feel my Chloe’ness curl herself up against my leg…..that is bliss.  That is home.  That is….

Rick,

Here we are in month 64 since we met.  When I now think back to those early days I remember a sense of wonderment, an emotional place and time where life almost stood still and allowed us to play and run through the rain. I know we’ve never actually run through the rain for fun, but those early days remind me of that joy.  I recall so many things but mostly I recall a sense of amazement at how happy I could feel in the midst of life falling apart as I knew it.  My whole world crushed in a matter of weeks and during that caving in, there you were on the ledge to retrieve me, hold me and help me through.  Most people would call that a rebound. I call it a soft place to land.

We’ve not always had easy times and we’ve had our relationship tested a few times, the thing I remember about the darkest time in our relationship, the time that we rarely speak about now, is that even during that time you could never turn your back on me, even when I deserved it. I have images in my mind that will be there for all time.  I recall you, me, one morning before a court date, worried, wondering, what would happen.  I recall me spending lazy Sunday afternoons in our bed, waiting always waiting to come retrieve you during those long 6 weeks.  I remember just how much I miss you when you go away, or when I stupidly send you away.  I know it seems like I’m recalling only the bad things, but you see life’s trials and tribulations often destroy relationships.  In our case, they have strengthened me, us.  And for that I am always grateful.

 I could write a long paragraph about the things that drive me crazy but I’m sure your paragraph about my faults would be longer.  However, I want to tell you about all the things I don’t ever say, the things that make me smile deep inside even as I stubbornly claim otherwise.  I love the way you hug me, with your entire body.  I love the way you aren’t a pushover and I love that you fight back when I’m acting irrational.  I love the way you smell, I love the way your hair feels under my fingertips. I love the way you never turn away from me at night when my limbs reach for you like the stems of flowers reaching towards the sun. I love the way I trust you, the way I know that I will never hear about what you are really doing from anyone else.  I love that you work so hard every day.  And yes I love that you sweat and get dirty and are manly and covered in muscles.  There I admitted it.  I know I roll my eyes when you make a muscle, but that’s because I’m stubborn.

I need you. I need you more than I ever say; I want you more than I can often stand it.  I just have such a damn hard time not being scared to show it.  Stupid, I know.  The more I care, the harder it is.  I suppose I also really like how you tolerate my emotional baggage. Sure we lose patience with each other but mostly I just love how we never lose each other.

Sometimes at night when I wake up and I can hear you snoring I want to kick you until you stop.  But more than that I just have a swell of gratitude inside my chest that aches so much for how lucky I am to have you there beside me.  I know what it is to lay against the wall at night hoping for life to just stop because it’s so damn hard and so vacant to lay beside someone you hate.  I have lived through those things and while I often wish I had met you first, I didn’t.  I am just glad that I met you at all.  Life is a funny thing; it doesn’t always just gift you with amazing things.  You are amazing to me.  It’s always amazing that I got a second chance to do love right.  I know I’m probably messing up left and right but please know that I am trying so hard not to.

I used to spend a lot of time wishing for something else.  In fact I spent over 30 years wishing for something else, anything but what was.  I haven’t wished for a long time because I have more than I could wish for because I have you.   Here we are in month 30 of marriage and I’m glad we did it.  I’m glad you said yes.  I’m glad I shoved down all my fear of rejection and loss long enough to ask because my one act of bravery has yielded a thousand moments of bliss.

The single biggest thought I always have when I see you mowing the grass, getting dressed in the morning, spraying yourself with cologne, putting your shoes on, wiping the truck windshield off this morning…I’m so lucky.  Is luck something that just lands on you one day? Is it an amazing windfall, unexpectedly?  That’s my definition of luck when I see you doing the mundane everyday things.  My heart still lurches to my throat in anticipation when I see you walk in the front door.  Thanks for always coming back to me, it is the best thing in the world, us…you…me…our life.  There are still all those reasons I pick you, they are just multiplied by time.  I love that I can look back and recall the good ole days with you now.  I love that we have built that together. 

You are the boy that saved me, taught me a new way.  You are the boy that moves all of my books without complaint.  The boy that goes to work even when your back hurts.  You are the boy that can make the worlds best breakfast.  You are the boy that never rolls your eyes when I say I have to write another paper.  You are the boy that smokes outside at my request.  You are the boy that gave me Chloe for my birthday.  You are the boy that hangs up on me when I need to be hung up. You are the boy that doesn’t complain about my books piled up all over the house.  You are the boy that made me whole, the boy that can’t stand to see me cry. You are the boy that lets me spend hours at the bookstore just because I love to.

I love you more than you can imagine. I love you more than I show. If you ever wonder how much I love you, count the waves at the ocean, I love you endlessly…

Your wife,

Kristy

p.s. pick up your socks!  Please.