Trying Not to Lose that Loving Feeling

Get it?! ;)

While we were on a whirlwind vacation to Kansas before school started, I was able to get in and get Sloane's hair trimmed and mine colored by a local gal. To be more specific, Becca went to Caney (my rival school growing up in Sedan), she married my sister's high school boyfriend of two minutes and she lives in Niotaze (pronounced Ny-o-taze - Ny-o-tazee), a teeny-tiny town that I have driven through about 1.8 million times in my life, but never actually turned and went through the town.

So finding Becca was actually more difficult than I had imagined!

Anyway... I had a great conversation with her, which is one sign of a fantastic hairstylist, and before I left, she told me I needed to read this book that she had started.

The book was called "Love Unending: Rediscovering Your Marriage in the Midst of Motherhood" by Becky Thompson. Becky is a blogger who, similar to the Pioneer Woman, was a 'city girl' and ended up in the country. Or northwest Oklahoma.

This book is 21 chapters long and the chapters are very short, but each chapter ends with a spot to take notes and reflect, a challenge as well as a prayer. The goal is to read this book in 21 days -- so every day is a new challenge for you in your marriage, something to try and better, atleast better it than it was the day before.

When Becca was explaining it to me, this is where my mind went...

"That book is exactly what I need! Where is Matt's version?"

Because obviously, if I'm going to try and better myself as a wife, he darn tootin' better be trying to better himself at the same time!

And what's funny is that I was reading this one night while we were hanging out in front of the television (because that's what we do to spend time with each other!) and I told him that I was reading this to "try and become a better wife."

A few seconds later he said he was writing the book on ways to be the worst husband.

Those of you that know us know that being serious is not our forte.
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So I will be honest. The 21 day challenge is going to probably take me 52 days. And I think that's OK. I don't think Becky is going to scold me for not reading every day. The book is about being a better wife AMIDST motherhood, which as most of us know, it takes a lot out of a person by 5 pm.

I read the first chapter and after reading it, I sat the book down and just thought about where I am at in my life... If I could remember life before kids. If I could remember MATT before kids.

And MAN... is that hard! We both have admitted that we don't remember much before Sloane. And what's really funny is that Matt said he doesn't remember much between the five years from when he graduated to college until we got married.

Which ALL just makes us both feel senile!

The first chapter challenged me to greet Matt when he gets home from work the way I would have greeted him while we were dating. Matt and I were long-distance daters for five and a half of our seven-year courtship so when we were dating and I saw him, I had an extra pep in my step.

I don't remember the exact day it happened, but that "jump in his arms" greeting disappeared at some point. When we lived in Minneapolis, I was usually mad at him when he walked in the door.

Why, you ask? My answer is I have no flipping idea. Maybe I was mad that he got to leave the house every day and have atleast 20 minutes of peace and quiet. Maybe I was mad that he didn't call to tell me he wouldn't be home until later. Maybe I was mad that I hadn't had time to make dinner (again) so in turn, I was mad at him.

I don't know why! I feel like as much as I loved Minnesota, I spent a lot of time unhappy there. I made some wonderful friends that I am forever grateful for. But I think we had a lot of things happen to us that were a part of life's road bumps that just made me an unhappy person.

And so instead of being happy to see him walk through the door (which I was), I fueled it into anger. And I had a resting frown face when he would walk in. Most always.

Since those days, we added children, Matt's job title changed, we moved (numerous times), I started doing some things on my own such as this blog, Two Dots, LipSense - you know, just OVERDOING it over here! - but things that gave me a sense of accomplishment.

We have found our version of happy and though not every day is buckets of roses, I feel like they are just better.
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My husband is not perfect. He probably would tell you that himself. But I am most certainly not perfect either. And movies and TV shows (thanks a lot, 'This Is Us') give us all this unattainable perfection of marriage and life that sometimes makes it's hard to not be mad at one another for not being more like 'Jack'. Or 'Randall'.

So tonight, when my husband walks through the door, I am going to be the first to greet him with a smile on my face. I might not jump into his arms like I did 16 years ago... but I will hug him longer and remember that we might not be 20-year-olds and we might not stay out until 2 AM and sleep in until 10, but our journey is still young.

As are our children. Who need to see two parents that love each other. So when my daughter says, "No more kissing tonight!", we can laugh and I can feel like we are doing our job.

So thanks to Becky for challenging me... it may be hard, harder than I thought it would be, but the challenge is accepted!


XXOO,
Allyson

16 Years and Then Some...

Once upon a time, in a faraway land (to many, known as Kansas), in a teeny tiny town, lived two young kids.

These two kids were very good friends. One friend had a girlfriend and the other friend probably was never able to take any sort of hint that she wasn't wanted around all the time, so she was around. All the time. She hung out with the friend and girlfriend all the time.

The third-wheel friend also had a boyfriend who told her nonchalantly and in a joking manner that she was probably in love with her friend.

The friend did not like hearing such things because he was just her friend. And would never be anything more. He was Matt, for Gods sake.

Sixteen years later, those two friends have been married for eight years, have three children, a dog, a trampoline and don't remember much from 16 years ago because... well, because life at the moment is madness... but I can tell you that in January of 2001, none of this had ever entered my mind.

Our love story is funny because never during that time when I was the third-wheel friend (yes, that was me!) was I imagining my life with Matt. Because he was my friend. He was nothing more.

Yes, he had an outrageous smile that made your stomach do flips and his hair always seemed wet because he probably managed to let him take gym class four times a day.

Matt was charming in that he could get just about anyone to do what he wanted, just by smiling. Why do you think he sat next to the odd Spanish teacher's desk his junior year? That gal was blushing all class long.

How on earth did we end up together?

Great question.

Here's what I can tell you.

I had a New Year's Eve party with my friends (who Matt still makes fun of - listen, we may not have been as "cool" as Matt and his buddies back in the day, but my friends were good friends and we made our fun... all legal fun) and somehow Matt ended up there (he is a year older than me so why he was at a high school party must show you the deep-down love he had for me - ha). I was trusted to have a sleepover... because seriously, none of my friends and I had any of those lovey dovey feelings for each other, but somehow, my relationship with Matt took a turn that night. And it was from nothing, except flirting, and being mature and throwing carrots at each other (high school, people).

Since he was in college and his break was a little longer, he was around - he was at a basketball game where I hurt my knee (I DID hurt it... I just probably pushed my recovery time a little longer than needed!) and we sat together.

A few weeks later, we are at a movie together - "Save the Last Dance".

And that was it. The full-on love fest began with hand-holding. And then a conversation in the car, with his brother Michael in the backseat asleep, about what was going on, should we be doing this, is Michael going to hate us.

Side note: I love Michael to death and I have since 7th grade. Matt has joked that he thinks I might have married the wrong Clark boy because for all the things Matt doesn't do (or doesn't remember to do), Michael usually does do. My love for that kid though is full-on brother mode and I'm taking applications for for a sweet sister-in-law for myself (or more for Michael... whatever).

Despite it all, we decided we'd give our relationship a shot. And the rest is history.

They let us get a dog.

They let me teach him to ski (that was fun...NOT)!

They actually let us get married.

We have had our bumps along the way... how can you not in 16 years?! I wanted to kill him most days (said by every woman on the planet at some point in their life about a man). He probably wanted me to be less needy (says every man in the universe).

I watched many Newman Jet basketball games in my lifetime!

We tried time apart at the end of college because I was trying to prove a point with him.

I sucked at that and our time apart lasted maybe a week.

Babies.

In the end, I couldn't do life without this person. He came in to my life as a friend 18 years ago, he became my boyfriend two years later and now here we are, 16 years down the road, and I don't think we ever thought this would be our life.

I don't think we ever thought the third-wheel and the kid with the great smile would end up happily ever after.

But that's the fun of living your own story, your own fairy-tale. You get to write it all.


XXOO,
Allyson

Until We Meet Again...

Losing a loved one is never easy. You can never be fully prepared for it.  Even if you know that it's coming.

Matt lost his granddad Jim last week and though he had not been doing well for a few months, he really hit the downhill slide after Christmas. They moved him to the nursing home and eventually hospice care came in. 

Matt's dad had sent a picture to Matt a week or so ago of the bulletin board in granddad's room in the nursing home and it had a drawing that Sloane had drawn up on it.

But that was not what I saw, what I saw were two things:

• A frail man who resembled nothing like the man I had known my entire life -- let alone the man I had seen just a few weeks before -- his belly was as thin as I had ever seen on him.

• And next to him, lay his wife, Donna, by his side, like always.

I used to tease Matt about his grandparents relationship and why we couldn't be more like them. It was literally something I was hoping we could aspire to be.

They were inseparable! And WANTED to be inseparable! They were the busiest old couple I have ever known: pinochle club, dances on the weekends, Blue Devil sports all during the week, constant food preparation and cooking, which led to Jim's constant washing of dishes and loading the dishwasher.

They just loved to be together. It's hard in this day and age with so many things pulling our attention away from what is most important. Just last night, I told Matt that we could be on our phones for five minutes to look at houses (because I think this is ALL we do right now - look at houses in Chicago!) and then we were putting them away and we were going to watch a TV show together. And who followed those directions? He did. I didn't (house hunting really pulls you in).

But Donna has always been by his side. I remember them from elementary school when Jim was the principal (and terrified me!) and Donna worked as a Title 1 teacher. I remember them always being at ballgames together to cheer on Matt and Michael. Donna even had special shirts she wore to the games, most notably is the "Gramma's Stars" with the boys basketball numbers stitched on stars on her shirt.

Somehow, years later, I sat at their dinner table as a member of the family, with my kids by my side and still semi-terrified of Jim, but helped clean up the kitchen and get the dishes in the dishwasher - almost like my right of passage. 

My hope for Jim is that he is up in Heaven, watching over all of us and finally getting to eat the bad food that he had to cut back on a few years ago for health reasons. I hope he is enjoying all of the pie and lemon jello cake his belly can take! And my hope for Donna is that she can still continue to do some of those things that they used to do together and maybe come visit us before we leave and make many apple pies for me! :)

I haven't seen eye-to-eye with this side of the family much this last year. And it's been hard for me to push aside my differences even when we are around them. But this Saturday, I will not be focusing on that, but will be focusing on the life Jim led and the relationship that he and Donna had and remember that Matt and I might not have yet reached that level that they were on, but that we can sure hope to get there one day!


XXOO,
Allyson