After finally exorcising our house of pets last December, we’ve finally gotten around to replacing the stain ridden, pet saturated carpet. Yuck, and way overdo. The crew has been in this week pulling up carpet and putting down the new hardwood floors. Last night, we needed to move my wife’s 75 gallon fish tank and oak stand so the work could continue today. Not an easy task to say the least…especially around 10:30 when I was ready for bed.
As Beth got started, we ran into a few little issues. The place where we wanted to put the fish tank was not floored yet, so that meant we’d have to move the tank at least 1 more time. If you know anything about fishtanks, a 75 gallon tank has about 2 inches of gravel in the bottom. Practically a 2″x18″x60″ concrete slab. We had to figure out where to put the fish during the move. Wifey’s plan, put the fish in bowls all over the kitchen.
I’m a planner by nature, so I was more than a bit frustrated by the situation…which seemed to have not been thought through. Wifey got a little testy. She does that under pressure sometimes. It’s cute. 🙂 In that somewhat heated moment, which I contributed to, I found myself asking/thinking, “Why do I always have to do this planning for you?” Then it hit me, that’s my part of the marriage. Opposites attract, etc. Honestly, I smiled, felt a little guilty, then did my part by executing on my marital contribution. Planning and problem solving.
Bowls weren’t going to cut it. Moving the tank 2x wasn’t going to cut it either, so I looked for options. I found a cooler in the garage and voila. The 30 fish had a home for the evening. No I didn’t freeze them. 🙂
These types of interactions are typical of our marriage, and quite often I think about how other marriages handle these exchanges. It would be easy to look at a spouse and say “Why can you just take care of this? Why do I always have to do this for you? Can’t you just get the kids to pick up? Can’t you…” You get the picture. As we approach 10 years of marriage this year, I am increasingly beginning to “own” what I bring to our marriage rather than let myself be frustrated. Opposites truly do attact, and if we really learn to respect the opposites that our spouse brings to the marriage, it becomes a truly marvelous and enjoyable thing to be married…most of the time.
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