14

Fourteen has been an important number to me for a long time.  Of course it was a horrible age. I assume it was for most of us.  For a boy/man you had to be tall, strong and fast to survive fourteen.  I was none of these. Fourteen is high school freshman year, where being picked on was my default.  It came from sophomores and juniors, my sister was student body president and had the senior class on lock down.  Mostly it was my soccer teammates, but baseball had its fair share even after I turned fifteen.  I was 4 ft. 11 and overweight (still am; actually I'm 5' 8" now, but definitely overweight), I was a horrible combination of band nerd and soccer practice squire.  I had a favorite hat that my teammates pissed on and never told me, but I heard the sneers and figured it out.  They thought I was too dumb to notice, but I'd already washed it by the next day.  You had to earn your place.  I did. In fact, fourteen became my number once I made Varsity two year later.

Fast forward to 2017 (to a completely unrelated topic).  Fourteen years after I married her.  That's twice the seven year itch, but I'm not sure that I could honestly admit to feeling scratchy.  Marriage is hard.  But I've never seen myself with anyone but her.  I didn't date much, mostly because as my wife said years ago, "you have no game."  I'm not good at making friends, let alone the kind of friend you spend the rest of your life with.  I can't fake interest well.  I cut off conversations when they bore me, small talk is a miserable experience.  My wife is not only my cliche' best friend, she is my only true friend.  A true friend is the first person you want to call with good news, bad news, and everything in between.  At some point over the last 14 years we've realized that we have no one else.  For a very long time I encouraged her to make decisions on her own, learn the tasks that I handle in the household and in general be more independent.  But after nine weeks of my own physical ailment, I've learned that my dependence on her has made my appreciation for her grow exponentially.  Perhaps, the fact that I handle the business of the household is because I am better suited for it, not that I am fulfilling some manly stereotype.  I'm proud that my wife contributes to our finances and in fact out earned me for more than half of our relationship (I was jobless and homeless on our wedding day, she had a good start).  

So she's dependent on me.  I'm dependent on her.  I need her to take over when the kids hang on my last nerve.  I recharge and take over when the same happens to her.  Even if it is just 10 minutes after she took over for me.  Two tag team wrestlers slapping hands over and over as we keep the three smaller more agile spawn from pinning us.  Those days are exhausting, they test our minds, our souls, our self-control, and every gift of the spirit God gave us.  However, they are the days I depend on my mate.  They are the days when I know the greatest team I'll ever be on is our family.  I love my wife,  I can't do life alone.  As long as she is willing to forgive and work, and as long as I return the favor, I plan on dying with this wedding band on.  So since you'll eventually read this hot stuff, I am OK with doing the things you think I'm better at, Lord knows you are better at plenty.  

Married Up, Exhibit A

As previously stated, I cut off conversations when I'm bored.  I'm fully aware that I do this to my best friend/wife as well.  I'm working on it.  I also do it to my kids.  This is one of my greatest flaws. Their stories never land. The plane in my mind is still circling the runway.   My older son sounds like Elmer Fudd, constantly repeating the same opening sentence to a discussion; "Guess what? Guess what?" etc...  My daughter gives every detail of the situation other than the subject and verb.  If she could just start with:  Friend at School... farted, then I could fill in that it was in the lunch room in an odd time that everyone was quiet, and the detail of the other friend squirting milk out her nose would have made so much more sense.

I'm rude, and I never see it when I'm doing it.  It takes a true partner to except me with my flaws and help to make me a better person.  She does it.  I hope and pray that fourteen years from now we will have moved on to a new flaw, I have several to choose from.