Couplehood

Five Signs You Need A Holiday

Originally uploaded by Dave-F

1. Your Head Hurts When You Think
Thinking is easy. You can do it anywhere. It should take mere microseconds (and probably micro-calories) to process a thought to completion. However, when you find that deciding between water and orange juice after dinner becomes a mentally and physically excruciating exercise, you know you need a break.

2. You Speak, And People Stare Slack-Jawed At You
Hint: it's not your charisma, and it's not because you are delivering a ground-breaking dissertation on theoretical physics; to be honest, it's your face, and the telling signs of exhaustion written all over it. I know this guy who has the most amazing set of eyebags known to humanity. Both eyebags are pitch black and both droop to his chin (exaggerating). He looks like he could do with a few decades of enforced hibernation (again, exaggerating). I can't help but gawk when he talks, because half the time I'm wondering how he coherently forms sentences. One long holiday desperately needed there.

3. Things You Like To Eat Lose Their Savour

"Oh, not me!" you say. "Double-chocolate Marshmellow Rocky Road never fails to satisfy." Clearly, you haven't experienced pain that takes you beyond the edges of the human threshold. Either that, or you've never been pregnant. If food starts to taste different - moreso if you are not pregnant - take a break pronto, because your brain's messing up.

4. You Drive, And All You See Are Twerp Drivers
By twerp, I mean something really mean. If you're driving and you're finding that other drivers are giving you symptoms of a heart attack (a heavy, strangulating, suffocating experience, far more intense than anything like indigestion; pleurisy or spasms of the esophagus), it's not just the bad drivers, it's your repressed hyper-stressed psyche. In this case, however, you don't just need a holiday (in a remote island resort preferably), you need medical attention. (That said, Singaporean lorry drivers are a bunch racer manqués who shouldn't be allowed to touch anything faster than a rolling pin.)

5. You Are Insanely Angry At Nice People And Innocent Little Children
This is where people cross the line between super-stressed-ness, and sociopathy. Detect it before it happens. Personally, I get very sad reading the story behind the mass murderer who shot 35 people in Tasmania. It could be have been avoided.

Conclusion: An Honest Analysis
It looks, then, that I need a holiday. Somewhere - anywhere - but here. You know the feeling?

Ten Reasons Why I Need My Wife

Originally uploaded by Jams_123

Just ten. But I'm warning you, this might get mushy.

1. I'll be a grumpy old pooch if she didn't tell me to be nice.
2. I won't be able to fall asleep at the right times (non-unearthly hours) without her patting my head. (Works better than warm milk. Mostly because milk gives me gas.)
3. I get to stay home more often. Strangely, I've grown to like this.
   
4. I won't have someone to fool around with.
5. I want, for once, to not have to play with SOEKs (SomeOne Else's Kids) and start to have SOMOs (Some Of My Own).
6. One word: Comfort.
7. Birds, bees; cars, keys (figuratively, if you please)
   
8. I won't have someone to blame for leaving wedding dinners early.
9. I can't make it through a day without seeing her smiling back at me. I just can't.
10. There's also that noodle dish.
    

Gents, I absolutely *DARE* you to go up to your wife tonight, and her one thing you need her for.

Really. Do it.

Crabby

Originally uploaded by steev-o

I Was Crabby

I tire easily these days.

Maybe it's the lack of regular exercise (a situation, I promise, I am working on by means of a step machine), or a regular sleeping pattern. It might even be the stress common to urban humanity.

Whatever the case, I'm tired.

I Just Realised I'm Not That Young Anymore

I Know How He Feels

Facebook Reminds You of Your Friends' Brithdays. And Your Impending One.
Just over the weekend, some of my old classmates celebrated their 27th birthday, marking their irreversible stumble into the realm of the "late twenties". That's a journey the Missus and I will be making this year too, though that won't be the main highlight this year.

I was thinking: we're both not all that young, and we're probably more prepared for familyhood than we think.  Thinking back over the years, I'm seeing how the Good Lord has prepared us for our roles in a marriage, if somewhat indirectly through the harder knocks of life. Still there's lots to get ready for.

The Humbling Heartbeat
Just last week, the Missus saw our little one's heartbeat as it throbbed in a small corner. I missed it, and I'm beating myself up for missing it (because of work - her appointment was in the afternoon after all). I'm determined not to miss the next one.

When I got the call about the heartbeat, I was moved to near-tears. I'm not sure which got to me most - whether it was the baby's unmistakable sign of life, or if it was the reality of fatherhood once again reinforcing itself in my mind. Probably both, really.

That sort of made me feel young and inexperienced again. I think that goes for both of us.

Marriage Counseling: What Needs To Be Done

 

I’m mulling over a comment I got a few weeks ago from my wedding counselor (also pastor, and friend) who told me that I've got to start letting go of singlehood, and start preparing for Angela to come into my life. “Don’t be married singles!” was his firm advice, which begged the question: What changes do I need to make as I switch from singlehood to couplehood?

Less Time On The Distractions
Heh. Well, Angela thinks I’m a 'net addict, but I’m firmly resisted the label. I can prove that there have been long spans of time where I’m neither on a computer nor hooked up to the internet. It’s called sleep.

Okay, seriously. I’m going establish a habit for “No-Distraction Time” – and the first step’s already taken. I've taken out all the computers in the couple room, except for the Mac Mini, which is probably going to serve as a media center more than anything else. All other distractions like books, magazines, and TV will be minimized (TV is Angela's weakness). Man, I’m feel cold turkey-ish already.

(… and following that) More Time Together For The First Year
The first year’s important, yes? I've heard that in some older Jewish traditions, the newly weds cease all forms of work for 1 to 2 years just so that they can work on building the marriage. Sadly, we don’t have that luxury,  and we've got bills to pay. That doesn't mean we can execute that in spirit, by prioritizing the marriage above all other humanly relations.

Actually, It’s All About Small Steps
Patience is a virtue, and if what the ladies on Real Simple say are right, then it's going to take some time to get used to each other. There are old habits that we're going to need to drop, and similarly, new habits to will need to be cultivated. Inevitably, there are going to be rough spots, but with the right amount of patience, and the acknowledgment that both of us need to put in effort, I think we'll be able to work things out.

Bye bye, singlehood. It's been nice knowing you.

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