My Ben is getting married to our Lovely Jillian on August 28th!!! I am so excited for them!
Looking at their engagement pictures today I could see the happiness in their brows. They both seem very relaxed and that is a very comforting thing for a mother to notice.
I thought about all the things I have learned about being married in the past 7 years, mostly how much work it is even when it is a really good marriage and how worth it all is to work at it. The operative word is being "kind."
If Ben were sitting across the table at dinner or on the couch in the living room I would probably tell him some of those things as I thought about them. Many things are no brainer polite society rules, but some are surprising to me still. Since he isn't here I decided to do a series of posts on things that have made me a better spouse and things that my Lou does to make me a better person.
I was raised by shouters, I am a shouter, I used to be married to a shouter, and my kids are shouters too, I think. Not so much any more (for any of us) because I think most people just remove themselves from your presence when the shouting begins. Not shouting comes under the "being kind" heading.
Learning to approach things that need to be discussed is one of the hardest arts to develop. Believe me, the person receiving the information is always going to feel like "this isn't the right time" every time you want to "talk." Doing it out of context is probably where I have gotten my best successes. Doing it out of context in a one sentence statement and then just shutting up has been the most positive way to make a point I have ever used. I highly recommend it.
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