Ted turns onto his side in the middle of the night and places his hand on my hip. The handprint of physical warmth spreads throughout my body. As I lie still next to my husband, I think, “Whatever good I have done in my life to deserve Ted, I am thankful.”
Fast-forward to breakfast. As I eat a piece of toast or some yogurt, I watch Ted take out six containers and a bowl. He measures one ounce of Uncle Sam’s®, a few Cheerios®, a smidgen of Grape Nuts®, a tablespoon of oat bran…..
I throw a load of laundry in the washer. When I return to the kitchen to empty the dishwasher, Ted is – slowly – slicing half a banana onto his masterpiece. Thirteen blueberries have been dotted onto the cereals.
I go upstairs, answer a few e-mails, make a phone call, and return to the kitchen to evaluate what the fridge holds for dinner. Ted looks up from the sports pages and smiles at me between spoonfuls. I think, “No jury of my peers, i.e. married women, would find me guilty of anything if I were to bop Ted on the head with each of those six containers.”
Ted’s slow, methodical ways drive me to distraction!
He never speeds while driving. Okay, I can live with that. But he does not even get close to the speed limit. He does not know the phrase “go with the flow.”
Most days, we drive through a commercial district where the speed limit is 35. Ted hovers around 25. Sometimes I honestly think he is doing this just to agitate me. I look over at him, ready to say something sharp. But when I see his face, I realize that he is just being his blissful self, driving along without a care in the world. He would be appalled to know I could think that he was intentionally irritating me.
So, I take a deep breath and soften my tone a bit. “Our appointment is at 2:00 today, Ted.”
“I guess the speed limit is 35 on this stretch,” he says as he speeds up to 31 or 32.
I sit quietly, saying my mantra in my head: Patience is a virtue, patience is a virtue, patience is….
There will be two or three more of these little irritations during the day. After 20 years together, you would think I could remember not to ask Ted a question when he is in the process of getting me a glass of wine. He does not talk and act at the same time. So he sets the wine bottle down while he answers my question. Sometimes with a very long answer. I look longingly at the wine bottle as I attempt to listen patiently, but I am silently reminding myself, “DO NOT ASK A QUESTION UNTIL THE WINE IS IN YOUR HAND!”
And then we get into bed at night and Ted gives me a warm skin-to-skin embrace, and I think, “Whatever good I have done in my life to deserve Ted, I am thankful.”
