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It’s funny how easy it is to see our own relationships with rose-colored glasses.  I have an ex with whom I swear I just about never had an argument.  In my mind, rather than just finishing each other’s sentences, each of us would say an alternating word of each phrase, but I’m lucky to have sisters who tell me how foolish I am and remind me that we really fussed plenty.  With my most recent ex, however, it seemed like we argued over everything.  We were just contentious for no good reason.  We probably would have argued over whether we were standing on the floor or the ceiling if we had realized we could.  Just silliness…  Thankfully, my fiancée and I don’t do that.  We have something else entirely going on – something between the no-arguments I saw in the first relationship and the contentiousness of the second.

As I’ve said before, we recently postponed our wedding because we weren’t ready.  Informing the vendors of the postponement was all too much for her, though, and I was assigned the responsibility.  Cool.  She gave me a list and I reached out to the vendors to inform them of our decision.  I let her know I had followed the orders and she was as fine as could be expected, given the circumstances.  Then she remembered Scoobie, the makeup artist.  He wasn’t on her initial list, but apparently I was supposed to have turned on my extrasensory perception (ESP) and read her mind.  I honestly forgot about it but, luckily for me, she remembered today in the car.  I told her I hadn’t contacted him yet, but that I would “try to remember” to reach out to him.  Why did I even say that?

“Try to remember means try to remember” was my response when she asked me what that meant.  During the next fifteen minutes, I was lectured on how it makes her feel to even think about the wedding and informed that by me not telling Scoobie about the postponement, I was forcing her to think about it.   She also let me know that I was supposed to pat her hand and tell her how sorry I was that I had not reached out to him, but that I knew it was important to her and would do so ASAP.  I did it just as she told me to do, with only the slightest bit of sarcasm.  That’s when I started really thinking about who we are as a couple.

She’s my mother, and I’m her child.

“Clean your room,” my mother would say.  “Okay,” would be my reply.  Did I clean my room?  Not hardly.  I heard her, but I wasn’t listening.  She might as well have been speaking in tongues.  Did I listen the second time she told me to do it?  Nope…  When did I start listening?  When she started yelling and reaching for “The Strap,” the belt made of a very narrow piece of leather that she only used when she meant true business.  My fiancée has her own version of “The Strap,” which comes in the form of long stories of the anguish she has experienced at my errant hand.  Because she knows I am a child in need of her guidance, the stories always finish with the proper way for me to rectify the given situation.  Thanks, Mom …  I mean, Fiancée.

I’ve given up fighting it anymore.  My fiancée is clearly just trying to prepare me for the next phase of my life – the one where I serve and cater to her absolutely forever and ever.  Boy, I can’t wait to grow up!

P.S. – Scoobie says just let him know about the new date and he’ll be there.

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