All too often, I regress to portraying mine and Zack's life together as being melodramatic; hurried and half-chance. I guess that's because, all too often, it feels that way, but it doesn't tonight. Emily and I had a long conversation tonight about money and relationships, people and home, and afterwards I should have gone to bed, but I wasn't tired, so I decided to organize and clean up a little, partly because it needed to be done, and partly because doing something like that makes me feel less guilty than staying up arguing with some jerk of a poli-sci major, or some other fruitless, destructive activity.
I decided to find a few folders and a box to act as a makeshift filing cabinet, something we've been needing badly around here, and as I started sorting through our life, in crumpled paper form, I started to get a sense of the bigger picture of us. How simple and pleasant our life might appear to a distant onlooker. How wholesome and all-American we just might be.
We got married young, and now work full-time to put ourselves through college. It's a daunting task that we surmount gracelessly, but at the end of the day we get it all done. More times than not.
There's a jar on the counter that I've decoupaged with pictures from a travel magazine, and we put all our spare change in it, and even bills, when we can part with them. I got the idea the first month after we moved in, when I was feeling particularly depressed about the less-than-glamorous route my life was taking: I was afraid I'd never do all the things I wanted to, see all the places I wanted to see, and after a little outburst, I calmed down and we went out and bought the jar and the magazine. We have strict rules about not taking any money out of it, and we only cheat some of the time. It's not full yet, but it's so heavy now that it's hard to lift, and every time a put change in it, I feel a little bit better.
Our living room rug is the battle field for a never-ending odor war with our dog, whom we haven't trained as well as we should (or at all), but who I'm confident is happier with us, and does not remember anymore being abandoned in the past.
The laundry rarely gets folded or put away, but does get cleaned a little more often than it use to. We stack our dirty dishes precariously on the edge of the sink, and there are cans scattered throughout the house; we put on Zack's Marcy Playground CD when we clean.
Our creditors have the high ground in our constant battle with money, but I still believe that one day, we will pay off our debt.
We get stressed out more often than I'd like, and it feels, all too often, like we are about to fall from the delicate balance that we so narrowly have over it all. But whenever I stop to look around, we haven't fallen yet.
Our song is "Moon River." I don't remember how it first became our song, but I remember dancing to it on our wedding day. I'm listening to it now.
One day, Zack and I will be organized, and more financially secure, and our problems with making love will work themselves out-- rather, we will have fought them out, together, with love, and unity, and patience that carried on in one of us, usually him, when it ran out in the other, usually me. In just under two weeks, it will be our two-year anniversary. By now, we've probably outlived any bets in the pool. If you all pay up, we can probably afford a nice hotel.
Or at least bring me some change for my jar, next time you come around.
On with it.
(P.S. I haven't quite figured out how to use the blog picture service, so until I do, just assume the below pictures are all part of this post.)
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