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Love song with double-sided tape.
Misha and I weather-proofed our windows tonight. This is a complex process involving outlining the window with double-sided tape (always a finicky item to handle), pressing big sheets of thin clear plastic against the tape, and then shrinking them to fit tightly over the window using a hair dryer. Neither Misha nor I had ever done this before, although I was familiar with the theory. Many problems were encountered: tape coming unstuck and spiralling all over everything, plastic sheets tearing or suddenly proving to be too short, un-draw-able vertical blinds over the patio door that had to be individually held out of the way.
And through the entire painstaking, unfamiliar, irritating process, we said not a harsh word to each other. Not a one. I don't know about him, but I wasn't even having to hold any harsh words back. We worked together smoothly, handing off tasks, helping each other, improvising solutions, getting it done. We even - and this is the part where it starts to sound like I'm making this up - spent a few minutes talking calmly about an aspect of our relationship that's been bothering us, while we taped and cut.
This, in my mind, is the difference between a grand passion and a great marriage. This is what, four and a half years ago, set Misha apart from everyone else I'd ever had strong feelings for: we work together well. We have our problems with practicalities - we've certainly had to straighten out plenty of problems of our own making - but those problems don't create tension between us. If we get lost while driving, if we face a four-hour flight delay at the end of a long trip, if we've messed up on paying a bill and owe penalties, if we're out of vanilla at 11:00 on a Sunday night and need to bake a cake to take to work on Monday... we swing into problem-solving mode, and we do it together. No sniping. We're a team.
Love is not enough to make this happen. I have no illusions that I'd work this well with some of the other people I love. I don't know what it is. But it's what made me so sure that I should marry him, just a month after we met in July of 1997. It's what protected me from jitters before the wedding and regrets afterward. We have our problems, of course, and more will come up in the future. But I'm really rock-certain we'll fix them together. It's what we do. It's how we work.
And through the entire painstaking, unfamiliar, irritating process, we said not a harsh word to each other. Not a one. I don't know about him, but I wasn't even having to hold any harsh words back. We worked together smoothly, handing off tasks, helping each other, improvising solutions, getting it done. We even - and this is the part where it starts to sound like I'm making this up - spent a few minutes talking calmly about an aspect of our relationship that's been bothering us, while we taped and cut.
This, in my mind, is the difference between a grand passion and a great marriage. This is what, four and a half years ago, set Misha apart from everyone else I'd ever had strong feelings for: we work together well. We have our problems with practicalities - we've certainly had to straighten out plenty of problems of our own making - but those problems don't create tension between us. If we get lost while driving, if we face a four-hour flight delay at the end of a long trip, if we've messed up on paying a bill and owe penalties, if we're out of vanilla at 11:00 on a Sunday night and need to bake a cake to take to work on Monday... we swing into problem-solving mode, and we do it together. No sniping. We're a team.
Love is not enough to make this happen. I have no illusions that I'd work this well with some of the other people I love. I don't know what it is. But it's what made me so sure that I should marry him, just a month after we met in July of 1997. It's what protected me from jitters before the wedding and regrets afterward. We have our problems, of course, and more will come up in the future. But I'm really rock-certain we'll fix them together. It's what we do. It's how we work.
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(Among other things, they remind me why I should get off my ass and start organizing C'con '02. Who knows who might meet there, and what might happen? *grin*)
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Ain't it the truth?
I just love the combination of your romanticism and your pragmatism, incidentally. Very cool. And can't wait to meet Misha, hopefully someday soon.
-J
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