Are You Waitin' on a Fairytale?

...if the answer is yes, stop it! That's not how life works.

Someone asked me today, "Are you happily married?" I replied, "Yes. Why?" He said, "Well, sometimes your posts don't make it sound that way." I must confess this line of thinking truly makes me crazy! How can you tell anything at all about a person or their situation based solely on their Facebook posts? You can't! Has this become the new venue we use to judge others, gleaning "facts" from a series of memes? *shaking my head in frustration* To me that's the equivalent of picking up a novel, opening it to a random page, reading that page only and thinking you know anything about the book! Perception is such an arbitrary thing based often on snippets of this and that to shape someone's views of the world around them. The more educated we become about any topic, the more accurately it comes into focus and even then we still bring to it a host of our own life experiences that don't necessarily add up to THE truth even if it's adequate to label something OUR truth. While I could give examples of this from my own experiences on a number of topics, I'm going to stick with the "happily married" one since that's what has inspired my thoughts today.

Everyone defines marriage AND happiness in their own way. What "works" for some couples wouldn't do at all in other relationships. And the list of things that make people "happy" in general and in regards to their relationships is endless! I cannot speak to what makes others happy and it would be extremely arrogant for me to try. Instead, I'll tell you why I label my marriage a "happy" one (...and let's not confuse this word with "perfect" because in my opinion there is no such thing).

I have known my husband since I was sixteen years old. Since I'm now forty-five, that means for well over half my life he's been a part of it, sharing in almost every joy, sorrow, and everything in between. The first five years of our marriage we pretty much made every mistake there was to make, some of them repeatedly! We were young and stupid, having absolutely no clue what we were doing or how to go about this whole marriage thing in the first place. We have spent years, off and on, at odds with one another compounded by life, in general, which tends to get in the way especially if you are connected to the military (...and he was active duty USAF for 24 years). Nearly half of our marriage we've spent apart, not conducive to working our "junk" out at all! In spite of all the obstacles either we or life has placed in front of us, we have yet to give up. Almost, but close doesn't count. Love, honesty, trust and tenacity have gotten us over every single hurdle thus far. Neither of us take for granted that this relationship is going to last "forever". Mostly, what we do can be summed up in one sentence--"I'm not giving up on you because you're worth the trouble" (...and believe me, these days I'm certainly way more trouble than he is, although that wasn't always the case).

People looking for their own "happily ever after" story will be sorely disappointed if they think love works that way i.e. love being the solution that makes everything great. Life is messy and the only person responsible for making us happy is ourselves. Sure, we can enjoy someone elses company, but that really has nothing to do with being happy and in fact is often a temporary high. My husband and I strike a good balance. I am complex, he is simple (though he can and does hold his own when it comes to deep thoughts). I am easily bored, he is lazily laid back (...but he is happy to tag along by my side while I beat back boredom with a stick). My emotions are all over the place, while he is very calm and even-tempered most of the time. I am fiery passion, he is cool water. I am doggedly driven, he has a strong work ethic and deep desire to care for his family. We don't see eye to eye on a lot of topics, but we both respect each others views. At the end of the day, just like in everything else, we each have to choose. We choose to make the most of the day, our life, etc., or not. Either way, the day comes and we must face it. I'm very happy that he says, "There's no one else on Earth I'd rather face anything with than you." In my world the BEST people are the ones that refuse to give up on you! It means everything to me. I try to be that person and I keep those who feel that way about me closest to my inner circle. That, alone, is enough to make me happy the rest of my days.