Married Life

At the suggestion of the best writer I know - I'm back to writing when I can, hopefully waiting less than a year to add a post. The following is part of an email I sent to my oldest and dearest friend, who inspires me to share my thoughts in the most expressive way possible. I feel liberated when writing to her - I feel like she'll understand me more than anyone ever could and knowing that I'm able to speak with my writing in ways I can't any other time. I had years of practice because we wrote volumes of letters to catalog our lives as teenagers. My how frightening it is to think that all those experiences are documented. Anyway, this is what I wrote after having a moment to think of how life has changed for me.

"I blame you and every other girlfriend who married before me (so all of them except Nichole). YOU DID NOT TELL ME the drama of married life is SO MUCH GREATER than the drama of single life. I thought it was called settling down, not "You'll never again have time for yourself but you're stressed out all the time and you thought you never had money before yet somehow you're now making ends meet but still stressing over money and it just will never end and someday the kids will grow and boy do they grow and they don't stop growing no really STOP GROWING DAMMIT but they eat and they grow and use enormous amounts of toilet paper and fingerpaint with yogurt on the underside of the table and the whining ohmygosh the whining just never stops and the butt wiping is never ending and I can't have time alone in the teeny-tiniest bathroom in the whole entire world fits one small adult, two oversized children, and one large labrador and I can't stand always peeing with three pairs of eyes on me and..." I could go on but I have a cramp. :) BUT you just didn't tell me. I blame you all! You just kept it this big, fat secret and waited. You all just waited to have the last laugh as I longed for this life and you thought "OH, you just wait..." and here I am.

Happy but without money because it's spent on everyone else and unable to pee without an audience."

There's so much truth in this brief rant but more than anything, I'm thankful to have this life, for my husband, the girls, and for my dear friend Becky. She inspired me when we were kids and now as an adult. She's now inspiring two beautiful little girls and one very fine young man.

My guess is she does it while peeing in front of an audience too.