My Life as a Novel

Dear Kyle,

Labels: Marriage, The Hubby

Labels: Marriage, The Hubby

I truly enjoy working on projects with my husband. The process of actually making time to get together to make things happen -- which includes time allowed for good communication, the syncing of our brains and ideas, researching, and then finally putting rubber to the road to bring it all together -- it's not always the easiest thing for us to do. We're both really busy doing our own things at times, but magic happens when the Polk brains come together.

And this is why: Kyle Polk encourages me in a way that no one else does. Perhaps this is because I value his opinions and criticisms more than anyone else's. And perhaps that's because he processes his ideas for a while before speaking them. You will rarely hear him speak something that he doesn't absolutely believe and that's because the idea has been tossed about in his weird little head for long enough that he's behind it 100%. (This doesn't mean he's always right, but just that his opinion is rarely - if ever - a knee-jerk reaction.)

Today, Kyle told me, "I wish people saw you the way I see you."

And here are my thoughts on that.

"Hello, nicest boy of my life. Tonight, you can share my bed."

But seriously, you would all hate me. If I were vulnerable, selfish, mean, honest, dirty (bordering on disgusting at times) with you like I am with him ... If you saw my emotions run the gamut between elation and exasperation and ire ... If you saw these things in me the way my husband has seen them, you would hate me. You would worry - as I'm sure he does at times - about my sanity.

I love my marriage. I apologize to anyone who has heard me make derogatory comments about my marriage - or marriage in general - because I am only going for the easy joke. I never intend to defame what has been so good to me.

Not every moment is golden and glorious, but there are days that make the ugly ones completely worth it. We make a good team, he and I. We support each other and each believes the other is capable of more and pushes them until they reach it - or believes until they find that belief in themselves.

Labels: family, Marriage, The Hubby

Dear Kyle,

Last night was a first for us. In three years of marriage, we have spent most of those nights sleeping in the same, king-sized bed. Last night, however due to the fact that I am a forgetful person (and because I was reading Harry Potter), our sheets were still in the washing machine (read: not dry) when it came time to go to bed - a situation that I recognized too late to rectify. So we still slept together. And for some reason, we chose the smallest bed in the house. The smaller-than-twin bed was our place of rest for the evening. It's the softest bed in the house - my bed from before we were married. The twin sheets that I bought for it only fit the extra-small mattress because of the two layers of pink foam I added to give it the "sleeping in a cloud" effect that you so love to hate. It is divinely soft in a way that only I truly appreciate.

So I fell into a deep sleep pretty quickly. The warmth of the big, strong man I love next to me on the softest bed in the world. It was everything I imagined marriage would be.

And when I woke up at 2 am, in my favorite bed, still completely glued to your side, my first thought wasn't, "Gee, how nice it is to be married to someone who can keep my feet warm at night." But instead, "I'm FREEZING! Why must he always take the covers off of me and throw them on the floor!?!"

And when the alarm clock went off this morning, you bounced out of bed, ready to be released from Divine Discomfort and were a whopping 25 minutes EARLY to work. Unheard of. Must've been as uncomfortable for you as it was for me.

And this might be the picture of marriage for some people. High expectations of romance and roses and candles and cuddling and laughing and affectionate love for a lifetime. And it is those things. But it's also fighting, and paying bills, and dogs pooping in places they shouldn't poop, and waking up next to an extremely smelly person thinking, "Really? Is this what I signed up for?"

Three years ago today, we made the command decision to move our wedding from Saturday to Friday, because of an imminent hurricane. It was the joke of those around us that 'this was a sign of things to come'. In their "joke", they meant to imply that it was an indication of the stormy nature of our relationship.

I translated it differently, however. I choose to believe that it was a true analogy of our ability to stand together through whatever comes our way. And three years is only the beginning.


I love you.
Rita

Labels: family, Marriage, The Hubby

Dear Mendy,

It’s finally here. The weekend we’ve been planning for months. The weekend you’ve been dreaming of your whole life. You found each other. You’ve plotted and planned and delegated and … delegated again, and it’s upon us. This weekend, you become Mrs. Derek Goebel. Not just my little sister. Not just the Baby of the Moss Family. But someone’s wife.

Pardon me if it takes me a while to get used to the idea. During the past 23 years, I’ve been The Big Sister, a role I’ve taken very seriously. Fierce Protector. Counselor. Guide. Second Mother. Sister … with all the good and bad that the job entails.

And as my final act as Self-Appointed Primary Protector of Mendy, I pass along the lessons that I have learned over the past three years: My Marriage Advice.

This list is a compilation of Lessons Learned By Rita The Hard Way and also the wise advice of some respected persons. I hope this helps you.

• Learn to say, “I’m sorry.” I list this one first, not by random, but because of its importance. I know this is a point of contention for you because you’re my sister and we are very alike. Pig-headed, because it's in our blood. We want to be right. We are easily persuaded, during heated discussions, that the person we’re talking to is “against” us.
  
  Overcome that belief, remember that you’re really working together, sincerely apologize … and you will have learned the most important lesson of your marriage: You’re on the same team! And marriage works so much better with that in mind.
  
  
• Communicate, communicate, communicate. They say the first year is hardest. Near the end of the first year, you begin to hear that the second is hardest. And, as I enter my fourth, The Experts are promising that the hard years stop coming after five … or maybe seven.
  
  Honestly, we haven’t had “a hard year”. We have difficult weeks, bad days, tough spells. But we talk it out, work it out together, and are better for the communication it takes to work those issues out.
  
  And, to be truthful, if “the hard years stop coming” means that you learn to tolerate one another while you each do your own thing and merely coexist, personally I’d rather have bad times.
  
  
• Respect. You’re about to enter a crash course in The Opposite Sex. One thing I’ve learned that’s helped me a lot is this: A man needs to know he’s respected to feel loved. Biblically, a woman is never told to love her husband. “And this [picture of Christ and the church] provides a good picture of how each husband is to treat his wife, loving himself in loving her, and how each wife is to honor her husband.” (Ephesians 5:33) I don’t believe those words are written by coincidence. In as much as you need to know you’re loved in this relationship, Derek needs to know he’s respected. As the head of the family. As your husband. In whatever he decides to do. Respect him. Even when he makes mistakes.

I also kept this list of stuff from a sermon that Pastor Hal preached in May 2005. At that point, I hadn't been married yet a year, but it already meant a lot to hear at that point. I remember that the Sunday this sermon was preached, we had a group of single friends visiting from out of town. After church, they were all, "Duh! Those are so easy!" and Kyle and I just looked at each other and knew we had appreciated the reminder.

I hope it will mean as much to you as it has to me.

20 Principles and Practices
That Will Build A Stronger Marriage:

1. Grow Spiritually
2. Love Completely
3. Work Continuously
4. Play Often
5. Share Equally
6. Serve Cheerfully
7. Give Selflessly
8. Laugh Heartily
9. Talk Honestly
10. Praise Frequently
11. Criticize Gently
12. Spend Wisely
13. Protect Fiercely
14. Parent Jointly
    
15. Celebrate Happily
16. Forgive Easily
17. Believe Stubbornly
18. Pray Daily
19. Sacrifice Gratefully and
20. Grow Old Joyfully

Spend the rest of your life being a student of your husband. Learn his interests and encourage him. Learn his love language and become fluent. Learn his communication style and speak it.

Spend the rest of your life making it what you always dreamed. You hold the keys.

And know that I will always love you. And I will always be here for you.

Love,
Your Big Sister

Labels: family, Marriage, Self-Discovery, Wedding

Kyle's band had a show last night at the Map Room. I am an individual who requires much sleep, so the fact that I was in attendance at a 10 o'clock weeknight show (which doesn't end until 11, and has other acts playing after that) shows my complete devotion to and love for Mr. Kyle Polk. [yawn]

I mostly relegated myself to the couches last night, as I am generally no good after 10:30 PM. I was as comfortable as possible without a book and my bed. (I really do try not to be old, but I guess it happens to the best of us.)

The show was good. Afterward, we hung around for the bands that followed because Kyle's courteous that way. I, having firmly planted and rooted my butt to that couch, was pretty much good for nothing. Fortunately there were friends around who took pity on me and sat with me. When Kyle got done tearing down his stuff he came and sat with me. The seating arrangement looked like this:



Until about three songs into the second band's set. When a young (under 21) thing came and took a seat next to Kyle. I, being sleepy but not dead, immediately took notice.


This girl was flirting with my husband. Right in front of me. Of course, she had no way of knowing we were together. Being firmly planted as I was, I had not really reacted when he came to sit beside me. I could just as easily have been sitting with Andrew as with Kyle.

So the conversation was brief and another guy came up to sit next to her. He walked off and she followed shortly after. Kyle went up to the bar and was talking to a friend of his a few minutes later. She came up behind him and started talking again, apparently flirting. To the point where Adam said to Kyle, "Does your wife know about her?"

But Kyle kept brushing it off saying, "She is just lonely. She needs a buddy." (Not that he was volunteering himself as The Buddy, but just that he was refusing to accept that she was actually flirting with him.)

I kept volunteering Andrew or Philip - one of our single friends - to run offense. She was a cute girl! And other than the fact that she was flirting shamelessly with my husband, she could've been a good catch for a single guy. Who knows?

As Kyle and I were making the rounds and saying our goodbyes, I spotted her one last time peering at him through the door as she was standing outside. Weird!

And the only thing Kyle could say was, "She must be really desperate if she's flirting with me. Really desperate or really lonely. And really lonely makes me feel not quite so bad, so that's what I'm going to call it."

___________________

I re-read this and it seems like I'm angry about it or something. I'm not. Just so you know. It was just a funny occurrence. I thought I'd share it.

Labels: Marriage, The Hubby

A few days ago, I was riding around with a friend of mine when she said to me, "[Husband] and I are trying."

This was out of the blue, but when you're married and you're accustomed to being asked questions of this nature, you know what this seemingly fragmented sentence really means.

And my reaction was not what she was looking for at all. It wasn't a, "Oh congratulations!" or even a "Good luck" or any number of suggestive comments I could've made.

No. Instead, I made a face that looked something like this:

I'm 100% sure that wasn't the reaction she was going for. I spent the next few minutes apologizing. Explaining how I didn't mean for that to be my first reaction, and how I was as surprised by it as she was. She was gracious enough to just change the subject.

I felt like a heel.

Labels: Friends, Marriage, Self-Discovery

Ever since Heather and Jamie have been planning to move, I've had in mind to dig through my old blog to find this post that I made about them. Complete irony: I posted it exactly two years - to the day - before their first day in their new home in Hampton.

I posted a while back about Anna, my best friend since middle school. She was my maid of honor and, at her wedding in June, I'll be her matron of honor. She's a very good friend, but I've found in the months since I've been married that our priorities are completely different. Things that I've always had in common with her, I'm finding harder and harder to relate to.

The change was overnight. On Thursday, September 2, 2004, I was a normal 22 year old girl who was still tying up loose ends for the big wedding day. But on Saturday, September 4, 2004, the wedding was all over, and my priorities were completely changed. It was as if something inside me had been re-wired. I know I sound like some kind of 1950s wife (think Stepford Wives) or something, but now I live for
being married and my highest priority is always Kyle.

It takes a married person to understand the change that happens when you're married. When you're engaged, you understand, in an abstract sense, that a lot of change will happen. But you can't fully grasp it until it actually happens. And when it does, it's hard to remember life before "the change" because you're happier because of it. So having a married friend to talk about it with is very beneficial.

Heather and Jamie are our married friends.


Heather is from Hampton. Her brother (Chris) and Kyle were best friends growing up, so she was always like an older sister to Kyle.


Jamie is not originally from Moncks Corner, but he's lived here for 8 or 9 years, working as youth minister at my church. He was my youth minister during my high school years.


During my senior year of high school, Jamie was looking for a children's minister to work part time and help him out - especially with summer projects for the children. So he hired Heather as his children's intern. She was a senior Elementary Ed. major at Charleston Southern University, so this opportunity was right up her alley. Less than a year later, they were dating. and the following summer they were married (July 2001), and, of course, we give him a hard time about 'hiring' his wife and how he should've found a better pick-up line! :)


Heather and I became good friends when I graduated from NGC and moved back to Moncks Corner. She helped a lot when I was making my wedding plans. She was one of my bridesmaids in the wedding.


She and Jamie and I work at the church together. Kyle and I go out to eat with them - usually at least once a week. It's fun because they're married and they understand 'married people things'. We can talk to
them. When I'm awful and mean to Kyle, Heather remembers and understands the frustrations of the first year and doesn't make me feel like even more of a jerk by saying, "Goodness, Rita. You need to be nicer." Even when I'm unreasonable, she doesn't tell me that and make me feel worse. She lets me figure it out on my own. And she prays for me ... which is always helpful.

(this post in its original context)

So here's to Heather and Jamie. To married friends. To good friends, and GREAT friends. To the Best Baby Ever. And to having a new place to sleep in Hampton!

Labels: Friends, Marriage

Coming up soon.

Heather and Jamie announced it last night: They're leaving! BOOOO!!! Of three of our best, local, couple friends, this is the second to move. Now a big "hurry up" to Craig & Amy so we can start rebuilding our Couple Buddies. Brothers and their wives count too!

Labels: family, Friends, Marriage