So, your husband is a monster.

There is a trend I see emerging in the beautiful sub-culture of young, married LDS women on Facebook. Like many things I don't understand, it angers me. I am going to try and discuss it here to vent my building aggression towards strangers. Bear with me.

Pornography is something that both science and religion disapprove of. Recently there has been an influx of people being willing to openly disparage the affects that pornography has on individuals and families. This is wonderful news. Hopefully with the recognition of the damage that is done by indulging in such a dangerous material, many people will be able to avoid ever facing a pornography habit or addiction in their life. Hearts and smiles, I'm totally with you here. 

Where I get lost is when I see a wife crying out for help with her husband's addiction. Yes, help is important in this instance! It is important for him to work on climbing above his addiction, and it is crucial for the marriage for both spouses to establish their communication and understanding of each other like never before. What I don't understand is this:

[Young married woman posting on Facebook]: HELP! My husband has a porn addiction :( :( :( I feel like I cant trust him anymore. He is a monster, and he has been cheating on me with this smut. What do I do???? 

[other young married women commenting]: YOU DESERVE BETTER. HE IS A MONSTER. GIVE HIM AN ULTIMATUM. IT IS YOU OR THE PORN. 

Hold up. Let's just hold on to our knickers before we run around streaking here. Yes, porn is a terrible thing, yes your feelings of betrayal and hurt are valid and reasonable, but how in the world do you propose getting through this and repairing your relationship if you are slandering your spouse with strangers online? This issue is also not yours. It is primarily his (or hers, I realise I am being mildly sexist by using only male pronouns. Forgive me) and therefore, he is the one who is needing the most immediate help and support. The same as with any other addiction (drugs, alcohol, gambling what have you), berating the individual who is struggling, or handing them ultimatums as an initial response will only close any remaining communication that was left. If a spouse is abusing the other or engaging in dangerous behaviour, then an immediate walk away may be in order, but rarely is that a necessary first move. 

With the expansion of social media and the acceptance of sharing your entire life with everyone you have ever remotely known, people seem less concerned about the necessity for being discreet in marriage. There are things that deserve to be private, and the struggles and vices of your spouse are number one on the list of things that you do not need to be disclosing online. As soon as you invite others into your relationships, you face the danger of further biasing yourself against your spouse. Your own viewpoint is vindicated while people who are sympathetic to you, yet foreign to them attack and dehumanise the person who you have vowed to love, cherish, and respect. 

I also see girls asking other girls if they would like to discuss their trauma further, which is something that just leaves hypothetical chunks of my own brain matter on the wall. Isn't your spouse the one who is in need here? Can you not go attend to him? Work with him to step beyond this awful addiction? I understand asking "how can I help him?" but rarely is that what I see being asked. 

In discussing this with my best friend Allison she said, 

"Ask yourself 'am I asking for genuine help? Do I want to hear honesty? Do I really want to put some work in to making this better? Do I just not know how to do that on my own?' Because in all reality most of us know what could solve the majority of these issues, we're all adults who interact with people. It's good to genuinely need help with solving a specific problem, for people to provide alternative views, but that's so rarely what it is." 

This isn't to say that abuse isn't real. If you feel you are being consistently belittled, controlled, or abused in your relationship, seek help. Reach out and approach friends and professionals to assure you are safe. Reaching out to simply complain about your spouse or to get support for your side of the argument, however, will not end well for your marital happiness. 

I feel bad that I haven't managed to be even remotely humorous in this post, but the rage is embarrassingly real! Please do not interpret my irritation as me being someone who feels pornography is not harmful, or even that it has its place. I don't feel that way at all. What I do feel is the need for people to be aware of how little their relationships should revolve around themselves, and how much it should revolve around their relationship and their spouse. Putting yourself first leads to being selfish and easily offended, while putting your spouse and your marriage first helps you see how problems are never really simply polarised into "his" or "mine," but are almost always "ours." 

And with that, let's discuss ways to combat an addiction. Having struggled with my own addiction and going through the therapy for it, these are some things I have learned: 

1) Identify the problem, and the times and places it emerges. When are you most tempted to engage/to use/to lapse into the addiction?

2) Find ways to avoid those times and those things.

3) Establish an alternative coping mechanism to replace the original behaviour. If you need to keep your fingers busy, pick up knitting, Lego construction, a musical instrument, painting, anything that you think you will genuinely enjoy and will distract you from the original urge. That first behaviour has been established because it is pleasurable, replacing it with something dull and tedious will not do the trick.

4) Accept that you probably won't successfully stop forever the first time. You will probably slip up, but if you allow one slip up to destroy your resolve to continue improving, you will never come out on top. Keep moving forward.

5) Find someone who will check in with you and hold you responsible for your lapses while still loving you when you do lapse. For me, I am addicted to self harm. Even when I am happy, and even though I am currently clean, I still get urges. Peter has been aware of this addiction since we first became friends. He knows it, he accepts me despite of it, but he hates it. Knowing this leaves me with three options when I am faced with a temptation: I can cut and hide it from my husband, meaning I have let lying into our marriage, cut and have him disappointed and sad, or resist and have him shower me with love and affection when I tell him I overcame my moment of weakness.

6) Seek professional help. When in doubt, find a therapist you can trust and rely on. They are trained, they are licensed, and they can give support to both you and your spouse no matter the issue. 

Be excellent, folks. You and your marriages deserve it. 

Don't make baby Jesus cry

Sit down, folks. We need to chat. 

I don't consider this to be a Mormon Blog, but today I am going to be discussing a vastly Mormon concept. Although I'm pretty sure 100% of my readers are LDS, let me define this crucial term for anyone who may be confused. 

Personal Revelation. 

In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we are taught that every individual is capable of praying to God and receiving personal revelation through the Holy Spirit. It is through revelation that we are able to gain knowledge and understanding about things of God, or receive guidance about personal decisions and choices. We believe God has anointed prophets to receive revelation for the world, but that each person also has the capability and right to ask for personal confirmation that the things the prophets have spoken are true. We believe that we are only able to receive revelation for ourselves unless we have been specifically called and set apart to also receive revelation for others (i.e. called as an ecclesiastical leader to others). 

Growing up in the church I was taught to pray always, and to include God in decisions I make, however, I was also taught that revelation I received was for me; others must also ask of God in order to be given answers for themselves. 

Okay. Term defined and explained. Onward! 

In my Social Psychology class at BYUH we studied a section on cults and manipulation. My professor, Dr. Timothy used one lesson to outline a list of red flags to look out for in people we date. The final entry he wrote in capital letters across the whiteboard: "THEY TELL YOU 'GOD SAID YOU HAVE TO MARRY ME'!" 

He then told us sternly, "If anyone ever tells you this, you run. Turn around and book it in the opposite direction." 

I didn't stand up and slow clap it out that day in class, but inside my mind I totally did. This was something that I knew was true and didn't even feel anyone would ever question. Unfortunately, I have now seen dozens of people use this key form of manipulation and others listen to it. 

SO, LET US TALK. 

Saying that God told you that someone else has to marry you is a douche of a move. Every person in this world has their own agency. We are given commandments, but we can always choose whether we follow them or not. There will be consequences for good or for bad, but we still are given a choice. Therefore, I do not believe God will ever tell someone (*booming voice*) "YOU MUST MARRY HIM!" Instead, He will confirm if marrying someone is a good move, or confirm that we need to get to ello out of Dodge. Our choice remains. 

Secondly, who died and anointed you supreme leader of inspiration, Kemosabe? Chances are, no one did. Say you have prayed about someone and decided that they would be a good marital companion for you. That's great! Unfortunately, it takes two to make a marriage, and therefore, only half of the process has been completed. 

Trying to take religion out of this example is hard, as it is a concept that relies on a belief in a deity who cares about our wellbeing, but I am going to try. 

Timmy and Kimmy are dating. They love each other very much and are beginning to discuss marriage. Kimmy comes to Timmy one day and says, "it is settled. You must marry me. I contacted the President of the United States and he officially stated that you, Timmy Grindledore must marry me Kimmy Dumblewald." 

What should Timmy do? Should he believe that Kimmy is correct, and go start working on wedding plans? 

Realistically, the POTUS probably doesn't know Kimmy and Timmy inside and out and know if their relationship will work, so the analogy is mildly flawed, however, what about the fact that Kimmy sought help from an outside source and used that discussion to decide once and for all that a marriage was to be had? Shouldn't Timmy have a say in things? The way she brought it to Timmy was incredibly manipulative because she attempted to use a higher power and authority to dictate the behavior and choices of a man she says to love. 

*BUZZER NOISE* EHHHHHHHHH.  That's a red flag there, Timmy. 

When Peter first got home from his mission in Japan there was a time where we dated long distance. I was in Hawaii and he was in Seattle, and so our main form of communication was through Skype, text, and phone calls. One morning I got a text from Peter. It said, 

"When I pray about marrying you, I feel like it is a good thing. I hope that when you pray about it, you feel the same :). I love you." 

A sassy Greek muse chorus sang out hallelujah in my head. 

I felt confident that Peter was not going to try and assert his will over mine. While he made it clear that he had hopes to marry me, he also let me know that my own revelation was important. Ten points to Gryffindor!*

Anyway, please stop being douches to people you want to date or marry. It's not cool and it makes baby Jesus cry. Manipulation has no place in a marriage, so if you see signs of manipulation from those you are dating, run away fast. It is much better to be single than to be in an unhappy marriage. At least that's what I can tell from the 9 couples I know (who are my age) who have already faced a divorce. Know that you have a say in your relationships. No one can force you into anything that you don't want, and likewise, you have no right to force them. 

Be excellent, dudes.  

*in reading this to Peter he felt he deserved much more than 10 points. I think that if Harry and Ron can receive 5 points after conquering a troll and Harry and Hermione can lose 50 points (each) for being out of bed past dark, the point system is pretty much based on the mood of the professor or prefect, sooooooo, it could be debated either way. 

How my anxiety found me a perfect husband

When I was a 4 year old, someone told me that you needed to get married to get into heaven. This did not sit well with me, even though I was still 14 years away from being a legal adult. I faced, what I think in retrospect, was my first large bout of anxiety. My therapist tells me that the basis of anxiety is fixating on something that is beyond what we need to currently be concerning ourselves with. The fact that 4 year old me spent hours crying about the prospect of marrying and being a mommy sounds like a textbook case for such a thing.

My mom would hold me as a cried and promise me that I didn't have to get married and I didn't have to be a mom. Instead, I could stay at home forever, and be her little girl.

This apprehension towards marriage is something that stuck with me my entire life. While others around me seemed eager to bind themselves to someone else for the rest of forever, I couldn't think of anything except how utterly terrible that would be.
This meant that when Peter came into my life and I started to love him, I felt incredibly repulsed by myself and the thoughts that I began to have that indicated that marriage could be anything besides a horrendous mess. I was certain that he would leave to go on a mission, and I would recover from my temporary insanity and move on with my life.

Unfortunately, I found this was a more difficult thing to happen than I expected. One night I called my mother distraught over my situation, hoping for some solace. I tried to express to her how badly I was transitioning to Peter being gone. Before I could get very far in my explaining, Mommifer asked excitedly,

"Oh, are you still in love with Peter??"
"What? No..." I said, before quickly bursting into hot and hysterical tears.
"Oh, Melece, I know you're so sad right now, but I could just turn cartwheels! I worried and worried that I would have to watch my youngest daughter live without love!"

And thus my mother became Peter's #1 wingman.

Even though I was coming to accept the fact that I loved Peter, I could never go for very long without thinking about all the terrible aspects of marriage. In fact I would only have small lapses of reason in which I thought marriage could be sufferable, these moments overrode by a massive fear and distaste by the institution.

Fears I had towards marriage:

1. I would get sick of my husband.

This was a serious fear founded in the reality of my past experiences. I had never had a close friend who I spent time with on a regular basis for much longer than a year span or so. There were several people in my life who had always been present in the background, and who I had known for many years, but any close knit relationships I had sought in the past, both romantic and otherwise, usually burned bright and passionately for a season and then ended in awkward avoidances and "we should definitely hang out"s, which as everyone knows is almost legally a phrase that translates to, "I recognize that we at one point knew each other, and I want to be polite, but I have no intentions of ever spending time alone with you ever." The polite response being "yes, we really should," which in itself means, "I am glad you also acknowledge that we will never interact by choice ever again."

2. My husband would get sick of me.

These two items seem simplistic and repetitive, but they fully encompass a world of marital problems. I saw spouses bringing lunches for each other at work, and in my head I thought, "UGH, it's like you're legally obligated to feed someone other than yourself!" a problem that fits nicely under list item #1. Other times I would consider, "men only want you for your body," which caters to the second category, under the assumption that I will someday grow wrinkled, lined, and flabby, preferably not by next week.

All the ugly things that I knew could come from close companionship alarmed me; I worried that when Peter came home we would quickly find that a love letter affair is much easier to uphold than a close up and personal one. Thus, we had a long engagement. In that time we fought some of our biggest fights, which led us both to realize that we can handle the biggest of the fights.

There is a phrase I once heard that warns "you need to love a person at their ugliest before you can truly love them at their most perfect." I knew I was ready to become a wife when marriage no longer seemed heinous. I found someone who was able to be my exception to my rules, not someone I was willing to bend my rules for.

Someday (probably next week) I'll write you a post telling stories exclusively about how my mother helped me realize that I could (and should) marry Peter. She had so many wise words to comfort me during that odd 2-3 year courtship/friendship, and she loved Peter deeply before they even met. She once told friends that she didn't worry about me marrying someone who was a stranger to her, because, "Peter makes Melece happy, so I know he is worth while."

The Poverty Games

**If you are a poor newly wed in the need of entertainment, or an intense fan of Petrelly (Petrece?) and want to emulate our lives through imitation, then this blog post is a How-To just for you!**

As Peter and I live on a tight budget we don't have a lot of store bought games in our home. Nevertheless, we are super creative people who can't be kept down by the man, so we play the games we don't have anyway. YOLO! Here are some of our favourites that you can play with only two players; perfect for date nights or for people who only have one friend, just like us.

Mancala:
Mancala is an African game of stones. That's what the internet tells me, anyway. Here are an outlined set of rules also found on the internet for those who have never played:

• Mancala is played with seven pits per player.
• Your pits are the 6 small pits on your side of the board, and the larger Kalaha pit on the right hand side.
• Each player starts the game by placing 4 stones into each of their 6 small pits.
• A turn consists of taking all the stones from one of your pits, and then dropping a stone into each successive pit in a counter-clockwise fashion
• If the final stone is placed in your Kalaha, then you get another turn.
• If the final stone ends in one of your empty pits while stones sit in the pit opposite then all of those stones are placed into your Kalaha.
• The winner is the person with the most stones in his Kalaha
• The game ends when all of a player's pits are empty. At that point, the other player places the remaining
  stones in her Kalaha.

We don't have a Mancala board, or rather, we DIDN'T have a Mancala board until last week when I made one out of an old egg carton and a bunch of tiny Legos. SUPER SIMPLE. I don't even think you need more guidance than that... Here's what our board looks like just incase. 

Stunning, right? Our big pits of points were just the carpet to the right of our sides.  

Battleship: 

I'm assuming everyone knows how to play Battleship. If you don't know, rules are here. To play Battleship at home without a board all you need is to draw two 10x10 grids on your individual paper - X axis 1-10, Y axis A-J - which you cunningly hide from your opponent to make sure they're not a cheater cheater pants on eater. Pencil in where your ships are on one of the grids, and then continue play as usual. This was one of Peter's and my go-to games to play when we were long distance, seeing as the boards don't need to interact at all. SCORE. 

The Floor is Lava: 

Again, a game that I assume and hope all of you know very well. This filled many of our Friday and Saturday nights when we were engaged because we had no friends and usually we had my house to ourselves as my roommates DID have friends. To play, rearrange the furniture in your home, or just in your immediate playing area, to create new obstacles for each round. Once you have your arena prepared, you then take turns assigning your opponent to retrieve or place an item at a certain spot in the area. You CANNOT TOUCH THE FLOOR, because it is lava, as the game name indicates. Peter and I usually ruled that you could not use the same route twice in one game because we're hardcore and essentially olympians, but do what you prefer. 

Checkers: 

Masking tape and small tokens of a uniformed colour (Legos, Bananagram tiles, pieces of paper etc.) create the perfect Checkers board. The last time we played we just used the tiles of the kitchen floor as squares and Bananagram tiles as checkers, one of us letter side up the other letter side down. Pretty much the easiest board ever, albeit a large one. 

Peter beats me at every game we play. It's practically spousal abuse. ;)

The Rainy Day Game: 

This game became to be and named because it was created on a particularly rainy weekend. We used Rook cards which have four colours (yellow, black, red, and green) and assigned a category to each colour. Yellow was Physical Challenge, green: Disney Quotes, red: Harry Potter Trivia, and black: Truth. When we recreated this game the weekend before our wedding with my sister Sharah we switched it up, adding the categories "take an embarrassing picture" and "spot the real trivia fact." The categories can really be whatever the heck you want, and you can use face cards too. Whatever ensures your figurative ship won't sink (get it? Whatever floats your boat?! bahahahahahahaha I am so funny to me).
In order to play, once you have decided your categories, you simply put the deck face down and take turns drawing a card, then completing the challenge attached. 

It's a really simple game. I feel like it doesn't sound simple... but it is. Here is some photographic evidence of how fun it is. 

Here we see Sharah completing "Take an Embarrassing Picture." The picture being her about to receive an intense swirly.

Physical challenge: with a pineapple on his head, Peter must dance and lip-sync to Best Years of Our Lives for my roommates

Poker: 

Granted, with poker you still need a deck of face cards, but chips are something you can improvise with. We generally use Uno cards divided into different colours and distributed as chips. Green = $1, Yellow = $5 Blue = $10 Red = $20. 

As you can probably tell, I'm running out of fun games that we play, especially ones that would be interesting to you. We also enjoy marathoning shows on Netflix, ordering Pizza, making forts, saying we are going to make a fort but then giving up before we start and watching Netflix instead, naked wrestling, shadow puppets on the ceiling above our bed, twerk-offs, gossiping, talking in weird voices, naked hugging, watching fantastic movies that are categorically awful, and planning our future as Rich People (it's capitalised because it's important). 

Marriage is the greatest thing I have ever done in my life. 

The alcohol juice

Life as an impoverished newly wed couple is really fun. Granted, I've never been a wealthy newly wed, so maybe life would be just as fun if we were rolling in money as it is now. However it may be, Peter and I have exciting adventures together in this life of limitations.

One of the fun adventures we encounter on a monthly basis is a local food bank we visit to receive free food. Volunteers gather together behind the Kahuku hospital every 4th Monday of the month to hand out free food to people in the community. To partake, you need only to show up with an ID and some sort of carrier to cart your spoils home. This food bank has been such a bounteous blessing in our lives; each time we attend, we come home loaded with enough food to sustain us for at least the next couple of weeks, sometimes longer. The fun part is that this food is coming by donation and is distributed to you via a conveyer belt of volunteers as you walk along with your boxes. It actually kind of feels like you're trick-or-treating in one long unbroken stream of houses that are really close together. Because you are not selecting your food, there is never any telling what you will receive.

It is this element of mystery which has made our experience with the food bank so very fun. On one occasion we received a "Humanitarian Daily Ration (Menu #4)" tightly sealed in inch thick plastic and stamped with the American flag, claiming to contain "one day's complete food requirement for one person." Where else in the world would we find such a gem?! It's still sealed and sits atop our refrigerator, but one of these days we are going to open it! Maybe we'll make a fort in our living room, turn off all the lights and eat it, flash lights in hands, while watching a Zombie movie. Maybe we will take it with us to church one day and use it as our snack, or take it to work for lunch. Whatever we do, and whenever we do eat it, it is going to be super exciting, and we will feel like Astronauts.

This last trip to the food bank provided us with four quarts of 100% Grapefruit Juice. It was a pretty yellow colour, which is always exciting because yellow is the fairest of all the colours, but as any of you who have tried to drink 100% grapefruit juice will know, it's a pretty little drink that likes to punish you sorely for attempting to quench it.

Not ones to succumb to the will of a juice, much less one we received for free, Peter and I opened a bottle once we got home, and poured ourselves glasses. As we drank, I was forcibly reminded of my high school days spent at bars with my friends, watching them do shots of pure tequila or vodka. I could never quite understand where the pleasure was, as all of them needed quite a bit of time spent psyching up to their task, then afterwards would pull faces that looked like they had just been sucker punched whilst trying to take a particularly vile and potent form of liquid medicine. Years later here I sat with my husband, both of us egging each other on to prove our genders' potency by taking shots of this juice.

In an attempt to make the drinking easier, I suggested we go to Foodland to purchase four more quarts of another juice and then mix the cumulative eight quarts together to dilute (and thwart) the grapefruit's power. Peter hypothesised that apple would be too light of a juice to do anything, so we instead chose a mighty opponent in the form of Pomegranate Berry Acai, and Pomegranate Cranberry.

As it turns out, when you mix together four quarts of 100% Grapefruit Juice with four quarts of Pomegranate Berry Acai and Cranberry, what you get is eight quarts of really potent juice that tastes mildly like stomach acid, but somehow grows on you the more you take tumbler sized shots of it. We've taken to calling it "The Alcohol Juice," and are actually finishing it up faster than I expected. We play our card games, and make the loser drink a glass of it, although usually we're so tired from our rapid fire attempt to annihilate the other, that the winner drinks as well. I find that I enjoy the juice a lot, so long as I continue to gulp at it from the bottle or glass, as soon as I stop is when the bitterness takes a vindictive dump on my tongue and laughs in my face.

Well, let it be said: I will probably never be an alcoholic.

Next food bank adventure... working out what to do with the six pounds of dried cranberries we have inherited.

The struggles and pain of a feminist marriage.

Feminism has been circling the news a lot recently. There are a lot of people out there who simply haven't been blessed to have an abundance of education on the situation, and who have taken their own, faulty, perceptions on the subject and chosen to embarrassingly tell the world why they do not need feminism. Oh you blessed souls, I pray for you.

I personally identify myself as a feminist. I follow the feministic belief that men and women are equal human beings deserving of equal human rights. While I daily see inequalities in our society that belittle women in favour or on the behalf of men, and these things do infuriate me, I strive to not be a misandrist, which is someone functioning on the belief that women are better and thus more entitled to respect and power than men.

With these integral beliefs that I hold so dear and warm to my heart, I work hard to practise what I preach in my marriage, but you know what? Sometimes that's hard because I'm a pretty pretty princess lazy and want my husband to dote on me. 

In order to keep myself in check, I have a simple decision making process. Before I make an action or a statement, I ask myself, if Peter were to say or do this time to me, would I be outraged? 

Things I would be probably be outraged to hear from Peter:

• "No fair! I need the last cookie; my testicles crave chocolate, it's not my fault" 
• "You should rub my back, I will be giving you children someday"
• "Feed me, Melly. It's your job as a woman to provide for me." 
• "I'm sorry I yelled at you, but it's in my nature to be hormonal this time of the month. You should understand." 
• "Women are destroying society!!!" 
• "You don't understand what it's like being repressed by the matriarchy. You're blind to the cruelties of your own gender!"
• "Gross. Please do something about your moustache." (No, wait. I'm reserving my right to say this one). 

As I mentioned earlier, generally my requests are just things out of pure laziness, not that I actually think I am deserving of more service than Peter. However, in sticking with my feminist regime it means I hand over all rights to demand or expect chivalry simply because I possess ovaries. I lose all the little perks such as the right to eat first (because I am a woman), have my door opened for me (because I am a woman), have Peter stand when I enter a room (because I am a woman), to kneel before me and kiss my hand (because I'm a sexy beast woman)... you know, the normal stuff!  

That being said, being a feminist doesn't mean that I'm outraged when Peter chooses to do these things, it just means that I try to do them just as often as he does to me, and maybe I should try getting my lazy bum off the couch sometimes to help him while he's working to serve me. Just not right now, because I deserve to rest my mammaries am comfortable.

If you want to read more about the subject by someone funnier than me here's Jenny Lawson's newest blog post: Women Who are Ambivalent about Women Against Women Against Feminism. She's my hero.

Well, I mean, besides YOU of course!!!! 

5 things ruined by marriage

Recently I've been thinking about how my life has changed over the past three months. Overall, I feel that the transition into marriage from engaged life was one so simple that sometimes I wonder if we're doing it wrong; maybe marriage isn't supposed to be this fun or easy. However, there are a few things that I have begun to notice that simply weren't in existence when I was still checking that "single" box on government forms.

And so, in no particular order, here are 5 Things Ruined By Marriage:

1. The capability to enjoy sleeping in bed alone.

Since getting hitched, I haven't exactly made it a secret how much of a struggle learning to sleep in a marital bed has been for me, but recently what has emerged as a brand new problem is sleeping in that same bed when it is no longer marital. Peter has now adopted my technique of picking up and taking the couch when the bedroom is too hot to bear and you need a new sleep location. The struggle is, I now cannot sleep without him next to me, and so find myself grabbing my pillow and blanket and camping out on the floor by the couch, creepily manipulating Peter's arm away from his body so I can hold his hand. Essentially, I now have no way of winning when it comes to sleeping at night. I either watch Peter sleep in bed (which is fantastic because he does the funniest things when he's sleeping. I want to film him but it's too dark, and I don't know if I'm ready for that level of creepiness yet), or sleep on the floor of our living room because I missed him and need him near me. THE STRUGGLE IS REAL.

2. Peace of mind in knowing I'm not THAT messy.

When you're living in a home with four other women, the never-ending supply of loose hair and hair-balls everywhere in the apartment (and seriously, I mean everywhere) is easily accounted for. Obviously, you have contributed to the mess of strands, but most of it was put there by others. Same thing goes for general mess in the communal living area. You can continue living your life with the knowledge that you are an essentially clean person, not ruining the lives of others with your hair or crumbs. When you're married you have no such luxury. Any hair that I find stuck to the wall, strangling Peter's Legos, or clinging to the bottom of our feet once belonged to me, and I alone am polluting our home with these overly attached pieces of reject body matter. It's enough to make anyone completely reevaluate their belief in themselves as basically decent humans.

3. Frivolous moments of monetary splurging.

Granted, I have never been one to binge shop or spend. I've always been pretty aware of what I need to survive and that there are certain needs that must be given priority and attention. That being said, I could pretty easily justify spending spare money on fast food, movies, e-books, beauty supplies etc. with very little buyers guilt to haunt me as I try to sleep at night. This is suddenly not true when you're aware that you have more than just your mouth to feed and that any monetary spending that you do will have a direct impact not just on you, but on your spouse as well. Sure I could survive on an eternal diet of Spam, rice, and Ramen as well as just skipping eatings if I need to, but CAN PETER?! The guilt alone of knowing you may be hurting your spouse and their future with any thing you spend at any time causes you to sincerely reconsider your needs and wants. Which perfectly segues me into my next luxury DESTROYED by my marriage.

4. Being the most important person in your world.

I don't think I am incredibly self-centered... but really, I am. We all are. What do you hear over and over when considering a difficult relationship with someone else? "First, look out for yourself. Is this good for you? Are you happy?" These questions are completely genuine and worthwhile; it is so important to make sure that your basic needs are met and that you are not stepping into emotionally self- mutilating territory. Yet now I find my own needs taking a back burner to Peter's. I have never cared about anyone's access to happiness as much as I do now. I want to find ways to make him happy and find ways to treat him. Your capability for guilt-free selfishness is wholly compromised when you're married. I still do have the ability to be the most important person in my world, and sometimes I am, but it no longer makes me feel very good. Luckily for me, my husband seems to feel the same way. Sometimes I find myself wishing we would fight more and have Realization of Personal Selfishness-Sessions less, because it doesn't feel very good at all when you're seeing how upset your husband is that he hasn't been able to provide for you the way he thinks he should. We both get embarrassingly weepy and snotty while whimpering in our strange baby talk voices,

"but, but, I just want YOU to be happy!"
"I AM happy!!! I want YOoOoOoU to be haaAAaaapee-eee *hiccups*"
"I am soo happy!"
"I want to make you happier!!"
"I want to make you even MORE happier!"

I could go on... but you really don't want me to.

5. Enjoying free time as an independent adult.

Separation anxiety is something most children overcome by the time they reach 6 to 7 years of age. I'm still waiting to find out at what age in marriage newly weds overcome the same thing. Even though I functioned perfectly fine in the two years that Peter was serving his mission in Japan, I now have a difficult time being physically estranged from my husband for more than a couple hours. At the end of each day we embrace like over emotional teenagers who think they're in love after the first week of high school, and if I wasn't so happy to see Peter I'd be incredibly grossed out and embarrassed by my behaviour.

If these things (The capability to enjoy sleeping in bed alone, peace of mind that you're not hideously messy, frivolous money splurges, being the most important person, and enjoying free time as an independent adult) matter to you a lot, ENJOY WHILE YOU CAN, BECAUSE THE MARRIAGE MONSTER IS COMING FOR THEIR SOULS. If not, then I guess you'll be fine, because beyond this, married life is pretty much the most fantastic thing since white bread.

It's you and me, Peege. Oh, and all these people lifting us up. 

The origins of a household psychopath

This past Sunday, Peter and I were lounging on our mattress (which we had moved into the living room area for a fun weekend adventure) doing very little. I was feeling bored and desperate for my husband's attention that he seemed very unwilling to offer me. As I lounged, I rolled and sang a song, which I can't remember now, but probably was just the words, "play with me, play with me" sung over and over to a classic children's song tune. Evidently, this strategic play which never worked on my siblings in the past, is still one that I cling to, because I am a creature of learning.
Turning from the show on his laptop Peter surveyed me calmly, clearly unmoved by plight.

"Chip?" he offers, holding out the bowl he has been snacking from. Excited by this friendly interaction from my loving husband, I agree, and reach my hand up to partake of the snack. From where I am sitting I can't see what is in the bowl, but I grope blindly with the faith and trust I have in my kind husband motivating me, only to learn that he has no qualms against calmly watching me dip my hand into queso.

"What the crap??" I scream, "What was that? You just watched me reach for dip!"
"Yes," he responds, still devoid of emotion and empathy, turning back to his show, "yes, I did."

Another dirty rotten trick of Peter has been to frequently hide the toothpaste from me. Seeing as he tries to spend a lot of time on my mouth, you'd think that he'd want me to know where the mouth-hygiene products are at every moment, yet each morning and every night I seem to be searching, dry toothbrush in mouth, for this elusive little tube.
Finally, yesterday morning I confronted him about it.

"Why do you always insist on hiding the toothpaste from me??" I demand.
"What are you talking about? It's always right here, on the shelf!" he says, picking up the tube from HIS shelf of personal toiletries.
"Just last night it was hidden under something on the kitchen table!" I yell, wandering into the bedroom to find clothes for the day.
"Oh. I'm sorry," he calls after me.
"Eez okay," I soften, "I know you don't mean to hide eet."
"No," he says, poking his head into the bedroom, "I'm sorry you found it. I'll do better next time."
*Melece issues angry animal noise while shaking fist* "Peeeeettterrrrrr!!!"

Last night, thanks to Peter's internship as an Assistant Campaign Manager to a local politician, (yes, he's political, so really these signs of psychopathology should be unshocking to me), we were treated to a wonderful dinner at Waimea Valley at the "Hawaiian Republican Party Party." Wahoo! Free food for me! A sneaky Democrat behind "enemy lines"!! (heeehee, I'm teasing, there is no enemy... EXCEPT SARAH PALIN (again, I'm joking), heehee) It was a fantastic evening, and I had so much fun feeling fancy and loving my husband, and eating FREE food. Then we returned home and begun our evening duties to prepare for bed.

I open the cabinet above the sink to retrieve my toothbrush and find both Peter's toothbrush and the toothpaste gone.
"Peeetttteeerrrrrr" I call, coming out from the bathroom to find him giggling with toothbrush in mouth and toothpaste in hand, waiting for me.
"Give. Me. The toothpaste," I say firmly.
"No!" he yells, before taking off for the couch where he jumps up on to the arm and holds the toothpaste up against the ceiling. "You can't reach it!!!"
"YOU THINK GUM DISEASE IS A GAME, GREGORY?!" I scream, climbing on the couch, only to have him jump off and begin to run around the apartment.

My husband is faster than me, smaller than me, and better at hiding than me, so within a couple minutes I'm tired and confused to how I cannot find him in an apartment that is essentially only one room. Then he emerges, smiling but sans toothpaste.
"I hid it!" he tells me proudly, continuing to brush his teeth.

At this point, I am tired and I am rapidly realizing that I will never win. Throwing what small remnants of dignity I had away, I advance on Peter.
"I don't have it!" he says, laughing, yet still backing up against the wall in fear, "you have to find it!"
"No. I don't." I say, and in one quick movement I yank the toothbrush out of his mouth and place it in my own.

Suddenly, this game isn't funny to Peter anymore, but disgusting, and he follows me saying, "no! Wait! It's right here, I'll show you! Just give me my toothbrush back!"
"I will give you this toothbrush when I have the toothpaste in my hand," I say, but not very distinctly, because, you know, I'm brushing my teeth with his toothbrush and all.

The moral of the story, Peter may be trying to be a psychopath, but I have very little fear of germs and grossness. Next time he offers me a bowl of queso, I'm smearing it on his face.

The Rich List

In being newly weds in Hawaii, one of which is a student, and one of us working a full-time job, there are a lot of things that you budget. Peter and I are blessed to be living so well thanks to generous parents, family, friends, scholarships, and grants, but we definitely live modestly and go without wherever we can.

Even before we were married, Peter and I enjoyed planning our dream home for when we are fabulously wealthy. On one recent night as I lay in bed, I found myself fantasising about some things that I would love to indulge in once we can afford it, and it wasn't anything that I had considered previously:

"We are going to have the BEST health insurance," I thought. "I'm going to go in and get a physical that addresses EVERYTHING, just because I CAN." I constructed this beautiful fantasy of a life with no fear of medical bills, a life that so few Americans know but yet still seem determined to stay away from (but that's a whole different issue). It was blissful.

Peter doesn't much care for our "Rich List" game, thinking that it focuses on all that we do not have currently. For me, the game makes me all the more comfortable in living within our means; I am able to easily justify saving any extra money that comes our way for our future, because our future is looking exciting.

Here is the latest written draft of the Rich List:

• Super cool shower - high powered, lots of settings, radio, lights, large removable shower-head, endless supply of hot water.   
• Big bed with nice mattress and frame, (some people say "but you'll be so far from each other!" Eh, we cuddle enough during day light hours. BRING ON THE CALIFORNIA KING). 
• Fantastic health insurance  
• Ear looky tool, nose looky tool, and stethoscope (I really enjoy cleaning and looking in ears and noses. I am so blessed to have a husband who both accepts and panders to my crazy) 
• Neat kitchen knives (for Peter. I don't cook at all.) 
• Fancy fridge 
• TV! - large, easily connected to Netflix and computer, DVD player, no cable. 
• Fun game systems for group activities - rock band, just dance, DDR, all those cool things. 
• Hot tub and pool
• Large bathtub for bubble baths 
• ***A PUPPY!*** 
• Soda on tap/bar 
• Sauna 
• Garbage disposal 
• Dishwasher, toaster, kettle (those last two really aren't that hard to get, we're just reluctant to buy things that we don't have room for). 
• Drum set 4 Peetah 
• Treehouse 
• Fireplace 
• Big, fancy fish tank 
• Deck/porch 
• Hybrid car with awesome gas milage or electric car. 
• Air conditioning 
• Fast internet that allows us to Skype people without losing the call!! 

Every day I like to think of more entries to this fun, extravagant life. The bigger the better! It doesn't matter so much if we ever have it all, I just find it ridiculously fun to plan it (additional entries include a pet sloth, jet packs, a slip n' slide, a giant, adult sized ball pit/tube town like at Chuck-e-Cheese's). Plus, these days anything that helps me fall asleep is my friend. 

A letter to my sleeping husband

Sleep is still a difficult thing for me to come by. It's actually the hardest part about marriage that I'm still adjusting to. I'm not good at waiting patiently for sleep to come, because I've always been so used to it just happening on it's own within minutes, so if I can't make it in an hour, I usually get up and go to the couch for a difference in scenery.

Here is a letter I composed to Peter in my brain at 4am last night shortly after I returned to bed, determined to sleep.

Dear Peege,
I adore you for opening your arms to me moments ago when I climbed back into bed. You pulled me into your body and it felt so nice, especially because you smell like a freshly cologned Greek god which is truly spectacular because it's 4am, and I'm pretty certain I smell like sweat and drool. I love that I can nuzzle into your neck right now and feel you breathing against my hair. This is great. This is so nice. Even when I can feel that spot on my head where your nose is slowly heating up until it could possibly compete with the fires of Mount Doom. I like it. It's like my head is on fire with your love. I love that our legs are intertwined right now, I feel like sexy clinging ivy with a really bad foot cramp. Seriously, though, this cramp is rough. If I try and move my foot will you still love me? You're snoring lightly, you lucky goose, and I've been awake since... forever, so you should definitely forgive me if I move my foot right now.
Okay, I know I just barely moved my foot, and you twitched slightly when I did so, but now my other one hurts too. I think you should allow me to move my feet.
Can you read my mind? Are you listening to me right now, Peege? Cause I specifically just thought that I wanted to move my feet, and you moved your legs. I think you may have been trying to help the situation, but you moved in the worst possible way. Seriously, the worst. If you can read my mind, I think you may be dyslexic when you do so. That's okay; I still love you. If you're still listening, please roll the other way.
I love you so much. Right now I'm a little bitter, because you're asleep and I'm not, and I'm mildly in pain, but that's okay; you're the greatest. I wish you weren't so insistent that sleeping with a fan blowing nearby gives you a sore throat, because your love fire on top of my head is making me sweat a little.
 I lied. It's really making me sweat. Can you feel the sweat dripping onto your neck? You may think that's drool, but it's totally not. I don't know if that makes the situation better or worse. Wait, no, there is some drool there.
Wow you're hot. I always knew you were an attractive man, but right now you are physically incredibly hot and I'm dying a little. Still, this is so sentimental, so sweet. We could just cuddle like this forever.
I lied, Peter. We can't cuddle like this forever. Not in this AC lacking apartment. I can't do it. Right now we're like the opposite of Rose and Jack while they try to survive in the icy Atlantic ocean surrounded by frozen bodies. If one of us dies, it will be from heat asphyxiation instead of hypothermia and I love you too much to allow that to happen.
You're a small man, and I have always promised to never assert dominance over you, at least not more than that which I can't personally handle in return, but I need to pin you. This sweet smelling cuddle has turned to my hair practically catching on fire, me sweating, my legs cramping and my left arm losing sensation. You've punched me in your sleep before, so I totally understand if that needs to happen right now, but it's time to roll. We can do this, we really can. We're not Rose and Jack, and neither of us needs to die, but it's time for us to separate. Please roll over.
Roll over.

Roll.

Now.
Now.

How about now?

Thank you for eventually listening to me. I was too afraid to roll you, so I'm grateful for how caring you are to do so on your own. You pushed me away, not because you wanted to, but because you knew I was on the verge of death, and I appreciate that. You look so cute sleeping right now, even with my drool and sweat shining on your neck. You wear it well, and that's something not many men could do.

Sweet sleeps.

Melly.
  

What did one brick say to the other as it hugged him? LEGO!

A fun fact about my Peter that some may not know is that he loves Legos. When he was in High School he taught a Lego class to kids in the community in Seattle, and at his parents' house he has gallons of Legos with which he has built incredible amounts of Lego sculptures and artwork.

Before meeting Peter I had no idea that Legos could be so exciting for some. To me what were little coloured bricks that children played with, and that could be used as torture weapons if left on the floor to be stepped on, are to others a part of a fantastic lifestyle which is not to be overlooked. 

Knowing this about my husband, and that here he has none of his Legos with him, I was excited for his birthday to come up so I could get him a good kit of coloured plastic joy. The day before his birthday I told Peter we needed groceries, and that I would go to Walmart after work to get them. I figured my task would be a simple one, and that I could be in and out of the superstore within an hour. 

OH YOU FOOLISH WOMAN WITH NO KNOWLEDGE OF THE COMPLEX WORLD OF LEGOISM. 

I arrive at the Lego isle to find myself surrounded by hundreds of kits with special pictures and instructions of exactly what you can build with them. 

"THIS WON'T DO!" I scream internally, "HE'LL BUILD THIS IN A MOMENT, THEN WHAT WILL HE HAVE?! NOTHING BUT HOBBIT/STAR WARS/LEGO MOVIE/DC/MARVEL THEMED BRICKS!"

To me, an uncultured and informed woman, these kits seem infuriating because they are so inflexible; there is only so much you can build with so specifically intended designs, and the last thing I want to do is limit my sweet husband's creativity. That being said, it is my quest to find Lego for Peter, and I will accomplish this. After pacing up and down the isle for what seems like hours, but is really only 15 minutes, two boys of about eight or nine come browsing and gasping over sets. At the risk of seeming like a predator I approach them. 

"So, uh," I begin smoothly, "which one of these kits is the best?" 

"The best?" one of them asks

"Yeah, like, which one would you most want?" 

"They're all good." he responds, before turning back to gush over what ever kit they were investigating. 

"'THEY'RE ALL GOOD?'" I want to scream, "BUT WHAT IF HE DOESN'T WANT TO BUILD THE ONE I CHOOSE?!" 

Foiled by these children whose parents have clearly taught them the reality of stranger danger, I go back to my pacing. I eventually choose a DC set with Batman, Flash, and the Riddler. Peter is thrilled. 

However, my assumptions that these kits are a one-trick pony are accurate, and I notice my lil' husband stops playing with his creations shortly after his birthday. 

Yesterday I had a CPI training in Honolulu less than a mile from the only Lego store on Oahu. Certain that this store will have all of my answers, I go immediately after the training. 

"Do you like Lego?" I demand of a teenaged worker standing by the entrance

"Yes," he responds. 

"But do you like like Lego? Are you serious about Lego, or is this only a job to you?" 

"I like Lego," he assures me, laughing now, but cautiously, probably realizing that he's dealing with a deranged woman looking for a Lego coffin set to stow her latest murder victim. 

"I need your help," I say, refusing to be foiled by the Lego world again. 

I explain to him I need versatile bricks, that my sweet Lego-deprived husband has nothing and I need to get something he can build everything with, and he guides me to a yellow tub with 607 pieces inside, as well as to a pick-n'-mix wall where you can fill a cup with as many pieces as possible for a flat price. Seeing that the yellow tub is the last one in the store, I cling to it like a life preserver and begin pacing up and down the wall, determined to get as many useful bricks as possible. Of course, to me, nothing makes sense and I find myself demanding "what is this! Is this useful? Is this fun?" while shoving various pieces in front of shoppers' faces while they attempt to fill their own cup. 

Eventually another shop assistant comes to help me, most likely in an attempt to get me away from the other costumers, and I leave the store, a collection of Legos now in my possession. 

There is so much I still have to learn, but at least Peter has a much better starting kit, and I get to smile while I watch him Gollum-crouch as he builds his masterpieces. 

Adventures of an inter-height marriage

Once upon a time, before his mission, Peter was in Seattle and I was in Austria and we Skyped all the time. This was the first time that my parents really got to know about Peter and how close we were. One time I mentioned that I had made a short joke in teasing Peter, and my dad laughed saying,

"Well, he's still taller than you!"
"haha, no he isn't!" I responded.
"He's not?" my father asked, a little confused now.
"No."
"Oh."

At this point I continued on with whatever I had been doing or talking about, but about 20 minutes later, after being silent for that time, my father asked,
"So, he's shorter than you?"

This kind of conversation became very common place once Peter was on his mission and I would mention I was waiting for him to people who knew us.

"Peter? Peter?" they would ask, usually gesturing with their hand somewhere near their shoulder and parallel to the ground
"Yeah. Peter."
"Oh... uh..." they would respond, and almost invariably, "is he, um... shorter... than... you?"

This kind of statement would strike me as funny because of the way it was asked, almost as though they weren't sure if I knew Peter was shorter than me, and that perhaps enlightening me to the reality of the situation would somehow change everything I felt about him.

"HE IS?!" Maybe I'd yell. "THIS IS BRAND NEW INFORMATION!! EVERYTHING I KNOW IS A LIE"

Meanwhile in Japan, Peter was having the same conversation with anyone he discussed me with. Well, whether I'm taller than him that is.

Not to belittle the turmoil or stress of homosexual youths coming out to those they love, sometimes, in introducing ourselves as a inter-height couple, I felt we had a similar amount of pressure and societal expectations to overcome. Especially in the way that people just didn't seem to know what to say about the situation when they first found out.
"I'm in love with a man. A short man."
"What? Really? Since when? How much shorter is he than you??" - said everyone ever.

I am 5"5' and Peter is 5"3'. This hasn't ever struck me as a bad thing; I fell in love with Peter as he was because he was my best friend and my life was so much better with him in it. I have no regrets in the world in regards to our relationship. However, I do have a plethora of really funny anecdotes.

This last Christmas we flew to stay with my parents. The airline had messed our seats so we weren't sitting together, so Peter charmed the gate attendant to change our tickets to the only open ones on the plane - an exit row. As we loaded into our seats a steward was waiting across from us.
"Uh..." he stammers, watching us, "I just need to check, but, uh, are you two over 15?"

Later that same trip Peter, my sister Sharah and I went to a trampoline house. You have to sign a waiver in order to jump, and you have to be over 18 to jump without a chaperone. While Sharah and I signed up no problem, Peter was approached by a worker and IDed.
"I'M AN ADULT!" he later vented to me. Sure you are, my sweet.

I'd like to believe that people think that we both look incredibly youthful, but the reality is, it's just Peter. On Mother's day Peter found me nine precious puppies to play with. The seven year old boy who lived in the house with the puppies came out and talked to us while we played. He was particularly interested in working out who we are and what our relationship was.
"Do you live with your parents?" he asked us.
"No, we live just us together." Peter said,
"Is she your sister?"
"No."
Turning to me he asked, "are you his mom?"
"No, I'm his wife."
"His wife?" He repeated, looking very perplexed and demanding from Peter, "But, how old are you? You're too little to be married!"

Oh, great, kid, but I'm big enough to be his MOTHER?!

One Saturday Peter came back from doing the laundry walking like a dejected Charlie Brown.
"A little kid just asked me if I was a kid or an adult," he told me, as I tried not to laugh, "I said I was an adult, and he told me he had a friend his age who could pick me up."

While the struggle is real, and people (including our sister in law) like to ask us how we kiss, ("like, do you have to stand on your tip-toes??" "No, Peter has a special step stool.") I love and adore my husband more than anything else in the world and he is my perfect man. Plus, it means hiding presents or food I don't want to share is super easy (the cupboards over the fridge are far too high for him to reach). Those fruit snacks are all MINE, Perter, and you KNOW IT.

I vow to always take the high road.
Get it? Heuheuheuhe

My husband is dangerously close to mysteriously dying

A struggle of living in a feminist marriage is that I have no power or authority over my husband that he doesn't have over me. This means constant war, and Peter and I take our battles seriously.

For the past month TVA has been warning us about upcoming cleaning checks. They were finally supposed to happen yesterday between 7 and 11 am. I have many criticisms of this school, and the decision to do cleaning checks in married housing on a Saturday morning between 7 and 11 am is just about the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

Peter left to take a practise LSAT around 7am, and returned around 11:40. Meanwhile, I slept peacefully with the whole bed to myself until he returned. This was fantastic, but it meant that if any cleaning check happened, it was while I was unconscious and drooling. Still, we didn't see any indication that anyone had come in to assess our level of slobbery (can I use that as a noun?)
At first we tidied the apartment to make sure that if our RAs arrived on Hawaiian Standard Time, we would be prepared, but still no one came, so we had a wrestling match instead and messed up the apartment in the meantime.

Around 1:15pm, Peter left the apartment to go to the temple, and I went to the bathroom with the intent of taking a shower afterwards. Here I am, sitting pretty on the toilet, sans clothing, when I hear five fast and loud thumps on our front door. There is no way that I am going to answer the door, in fact, there's no way I CAN open the door, but this doesn't matter to my visitor, as moments later I head the key card click and the door open.
"Oh, heeeeeeeyyyy no" I think to myself, "They are hours late and they think they can just come into my home??"
Assuming the intruder is unaware of my presence, I quickly flush the toilet and turn on the shower, figuring the only way I can maintain dignity is to take my shower and wait for them to leave. The whole time I wash, I spew an angry inner monologue about the fail we are sure to receive on our cleaning check because SOME PEOPLE can't come when they SAY they'll come, simultaneously afraid that when I do leave in my towel, I will awkwardly be faced with a stranger waiting in my apartment.

When I do leave the bathroom minutes later it is to find Peter at his computer chuckling.
"Was that you??" I demand.
"Mmmmaybe" he responds with a smirk.
"I thought you were the RA!" I yell.
"Oh, I know," he tells me still smirking.

YOU SNEAKY HUSBAND.

In the middle of the night last night I awoke to Peter laughing in his sleep. I chuckle and nuzzle closer to him, tying to make sure I can hear anything he says so I can mock tell him in the morning. He continues to giggle, then suddenly whips his body and arm around to roll on his side, fist making strong and painful contact with my nose as he does so. At the time, Peter awoke and said, "sorry sorry sorry!" before falling asleep again as I went to get ice for my face, but now he says he has no recollection of such a thing. Uh huh, sure you don't. I'm on to you, you night giggle-puncher.

This morning as I got pretty for church with a sore face and a grumpy disposition, I found that Peter had been possessed by the spirit of Speedy Gonzales with a exhibitionist fetish. This means that while I sat on the couch immersed in my makeup bag, Peter was running around the apartment giggling and lifting up his shirt to flash me his chest at random intervals, laughing, singing, and dancing when I would look up to see. We are mature adults in a mature adult relationship.

So maybe these aren't great example of our war battles, but they're funny stories, and I'm still butthurt about Peter's RA knocking to scare me, so the Speedy joke could be taken as a short crack too.

Strife with Husband and Wife

There are a remarkable number of things that I do that absolutely infuriate my husband.

If you're reading this blog, I'm assuming you're aware of my distinct lack of maternal instincts. I'm sure that someday Peter and I will have children, but that day is far in the future. The idea of getting pregnant honestly gets me into ugly-cry hysterics, the most recent of episodes happened just yesterday while my husband stroked my hair and wiped my tears and told me I wasn't pregnant, and I will continue to not be pregnant until the time comes when we're ready for spawn.
That being said, the concept of names is so interesting to me. When you become a parent you have this overwhelming amount of power to give the child its identity! Therefore, I am CONSTANTLY looking up baby names. I had one girls name that I absolutely loved picked out for about 3 years, but it has been gaining popularity which only makes it my obsession and life mission to find a replacement favourite name.
"But you don't even WANT kids!" Peter will yell at me in a fit of exasperation after I have asked his opinion on another dozen possible names.
"I KNOW." I scream back, "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND."
And, to be fair, he really doesn't, because I don't honestly understand it. It's just a thing.

Another aggravating thing for Peter is when I'll ask his opinion and do just the opposite of what he suggests. Last Sunday we were at a church potluck,
"Do I want more chilli?" I asked him, "or straight for dessert?" While this was a simple enough question, that I really truly wanted my husband's input on, as I asked, my eyes travelled to the dessert table where I locked eyes on the most beautiful cheesecake I have ever seen. This cheesecake was flawless, and it needed to be mine, there was no way that I could risk someone eating it while I was working on chilli and rice.
Faintly registering in the back of my mind that Peter had responded, "you want chilli first" to my inquiry, I firmly stated, "I need cheesecake" and headed off to cut myself a slice.
When I returned to the table, Peter demanded,
"Why do you even ask my opinion if you're just going to do what you want anyway?" and went on to have a conversation with the rest of the table about when their spouse does this to them, because apparently it's a common thing for all marriages to suffer under, while I ate my new found love.
Honestly, I can understand his frustration, but, Pagglecakes, it's CHEESECAKE.

This morning Peter realized that I had tried to end our marriage once and for-all when I was attempting to tidy our apartment.
I have been home sick from work since yesterday by the wonderful silver lining of my job which is: when your client gets you sick, he needs to stay home and you're not needed, so you both get to suffer from whatever plague you are sharing, but at least you're resting while you do so.
This morning I woke at 2am with a chainsaw hack of a cough and so moved to the living room to try and avoid waking Peter (hashtag: I'm such a good wife). When 5am hit and I was still awake I gave it up for a bad job and busied myself tidying the side of my bed where some envelopes and papers lay. I found a return-to-sender wedding announcement we had sent to a friend, my new car insurance cards, my pay stub, and something from the Honolulu department of health. I tossed the announcement, replaced my insurance cards, checked and filed my pay stub, and looked over the Honolulu letter. My brain told me, this isn't important, we're married now, because, honestly, the paper looked completely useless to me, so I tossed it in the trash.
Hours later, after Peter had woken and we had breakfast and snuggled and showered and all that fun stuff, he reached for the trash to take it out on his way to campus (how helpful is my husband?)
"Melly!" he yells at me. I look up to see him holding the paper that I had taken care of (with out even being asked, mind you).
"What?" I ask
"THIS IS OUR MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE. WHY DID YOU THROW IT AWAY?"
"It didn't look... important?" I offer, while simultaneously laughing at the fact that I had attempted to dispose of the legal document proving we're husband and wife.
"There's something for you to write on Facebook," he mutters while he ties up the bag, "better yet, blog about how you threw away our marriage certificate."

So here I am, blogging about how my husband adores me. :) He really does. We're so totally happy. Minus the fact that I am obsessed with finding the perfect name, I never take his advice, and I tried to file for divorce today using our trashcan.

I LOVE YOU, PAG! 

Stop running and let me seduce you, dang it!

I've always heard people say that marriage changes you. Having been thoroughly married for a month now, and thus an expert in all things pertaining to the subject, I can attest that this is true. At least, it has some strange power over your vocal chords and intonations.

Peter and I have always had a fondness for goofiness, but somehow vowing to be together forever caused us to throw all seriousness out the window, especially when addressing one another.

"Who's a good girl??" and "Who do I love?" all in dog-speak appropriate tones are something I hear multiple times each day, and, of course, being the tax-paying, money earning, college graduate that I am, I invariably respond, "Is it me???" in my best puppy voice right back.

Puppy voices aside, we have also grown fond of every form of alternate voice, dialect, or accent that we can muster, even though I have no recollection of ever deciding to add such things to our daily lives. On one occasion I can even recall telling Peter genuinely, "We need to stop using weird voices" while using a Russian accent. Peter only laughed. I suppose I am even harder to take serious as a Russian than I am as an American.

Sure it's fine if couples are weird with one another, however, sometimes Peter and I fail to remember that people are around and don't usually address each other in strange accents or Dogese (a variant of Motherese that is much more cool cuz it's for dogs and as we all know dogs>babies), which is a possible reason why people don't seem to come hang out with us much anymore.

Beyond voices, the name calling excels post-marital commitment. I've never been all that fond of the name "Babe" and therefore, Peter and I had never addressed each other as such. In fact, anytime I use the term "Babe" in endearment form, I am forcibly reminded of The Office episode in which Jim and Pam attend Michael and Jan's for a dinner party and the latter two spend the night fighting while saying "Babe" every other word. However, come to our honeymoon, Peter and I are saying "Babe" like it's the only name we've ever known each other by. Peter's use far surpasses my own, and I've found that there's a level to each stage of Babeosity: Peter's use prior to marriage: 0%, post marriage 50%, post marriage and with company present 90%.

Yet, in this story, Peter is shockingly not the one guilty of "pushing boundaries"...

In the glorious days of our engagement, I discovered I could produce a voice that was so off putting to Peter that he claimed it made certain parts of his body migrate to places that they are not supposed to be (heh look at me talking all fancy about testicles, you probably didn't even know that's what I was talking about). One night this week, I happened to stumble upon this voice again, causing Peter to make very unhappy noises and retreat away from me. Being the determined wife I am, I decided in that moment that I could conquer the world and persuade anyone of anything if I could woo my husband using the most off-putting voice I had.

So, that's how I came to be running around our small studio apartment in my underwear, armed with a Nerf gun, chasing my husband while calling, "Peeeeeeeettteeeeer" with my anti-sex voice, (which, for those interested, is an airy, whimpering, simper that includes chuckles every so often. It's fabulous. Trust me). For some reason unbeknownst to me, shooting Peter with foam and rubber bullets didn't seem to be helping my case, nor did me pulling out a nearby lightsaber, and I soon lost him. This was surprising to me, because, although my husband is small, there's a limited amount of places that a 5'3 body can be stashed in our apartment. Ultimately, while I stood, crouched and ready for attack atop our bed, my husband was curled beneath it hiding from the monster he had vowed to take and love forever.

Come on, Babe. Eez not dat baaaad, let me lav yoo.

Lovers 1 & 2

Sleep.
This five letter word is my life.
We first fell into our love affair when I was 16. While I had always been pretty indifferent about this nightly ritual, suddenly, something happened inside me which made me understand how fantastically beautiful sleep is. Since then I have never turned my back on it.

Peter.
Another beloved five letter word of my life.
We first fell into our love affair when I was 19. This spunky little man with a golden whitebrofro who was constantly rapping and/or dancing was always indifferent towards me, but I thought he was adorable. Four years after meeting each other, we are now married.

Two lovers of mine. Close to my heart. Close to my soul. Who knew that one would murder the other so brutally?

Okay, I'm totally lying, sleep isn't dead, it's just been stolen from me.
I always considered that sharing my bed with someone else - my main hook-up spot with sleep - had the potential to scare the latter away, but people told me I was crazy.
WHO'S THE CRAZY ONE NOW, FOLKS?!

Okay, so it's still partly me.

Let me back up.

While Peter and I were dating, he had already known me for two and a half years, and so he knew that I would climb mountains, or more realistically, refuse to climb anything besides my bed in order to sleep. Most Friday nights I was in bed by 10pm and every weeknight by 9:30 or earlier. Peter, on the other hand, never got to bed at a decent hour, no matter how much I urged him to.
Flash forward to our honeymoon and Peter is asleep EVERY NIGHT BY 8PM. In a cruel twist of irony, the lovers who I had been two-timing for 8 months had now fallen into each others arms, leaving me alone. However, the time I have been spending awake in our bed each night has enlightened me to fun observations about my little husband while he embraces my lover sleep.

1. While everyone twitches as their body falls asleep, my husband thrashes violently. If I am holding his hand, he will karate chop it away, while other times he will rapidly kick the bed with full force. Once or twice, I have been close to sleep when a dosing Peter will gasp in air as if he has been drowning and I spend the next fifteen minutes trying to ask him if he is okay, but of course

2. When Peter is sleeping, he will not be awoken. There have been many times when, as a bored wife, I poke, prod, tickle, and call to my bedmate, but to no avail. That being said,

3. A sleeping Peter is a delicate Peter. Any bump or graze is at risk to whimpers and "owwwwwwwww"s while he clings to whatever body part I have offended and curls away from me like an injured puppy. YET STILL NOT WAKING UP TO PLAY WITH ME.


This sleep thing is a struggle, but is slowly improving; I haven't spent a night on the couch or the floor in over a week! HOW EXCITING IS MY LIFE?