A new kind of romance

June 18, 2016

My husband and I went on a date a few weeks ago.

I could tell you that we laughed and held hands and felt totally at ease with each other.  

I could tell you that he looked at me and I looked at him and our eyes met and we remembered why we fell in love in the first place.

I could tell you that I’d dressed especially nice for him, and him for me.

I could tell you that I’d looked forward to this date all week, as soon as we’d made the arrangements.

And all of this would be true. All of this happened.

Here’s what else I could tell you…

We’d considered scrapping the whole thing multiple times.

The three-year-old would probably be sick. I might be sick. We didn’t want to burden my husband’s parents with our tired, crabby kids. We’d probably be tired and crabby, too.

Then we realized we’d only been on a date twice in nearly a year.

Upon getting dressed, I realized that I’d packed the same clothes we’d worn on our last warm-weather date, the previous fall. So did my husband.

Apparently we have date-night uniforms.

Apparently in addition to a lack of dating in our lives, there is also a lack of shopping.

I tried wearing my hair down, because I know my husband likes it. I lasted ten minutes before the ponytail happened.

When we told our two sons we were leaving, the three-year-old barely noticed. The nine-year-old looked after us longingly with a left-out expression on his face.

We made it to the gas station down the street before I asked my husband to pull over.

“He isn’t going to want to hang out with us much longer. He so rarely gets to do anything with just us, without his brother tagging along.”

I called my in-laws house and asked if he’d like to come along. He’d forgotten we’d left.

As we drove downtown the struggle not to talk about the kids was palpable.

It isn’t that we don’t have anything else to talk about. It’s just that we have fallen into a pattern – a habit of being – that is entirely kid-centered.

We’d originally planned to go to dinner, but the in-laws were grilling burgers and they smelled so good!

And our sister-in-law brought her famous guacamole.

We settled on dessert.

I ordered a double-scoop cone because why not?

The girl behind the counter gave me a funny look but I didn’t really notice. I was watching a boy about our younger son’s age be dazzled by sprinkles. I felt guilty for wishing we’d brought the kids.

When she handed me my cone I was embarrassed to take it. It appeared they’d heaped an entire carton of huckleberry ice cream onto a pushpin.

The days when this giant ice cream cone would have made me embarrassed in front of my husband are long gone.

He knows I have a spatial disorder. I simply cannot discern distance or volume or direction. It’s a part of who I am. We laughed at this shared knowledge as I tackled my giant dessert.

I felt a little sick afterwards, but I dominated that ice cream like a boss.

We walked around the block before we were both tired and stuffed and ready to head back and check on the kids.

In our own defense, it was a big block.

This article first appeared in the Lewistown News-Argus and the Sidney (Mont.) Herald on June 18, 2016.