Celebrating a New Relationship

Almost one year ago I moved into Sprite’s home. I brought with me five suitcases of stuff, and a lot of unsorted baggage in my heart and in my head.

We now live together in our new home that we moved into several months ago and plan to be married in our garden late next month.

It’s been an intense year of getting to know each other, and yet seems like a very short year of enjoying each other’s company.

I am always certain that I know how to live and that my way is the best way.

Sprite lived on her own for seven years and she too felt that she knew how to live the best way for herself which makes sense since she didn’t have to accommodate anyone else.

She ran her own company.  I ran mine.

So although we began our relationship with no clash in underlying values, there were differences in the details.  Sprite preferred to be in bed by 9:00 pm and she awoke before dawn.  I was accustomed to going to sleep after 11:00 pm and waking after 7:00 am.  She was used to spending a lot of quality time with her significant other, which was different than the way I had lived for the past many years.

What to do?

We both decided to be flexible and willing to try everything a different way, unless it involved eating raw oysters (which I detest).

Fortunately Sprite doesn’t like raw oysters either, so there was no issue there.

As for my trying to do things her way, my ego would say that it didn’t turn out too badly.  My rational mind says that it turned out quite well. We have each benefited from one another’s strengths. Sprite has valuable ideas for my blogs.  I help her to better understand money and investment because she wants to learn more about those subjects.

Sprite is better at organizing than I am.  She arranged our closet so that it’s easy for me to be neat.  Of course, I am delighted when she occasionally leaves her boots outside of the neat closet because I feel more relaxed living with someone who doesn’t also need to be perfect.  I certainly don’t want to have to be perfect, at least not according to anyone else’s rules.

Sprite loves to cook and does it almost every day. While, out of health concerns, I never added salt to food, she does (along with a lot of lemon juice) and I find her cooking delicious. Her breakfasts and dinners are healthy, inspired, and a joy to look forward to.  I relish our Sunday morning treks to the local farmer’s market where we buy most of our food.  This has been a totally new experience for me.

What I have discovered in our year of getting to know one another better is this:

1. There is no “right” or “wrong” way to live. There are only “different” ways.
2. Something different might be better.
3. Many of Sprite’s preferences work better for me than my own.

And yes, we have each lost some “battles,” Sprite sometimes goes to bed later than she is used to and often skips her usual morning workout just to stay in bed with me.  But both Sprite and I have won the peace together.

Cheers to our February wedding, where my 102-year-old father will be our best man.

Alan