Something I didn’t know about my husband before we got married is that he will not kill bugs; instead, he sets them free.

I never imagined I would be living in some sort of wildlife preserve, but alas, Max just carefully removed a giant stink bug from my Kate Spade purse, opened our front door and gave the bug another chance at life.

He usually places a cup over the insect to gently trap it before setting it free outside. I had never felt more like a psychopathic murderer than I did the first time I saw Max do this.

Am I an awful person for crushing bugs and flushing them down the toilet (and sometimes getting satisfaction from it??)

We  are creeping up on our one year anniversary and bugs and all, it has been the best year of my life.

Marriage is this interesting mystery where two people with their own separate lives come together and weld them into this strange hybrid. My husband and I are about as opposite as they come, so the welding of our daily life has come with some unexpected lessons.

The best illustration of how Max and I are different is that when Max signs his name on the Credit Card thing at the store, he actually signs it…the whole entire thing perfectly. **And he is a III. He even signs that.

When I sign, I do a couple swirls and a few dots for good measure. (I don’t even have any “i’s” in my name).

For the most part, our lives came together seamlessly, however there are a few areas of starkly contrasting opinions: I call them Great Debate items:

1. The Water Cups

Staying hydrated is important and for this reason, I like to leave a variety of half filled water cups around the house. They might seem haphazardly placed, but I know where they are if I need them. Unfortunately, more often than not, I go to retrieve a nice drink of water and Max has loaded my cup into the dishwasher.

2. The Microwave

When I am microwaving food, I NEVER let the time expire. When it gets down to about 7 seconds, I take my food and leave it. Nothing drives Max crazier than seeing :07 on the microwave instead of the time. He spends a lot of his life picking up water cups and hitting ‘clear’ on our microwave.

3. The Lights

Max enjoys turning off the lights as he leaves one room and enters another. I like the whole house to be illuminated with light. My parents told me when I was younger that “one day when I paid the bills, I would turn the lights off.” They were wrong. And I still don’t pay the bills.

4. The Cleaning Supplies

When the mood to clean strikes, nothing can stop me. Sometimes it’s while I’m lying in bed at night. I just need to scrub the counters. For this reason, I like to leave cleaning supplies and the vacuum out in plain sight for easy cleaning access. Max says that vacuums are not home decor items and should be hidden. Differences of opinion, once again.

5. The Teeth Brushing

Honestly sometimes I just need the night off. I have great dental health, I promise. One of my best friends is even married to a dentist. Yes, technically it has been 5 years since I have been to the dentist, but they look and feel great.

98% of the time I brush my teeth before bed, but there are just some nights I cannot muster the strength. On those nights, Max will not rest until my teeth are brushed.

He is relentless.

I think he once physically carried me to the bathroom to brush my teeth. This is a sore subject for us.

We prepared for the large issues: the money, having children, etc, but not for the Water Cups.

But the Great Debate Topics 1-5 have really only made this year stronger.

I can say this because I married a man who models Biblical love better than anyone I know in this entire world. He deals with my idiosyncrasies with grace, love, an unbelievable amount of patience. After writing this blog, I realized it should actually be called “Annoying Things I Realized I Do” but it doesn’t have the same ring to it.

 

The honest reason I have had the best year of my life is because I have been the recipient of unconditional, selfless love from a husband who seeks to love how God loves. I have realized all of these annoying things I do, and watched him love me fiercely even in moments when I am totally, completely unlovable.

The important thing is that even 20 years from now we still laugh through them and love each other in spite of them.

At the end of the day, the Great Debate Topics don’t really matter so much. I will start occasionally putting away my water cups, and Max will eventually let me have a night off from brushing my teeth. No matter how different we are, if we model Biblical, selfless love, we will still be disagreeing about the microwave when we are 95.