Date Night Revisited
The tale of the beginning of my relationship, before it was a marriage, is quite a story to tell. There are some truly funny portions of our courtship, and some equally as sweet. I honestly love to tell our story and all the silly twists and turns our path to becoming a couple took. One of the first stories I can remember, post coupledom, is very telling as to how Trav and I work as two people in our relationship. We were still in the first blushes of our love when, the in the bedroom of my tiny apartment, he expressed that there had been something weighing on him.
“I have to tell you something.”
“What, “I replied, quite worried.
Of course, conversations that begin with that statement are always anxiety producing. The mind runs wild with the possibilities of what “something” might be. There is nothing more frightening that what we can imagine. That is why the supernatural scares the begeesus out of me but, that is a topic for another time.
Trav sat me down on my bed and began to explain, “I need a lot of space. Like I need a lot of time to myself. I must be able to go away and not have to talk to you or anyone for large chunks of time.”
I giggled and replied, “So?”
This was obviously this was not the response that he had anticipated, and he tried to explain, again, just how much independence was required in his life to be happy, “No, I mean I need total removal. Like you can’t be around me at all.”
Again, “So?”
He stared at me, completely shocked. He had expected me to take it far more difficultly. He had expected me to rant and rave and cry and yell. How could his girlfriend understand that despite needing time alone he still was interested, even in love with her? Apparently, his former girlfriend had not taken the news of this personality trait well and set an unfortunate precedent for the girlfriends coming next. However, the one that came next, me, had no problem with the requirements and she stuck around for the long haul.
That conversation formed one of the cornerstones of our partnership. It was independence. It was separation with being together. As it turns out, both of us craved the solitude that Trav had mandated. Now, this wasn’t because we didn’t want to spend time with each other. In fact, the opposite, there was something about being able to come back together after having the space we both needed that was beyond magical. We could appreciate each other so much by having the independence our souls craved. It is not what one the conventional idea of togetherness is but it works for us. Without that rejuvenating aloneness our cogs are creaky and jolting. The oil we need is time alone.
It is for this reason that I have always had no compunctions with taking on as many theater projects as possible. I am home all day with our children, following behind them, tidying all of the chaos that they leave in their wake. During my days, even when we had fewer children, there was very little time space in the world for me. As many stay at home parents will understand, our work never ends. There is never a moment that is sacred and my own. Nothing is off limits. The number of times when a little boy has forced his way into my shower demanding a snack or refuses to leave the bathroom despite my begging for just two minutes to finish the task at hand far exceeds the fingers and toes on my own person and every person, I have encountered over the course of the time I have been a mother. Having rehearsal to go to every night allowed me to endure all these breaches of privacy, knowing that for a few hours, I would be able to have my moments of breath alone while creating my characters and art.
On that same note, Trav has had no problem “allowing” me to run off to the theatre on the regular because it gave him hours of guilt free time to play video games. I would book show after show, overlapping for months and he had nary a care. I t was only after roughly six months of me being gone at the theatre every night when he would begin to miss me. I would book the next show with a few weeks rest time and we would have a lovely couple of weeks together before I would run off for another part and he a new game to play. Then the pandemic hit, and all was thrown on its head. We existed in that limbo for two years.
All of this is to say that for our almost ten-year marriage, we have both enjoyed the independence and solitude that had been the established need in that early conversation. It may be unorthodox and weird to people outside of our relationship, but it works for us. That is not to say we don’t enjoy time together. Just that going out on dates isn’t the most regular thing for us. And then, covid. As with most things the two years of sheltering from covid changed our ability to be solitary beings. There was very little break from being “on duty” all of the time. So, in survival mode we tried to give each other the space that we each needed by trading off. This meant that instead of having any time just the two of us, our psyches were consumed with how we were going to cope in this emergent and highly anxiety ridden time. To top that all off, for safety’s sake, there was no way that we were going to indulge in leaving the house and sitting amongst other people with the potential to bring home the crazy virus that could have been so serious for our household. It had been a very long time since Trav, and I have gone out on a date. Not a celebration of someone’s birthday or an anniversary but just a date to enjoy each other’s company. Until last Friday.
As most of y’all know, Monday, the 18th was Tax Day. It has been a long-held desire for Trav to dip his toe into the world of taxes and this year presented the opportunity. Instead of dipping a toe in though, he was thrown into the path of a hurricane. This meant hat for three weeks he was working 16-hour days and even 24-hour days towards the end. This left me holding the household and children bag and by the time he was nearing done, I was exhausted. And craving time with him. So, in celebration of surviving The Buck’s first tax season we decided to book a babysitter and go out together.
It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, as far as dates go. We got all four of the kiddos in bed before we left, making caring for all of them as easy as possible for the sitter. Then jumped into Trav’s car and drove across town to the chosen restaurant. On the way, we joked about how terrible his car’s headlights were and how we might not make it home in the dark with them as our beacons to show us the way. Arriving at the restaurant, we were settled into a cozy corner table, and he began to tell me about his post taxes debrief meeting with his boss. He had been offered the opportunity to be a partner in the tax firm and my encouragement to take it was a surprise and a welcomed joy. We chatted about next year’s season and how it would be easier. It was so wonderful to sit with my husband in a special place and be together. We ordered and shared far too much food and even got dessert. (This is a surprise because it is usually I who wants dessert and Trav will begrudgingly order something. This time it was an emphatic yes from him.) We laughed and talked and just were us for two whole hours. It was a lovely departure from normal.
I supposed this is probably a very boring post for everyone. There isn’t really much content or a story to enjoy but it meant a lot for us. As the years pass and we settled into our routine and comfort zone, it was easy to just exist. And we have been happy in that. So happy that needing to go out on dates wasn’t something that crossed my mind. But despite the comfort, having a special night with Trav was absolutely wonderful. I need to keep that in mind because after ten years of marriage, we deserve to have some sweet stolen moments to ourselves. And I plan to make them happen.
(Also, for those of you who were worried about the headlight situation, we made it home just fine. In fact, it inspired me to play “One Headlight” by The Wallflowers. And then we went down the rabbit hole of early 90’s music and belting “Inside Out” by Eve 6 all the way home.)