291. Turbulence Ahead

Marriage is not for the weak hearted. However,  it remains to this day the best decision I’ve ever made, to propose to this girl in an ornate pool in a temperate city in a beautiful South Asian country. At the beginning of the trip to this different corner of our known world, I had no idea I was going to pop the question. But pop went the question in my head and it was one of the most pervasive and intrusive thoughts I’ve had. I bought a 5 cent ring and proposed to her immediately. 

Navigating these 8 years has been a learning opportunity for the both of us, as we have grown and the world around us has arguably grown as well. Thinking and reacting about how your spouse is feeling while realizing how you are feeling and what your surrounding loved ones are feeling would be a challenge for artificial intelligence and we’re just meat puppets with small buffers! Finding someone for whom you are willing to endure these kind of mental gymnastics is the biggest privilege I’ve ever known. 

I won’t say that without Roxanne, I would be a manipulable incel just perfect for preying alt-righters trying to enroll me into the whole Musk-testicle-gargling-to-fascism pipeline; but I do believe that learning to care and grow for another has inoculated me from that particular path. 

Is everything a garden path? No, there’s the fights that I think are about sponges left inside the sink but are actually about feelings of lack of respect or lack of empathy. There’s spats that I still don’t understand the cause and there’s all the quarrels left for us in the future as our environments and bodies change. Even with all of that, it’s worth it. Conflict is worth it, if you are willing to learn. I fear far too many abandon the project prematurely to avoid the conflict. One particular challenge is happening now, when we are both trying to escape the constant dread of a political movement set on demonizing others. Trying to dissociate and trying to be present are conflicting forces that many people will be contending with these next few years.

Roxanne helped me with this comic, it was a team effort while our plane was grounded in Detroit during an hour during our last vacation. It was a great moment of collaboration I won’t soon forget. 

Happy Valentine’s Day Roxanne, may menopause and a second Trump presidency be at the worst of the variables we have to contend with. If so, we got this, if not, I am certain we can climb that hill together.