I'd give anything...

Before I begin the meat of my post, I want to let everyone know that I lost 3 lbs! I celebrated by sharing a piece of baklava with my mom. 

I eat lunch every day with a collection of teacher assistants. I do this for two reasons. 1) the 8th grade team, with which I am close with, eats lunch after me. 2) I cannot stand the seventh grade team, that has lunch the same time as me.  One of the teacher assistants, Jo, spent lunch complaining about how insensitive and annoying her long term boyfriend is. As in, "he gets home at 3:30 and I get home at 7, and he asks what's for dinner! Couldn't he have made dinner while I was away?" and other things of that nature. Don't get me wrong, I can understand how totally frustrating it is. The other TAs bemoaned their husbands' collective ineptness.

I kept quiet through most of it. Only two of the TAs I consider "friends" and am wary of the rumor mill small school I teach in. My lunch group knows that Trevor and I had broken up, knew about Jay, and that we were no longer together. I never mentioned exactly how much I miss him-- other than my parents and his family, few people know that I want him home.  Part of the reason we broke up is that everyone in town it seemed had to put their input in about our relationship, whether we were friends with them or not. I do not want to listen to lectures about how much they disliked Trevor.

It wasn't all of Trevor's fault that they didn't like him. My town, like most small mill villages in Connecticut, consists of people, who like their fathers and fathers' fathers, are born, live, and die in the same town. With only one elementary, middle, and high school in town, you literally grow up together. The same friends you have as a child are usually your friends in adulthood. It makes people wary of outsiders. Trevor wasn't from the town, CT, or even from a small town. That made him an outsider, which almost ostracizes you from the "good ol' boys club" down at the fire house. Another thing that didn't help was that several of the firefighters had their eyes on me, and I had been talking to a few of them when Trevor and I met. Trevor also talked a lot and had tall tales to tell, I think, in part, to impress his new friends.

As these women bemoaned their husbands' mild cases of forgetfullness, messiness, and lack of consideration, I couldn't help but wish how I could be right there with them, affectionately complaining about my pet peeves with Trevor. At a lull in the conversation, I interjected, "It's funny, I would willingly accept his faults if it meant that Trevor would come back. You ladies don't know how lucky you are." The table grew quiet after that. It wasn't my intention to chastize them, just to let them know how lucky they are they have husbands that love them. I would give anything to have my "husband" home.

I'd give anything to have the collection of Mt. Dew cans on his nightable, to be able to wash his dishes, and take out the trash when he forgets. I'd give anything to drive by the fire house on my way home from work, see his car in the FD driveway, and catch him smoking a cigarette out back because he doesn't want to upset me. I'd give anything to work two jobs if it living in our own home. I'd give anything to be woken up at 3 am by kisses on the neck because he wanted lovin' even though he rejected my earlier advances because the game was on. I'd give anything to constantly be paying off a Frederick's bill so I could surprise him after a hard week at work. I'd give anything to be able to have to buy clothes, boxers, and tank tops for him. I'd give anything to wake up to pizza crumbs in the bed because he ordered out while watching hockey on the humongous plasma tv screen that he insisted hang in our bedroom. I'd give anything to lay on his chest at night and smell his distinctive aroma of sweat, cigarettes, and dirt. I'd give anything to playfully fight with him and make up after. I'd give anything to have to pick up his dirty clothes that he dropped next to the hamper.

I'd give anything to have him back, even if that means putting up with the little things that annoy me. For all the things that he does wrong, he put up with my moods, supported me in good times and in bad, loved my animals because they were ours, loved me beyond compare, let me know that I was his world, and was my best friend through it all. Without him, I feel like a ship that has lost its anchor and is slowly drifting from port to port, hoping to find the same easy comfort, support, and affection as before.

I'd give anything to have him home.

The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings- Eric Hoffer