That kind of morning.

    It has been a " reheat my coffee 3 times before I get to drink it" type of morning. Once again, after pooping his bedding into oblivion in the middle of the night, my Eli is home sick. What gives, people? If your child is sick, keep them home! That wasnt even the best part. No, thats a toss up between sitting in pee first thing because of a certain 5 year old who refuses to lift the toilet seat, or groggily stubbing my toe, all the while dripping breastmilk down the hallway on the route to get to the baby.
   Thank the LORD its Friday.
   I live for the weekends, where waking up at 7 am doesnt feel like such a chore and coffee is brewing before I even get out of bed.  When a husband is home to kiss half of the booboos and occasionally change a diaper. When in rare moments of contentedness, I can sneak away for a bubble bath before someone decides its time for their daily constitutional. Fridays seem endless. Usually my husband will stumble in the door around 8ish, exhausted and boiling over with stories of his day, but until that moment, the natives are restless. If this type of morning were to happen on a Monday, I would probably forfeit the week, deeming it already unsuccessful and crawl back into my bed to mourn..but its Friday, and for that I am thankful.

Sometimes I forget.

My husband would cringe, but sometimes I forget that I am a woman. No, really. 

 Ask any one of my single or childless friends and they will tell you, I do not sugarcoat the unpleasantries that are Motherhood. Its in the moments of wearing the same shirt for 4 days, pulling dried spit up off my skin in the same fashion of a sunburn victim, sucking boogers out of noses, telling myself for the hundreth time " I'll shave tomorrow.." and being elbow deep in poop on a daily basis that I realize I have seriously neglected the art of being a woman. Not that I was ever any good at the pretty stuff anyway, but even the most neglected of women have their standards. Ever since my Max was born, I have become a stagnant piece of furniture, blending in with the curtains.. that seriously need a facelift. The last time I plucked my eyebrows, the government was shut down..its a jungle up there.

Its easy to do, the forgetting that is. Raising two boys and caring for a color coordinating challenged husband does have its advantages. Im never expected to wear makeup or paint my fingernails. I have no little princess I feel a need to model for. In my earshot I get the imagery that comes from my Eli telling daddy about how his poop came out like a nuclear explosion this morning. Hes been battling a stomach virus on and off for 2 weeks. Ive stopped washing his little undies, and have opted to throw each and every destroyed by nuclear explosion pair away. My bank account hates it, but newsflash, my sanity will always take shotgun to money. I imagine the forgetting will only get worse as time goes on. When crusty socks and food stained shirts become the norm as my little boys morph into men. Dont get me wrong, sometimes I mourn the loss of days spent showering, shaving, blow drying my hair AND applying makeup all in one session, uninterrupted. Some days I want to put on a little extra makeup and a cute top..then my 2 month old projectile vomits undigested breast milk onto that cutesy top and I snap back to reality. 

  This isnt a complaint. Not by a long shot. I clean up dried puke that sat in my Elis room for 13 hours before he told me about it because "he forgot" (yes, Im sad to say THAT happened) or feed my little squishy while he blows out a diaper on my lap, right after I changed into fresh clothes from the last explosion. I rather do these things, gritting my teeth and pursing my lips the entire time, all the while feeling like the Frankenstein of all moms, than be perfectly groomed, waxed, manicured and dressed to impress. If feeling like a manly slob of a woman is the price of complete happiness, I can deal..for a few more years at least. In the dead of night while Im half asleep, feeding a baby who wont stop crying..when my face is darkened with black bags under my eyes and my hair looks like a tumbleweed in an old western, my husband sleepily wraps an arm around my back and gently rubs circles there and I realize, he doesnt care about how "womanly" or pretty I am...and neither should I. I need to stop thinking that my appearance in any way shape or form has something to do with the kind of wife and mother I am. Like I said before, if these things are the price of happiness, sign me up for a few more years of poop and throw up. 

So this is marriage.

       People take marriage so damned seriously. Don't get me wrong, binding yourself to another human for the rest of your everlasting life, never to be romantically or emotionally invested in another should be considered a big deal. In my experience, the more you pull the "married" card, the less successful your marriage feels. When I met my husband, I was barely old enough to drive legally. We fell in "love" immediately and decided that we were it to each other. Thank goodness it worked out... I can't imagine how stupid we must've looked to the people around us.
       Is it weird that I still don't feel married? Even after carrying his children, washing his laundry, laughing and crying with him through the chapters of our lives together..still. I feel like we are best friends before husband and wife. This works for us. When I say people take marriage too seriously, I mean that they put so much emphasis on the word and not enough on the meaning. Just because you're married now, should not mean that your spouse needs to suddenly conform to your idea of what a husband or wife should be. Why do we want the person we married to then change in turn? I'm well aware that I need to practice as I preach.
      Now, I don't mean you shouldn't sweat the little things. If he won't put the toilet seat down and your sleepy behind is getting a dose of cold water at 3 am, yes..by all means, holler at him. If he brews coffee first thing in the morning and you're coaxed out of your warm slumber with thoughts of a hot cup of Joe, only to find an empty pot and his full travel mug headed out the door, sure..I totally get it..sometimes I too consider taking a frying pan to his head. These are easily changeable attributes that your spouse can work on. It's when we get angry at them for things they can't easily change..that's when the situation gets sticky.
   Recently during a rare spat between my husband and I, I asked him " what more do you want from me?" he calmly replied " I want nothing from you. Just love me and don't get angry at me." OH. That's it, huh? Why are the easiest things sometimes (always) the hardest to achieve? I spent so much of our early married years trying to groom him into someone I could stand..when that wasn't fair to him. I since have just accepted him, tried to take his quirks in stride and put less emphasis on us being married, putting more on being partners and companions in life. Being married has been one of the hardest, most fulfilling of journeys..the weather beaten path of our life together becoming clearer and less gnarled with each twist and turn. I have to keep reminding myself..just love him. Love him for who he was, is and will be. Imagine this life without him and let go of the things that don't matter. Be his friend. Be his wife, if there is any difference between the two.