Fathered Five

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I was too young to get married at 21. I know that because I was stupid and it’s been a looooong, long road to smart. Now that I look back on 18 years of marriage, I wish that I had not been so young and had learned some key lessons sooner. Here’s what I’m talking about:

New husband asserts self, faceplants
I remember the day clearly. We had been married a couple of months and were adjusting to a new rhythm as the late nights gave way to busy work and school schedules. It was the weekend, finally, and I was free of obligations for a day. I picked up the keys to the car and headed for the door.

“Where are you going?” Her Hotness asked.

What was she, my mother? Did I have to report everything? Just cuz we’re married, woman, don’t get the idea that I owe you an explanation. A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do. I conveyed all of this, and more!, with my response: “Out!” I said, and left, closing the door hard for punctuation. I thumped my chest all the way to the car, baby! I was the man!

I don’t know what I did that was so important that day. Don’t remember. Here’s what I do remember. Much later that night, she said to me, “When I ask you where you’re going, it’s not because I’m trying to check up on you. It’s because I want to be part of your life.”

I felt like a guy who had just walked around a room full of strangers, shaking their hands, thinking he’s all that, only to discover later that the seat of his pants was out and there was his arse in all its glory, his most memorable feature. I couldn’t have felt smaller if my high school bully had walked in and slapped me, saying, “McFly! McFly!”

But I understood something. Imperfectly, to be sure, but the lesson was still there: my life was not entirely my own anymore. I had someone else to consider.

When stupid has zeroes on the end
That same winter, another lesson “clicked” for me. I got up and went to work or school, and it had snowed all morning. When I came back to our little apartment, the small, inclined driveway was coated with ice. I sat in my truck, wheels spinning, unable to get up the driveway. You can see what a disaster that was! What was I supposed to do, walk to my carport?? There was nowhere to park the truck at the bottom of the driveway, so clearly there was only one thing to do: buy new snow tires!

So I drove to the Goodyear garage around the corner from my parents’ home (it was the only garage I knew), and picked out two brand new deep-tread snow tires. Rubber so black and shiny I wanted to lick it! “Set me up with these,” I said, feeling like a head of household.

“You really should replace all four tires at once so they’re not out of balance,” said the mechanic salesman.

“I should? Allright, then, go ahead.”

They raised the truck on the rack and started to mount the four brand new tires. You won’t believe it, but I swear this is true: it occurred to me then for the first time that I would have to pay for them!

I walked sheepishly to the counter. I swear this is also true. “Um, I can just make payments on these, right?”

The guy looked at me with an odd mixture of irritation and pity. He was kinder than he should have been and showed me how to apply for in-store credit. I left an hour later with new snow tires and a new $400 debt at 22% APR.

The lesson? You are ill equipped to deal with grown up responsibility.

Ok, but what does it have to do with the book?
Willard Harley’s thesis in His Needs, Her Needs: Building an Affair-proof Marriage, is that men and women have specific core needs. In successful marriages, the partners understand these needs, maybe even unarticulated, and fulfill them in the other. It’s a powerful concept: I have needs only she can meet. She has needs that go unmet unless I meet them. For me it turns the pop-psychology idea on its head that states, “You are not responsible for anyone else’s happiness.” I once believed that, but I don’t anymore.

Each vignette illustrates my ignorance regarding one or more of her core needs. Here they are, according to the book:

See, you learn to meet your partner’s needs, and magic results. From Chapter 1:

I’ve written this book for those who want to be happily married. Whether you have just started your life together, have had a mediocre marriage for a number of years, or have had a horrible marriage, you can have a happy marriage if you learn to:

Become aware of each other’s emotional needs and learn to meet them.

This is a simple statement, but applying this principle to the complexities of marriage requires some careful thought. Let’s take a look at what it really involves.

Go buy the book by clicking on the image above. You’ll get brownie points for reading it, and then get her to read it, too. (I know you’ll start by pointing her to the sex chapter.) Harley makes it sound so simple, even I get it. I’m still learning, but I think I’m on the right road, at last.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 28th, 2007 at 9:46 pm and is filed under Marriage, Book reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.