Monday, November 19, 2007
Perfection
It made me laugh, but a commenter the other day said she had come to the conclusion that my blog probably couldn’t be made up. With tongue thoroughly in cheek she said that just maybe, perhaps this man with perfect wife, perfect children in a perfect house was happening.
After making me laugh, it also made me think. Was I publishing too glowing a view of my life? Lord knows this life from the inside is far from perfect. Far far from perfect. However, I am naturally a half glass full type of person. My personality was firmly inherited from my mother. Yet… life is good right now. I’m in a job that I’m enjoying hugely, my wife is also happy in her career at the moment. Our problems with the house are more figuring out what next to do with it, rather than, well problems. The kids are all in a happy place mentally, and doing well at what they put there hands to. Life is not perfect, but, right now, it is good.
It hasn’t always been so. Oddly enough I started blogging after an absolutely helacious year. I’d changed jobs after spending two years working for what I can only describe as a professional bully. He took actual delight in belittling people. LL was equally hating her job. It would take a long time to fully describe, but as a woman working in a predominantly male career (financial trading), she had pretty clearly experienced subtle but persistent sexual discrimination.
Perhaps not too surprisingly our relationship suffered. At the time I actually thought we were close to a breaking point. My LL has a firery personality at the best of times, and she can criticise and attack when feeling knocked back. If I’m honest, my reaction was to withhold affection. We where in a relationship death spiral.
We had just earlier in the year completed 18 months of repair work on the house to correct a really serious water leak that every effort seemed to fail to find. Our builder had gone bankrupt without telling us, and needless to say the relationship him wasn’t good.
To top if off, my parents where in a car accident and both where hospitalised for months, my mother recovered but with brain damage, my father died.
It was one of those times in life when it feels like the walls are falling in. I wasn’t blogging at the time, and I’m not at all sure I could have. Maybe it would have helped, but when there’s that much pain around in your life your whole focus is on just carrying on.
Yet the coin turned. I changed jobs, we got the house sorted and the builder out the door. Oddly enough LL and I made a breakthrough while out visiting my parents. We started to talk, and the relationship healed. Which is a very good thing, as it meant I had a supportive spouse while my parents where in the hospital (they had the car crash a week after we visited).
There’s not much of a moral in this story, its just an aspect of life. Right now, for me, life is good. It was not always that way, and I rather expect some darkness may yet hit me in the future. When it does, I’ll survive, because you do, don’t you? If you don’t you miss the good bits, like life is right now. And the right nows are so very worth it.
After making me laugh, it also made me think. Was I publishing too glowing a view of my life? Lord knows this life from the inside is far from perfect. Far far from perfect. However, I am naturally a half glass full type of person. My personality was firmly inherited from my mother. Yet… life is good right now. I’m in a job that I’m enjoying hugely, my wife is also happy in her career at the moment. Our problems with the house are more figuring out what next to do with it, rather than, well problems. The kids are all in a happy place mentally, and doing well at what they put there hands to. Life is not perfect, but, right now, it is good.
It hasn’t always been so. Oddly enough I started blogging after an absolutely helacious year. I’d changed jobs after spending two years working for what I can only describe as a professional bully. He took actual delight in belittling people. LL was equally hating her job. It would take a long time to fully describe, but as a woman working in a predominantly male career (financial trading), she had pretty clearly experienced subtle but persistent sexual discrimination.
Perhaps not too surprisingly our relationship suffered. At the time I actually thought we were close to a breaking point. My LL has a firery personality at the best of times, and she can criticise and attack when feeling knocked back. If I’m honest, my reaction was to withhold affection. We where in a relationship death spiral.
We had just earlier in the year completed 18 months of repair work on the house to correct a really serious water leak that every effort seemed to fail to find. Our builder had gone bankrupt without telling us, and needless to say the relationship him wasn’t good.
To top if off, my parents where in a car accident and both where hospitalised for months, my mother recovered but with brain damage, my father died.
It was one of those times in life when it feels like the walls are falling in. I wasn’t blogging at the time, and I’m not at all sure I could have. Maybe it would have helped, but when there’s that much pain around in your life your whole focus is on just carrying on.
Yet the coin turned. I changed jobs, we got the house sorted and the builder out the door. Oddly enough LL and I made a breakthrough while out visiting my parents. We started to talk, and the relationship healed. Which is a very good thing, as it meant I had a supportive spouse while my parents where in the hospital (they had the car crash a week after we visited).
There’s not much of a moral in this story, its just an aspect of life. Right now, for me, life is good. It was not always that way, and I rather expect some darkness may yet hit me in the future. When it does, I’ll survive, because you do, don’t you? If you don’t you miss the good bits, like life is right now. And the right nows are so very worth it.
