safe, eating lunch with me again in the break room at work. He eats my masterpiece sandwiches that I craft for him each morning so I can sit across from him and munch through salad or some other rabbit food like stuff. Sometimes we talk. Sometimes we just sit in semi-silence for twenty minutes, both of us lost in our work thoughts. We make random comments about nothing in particular. Nothing exciting. Sometimes nothing exciting is the most thrilling thing in the world.Before the normal sits down for dinner, there is always something that we’ve built toward and put on display in grand fashion. This past Sunday our big display was the baby shower. How it consumed us. How I lived for it and forced dear, willing, compliant, and patient Mr. Husband to live it, too.
I think my favorite part of the entire affair was the night before the baby shower as we both sat on the floor in front of the TV, cutting up poster board, wrangling cellophane into iridescent shapes, cutting off long strings of curling ribbon (always pretending we’re the first Henry Ford of Craftville), working with glue and glitter, and smiling to ourselves in our own creation as we felt the presence of the other near. It is the sign of a good man who stops and helps. He may not take out the trash or remember to feed the cats after being asked once or even twice, but if he can put his own head-push-pull-go-give on hold and focus on the moment when I need his keen scissor skills, then that, to me, is a darn good man. I could even write “durn” at the chance that this might mean something deeper to some. Isn’t a dialectic misspelling always an opportunity to strike specific senses? Maybe he’s not durn or darn good.
He’s just damn good. Yup, that’s it.I didn’t even need to give him a title. He wasn’t the Emperor of Elegant Poster Board Cutting. Not that night. He could have been, but he didn’t need to be. He was a simple subject in the kingdom of helping-friendliness. He was that guy who stops to ask if a stranger needs help. He was a Samaritan of the living room kind.
We worked so hard. We played and laughed and came up with bright new ideas that will most likely change the world of glue forever (maybe not). There was this comfort. This being together. This calm. By midnight, we had a pile of about ten bags filled with different items for decorating, including favors, a door prize, and a ceramic plate to sign that will immortalize the good wishes to these two soon-to-be-new-parents. We worked to decorate the loft at Jackson’s Bistro into the most elegant, chic, modern, and lovely baby shower venue that we could imagine. Gerber Daisies in pilsner glass vases. Balloons that were carefully blown up by Mr. Husband and Nader. A flower arrangement that seemed ten stories high that was crafted with what seemed like previous expertise by the co-hostess, Hind. Candle favors wrapped in cellophane with curling ribbon. Baby bottles filled with two different colors of pink M&Ms. My Mr. Husband never complaining and always asking what there is to do next.
It came together with time to spare and we all toasted a wonderful couple who have shared most of our best moments.
I have learned from Mr. Husband that giving time to help is key in making the world go round
for more than one. Turning away from selfishness to give can produce miraculous results. I couldn’t function at my high-stress, super-neurotic, constant-panic mode without his help. There’s more to simply being a husband than standing up before an official and signing your name. My Mr. Husband is a partner. And he really, really, really understands the reason for curling ribbon and glitter (after many, many, many lectures from me about simple craft aesthetics).That’s truly a bonus.
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