A Complementary Husband

May 2, 2015 by JoAnna 13 Comments

Today’s Stream of Consciousness post helps us remember the difference between the words: compliment and complement. I checked my understanding with Grammar Girl: http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/compliment-versus-complement?page=all, and was pleased my understanding was correct (this time.) The nifty reminder, I like to give compliments, is full of the letter i.

I get a lot of compliments about my husband: He’s handsome, he’s nice, he’s helpful…. Most of the time I’m proud of him when I hear these things. It’s good to get reminders, because after you’ve been married for a couple years, you get to see where the imperfections really are. He doesn’t have many imperfections, and best of all, he is aware of them, and works on them. Like I work on my imperfections, at least the ones I want to work on. My husband works on the imperfections I want him to work on. That doesn’t sound good, but it IS good, really. And it’s okay to not be perfect. I know that. I really do.

But back to the compliments. I confess that sometimes when I hear what a great guy my husband is, I get just a little bit concerned, not worried, just concerned, that he might appear too desirable. This only  concerns me a little, for a brief second, because I know what a good man he is, and that God would not have brought us back together after all these years, to hurt either one of us. God knew we were ready to walk together and work together on our issues.

We have enough in common to be compatible: we both love dogs, we’re both responsible, and we both gravitated toward the hero role in response to our different family of origin dysfunctions. (He’s a retired fire fighter/EMT; I’m an almost retired substance abuse counselor.) We both grew up with fathers in the military. We both like garlic, which is way better than only one of us liking garlic.

We complement each other. To me, that means we fit well together, but we also have different strengths that each of us sometimes lacks. My husband is practical, good with numbers, and tends to work too hard. He’s a morning person. He’s a bit of an extrovert, but thank God he knows how to listen and does not talk constantly. I’m good at singing, and art, and patience. I tend to be an introvert. I enjoy an occasional nap. I am not a morning person. I really appreciate my husband making oatmeal with fruit every morning. There must be something he appreciates me doing late at night. Oh, I let the dogs out late sometimes, and make sure the front door is locked.

If you’d like to read a little more about my high school sweetheart finding me again, see, “About Me,” and some day, we’ll publish the memoir we’re working on, so you can read the whole story. 🙂

If you’d like to join the fun of Saturday Stream of Consciousness posting, visit:

http://lindaghill.com/2015/05/01/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-may-215/

Here are the rules:

1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing, (typos can be fixed) and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.

2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.

3. There will be a prompt every week. I will post the prompt here on my blog on Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” or “Begin with the word ‘The’.”

4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours.  Your link will show up in my comments, for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top.

5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read everyone’s! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later, or go to the previous week, by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find right below the “Like” button on my post.

6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!

7. Have fun!