Today is November 23rd. I had a whole different idea of a subject I thought I was going to write about. I was debating if it was something I might want to pass on but I thought it couldn't hurt to attempt writing it to see how it came out and then decide. And then it was November 23rd and even though I wasn't going to treat it any differently then any other day I stopped.
Jay takes his days off on Sundays and Mondays and does the cooking on those days. I am an early to bed, early to rise person and he is a stay up late and sleep in. I usually wake up on Tuesdays with a bit of kitchen clean-up to take care of before heading to work. He will leave the kitchen from the night before in different states of disarray. I am not such a stickler for complete cleanliness but piles of kitchen clutter I didn't make has provoked me to spout a few choice words a few times. Not this morning. I woke to my normal routine of sliding out of bed and into the kitchen to start a pot of coffee. The kitchen was spotless. Dishes done, pots put away, sinks empty and wiped clean. Food was put away and damn if that little bit of effort didn't make me feel so good.
It's always the simple things that get me.
It has become a recent routine that Jay will come up with a weekly menu on Sundays and actually post it on the fridge held solidly with magnets. It seems like a trivial, childish thing but he takes inventory of what groceries we have and comes up with what will be prepared each day of the week. It sounds a little silly but just the fact that I don't have to come home and figure out what I am going to cook but just cook whatever the menu says takes an enormous burden off me. I know, I know. I don't mind doing the cooking but sometimes after the long day at work I can't face coming up with what to put together. This way I just have to follow what the posted menu says. It helps me immensely.
Since this is a holiday week with Thanksgiving on Thursday, he took into consideration that I will be cooking an abundance of food that day. He was making this weeks menu simple and easy. He thought Tuesday (today) would be easy. It wouldn't even be a cooking day. He found out last week Tuesday is a discount day for a local pizza take-out place. He put down we would do the inexpensive pizza today.
He came back to me yesterday and said, "I just realized that I put down that cheap pizza for November 23rd."
I looked up and went quiet for a while. I knew what his statement meant. I had refused to bring it up or remind him this year the way I have done in the past. I was certain there was no way he would remember. Certain. Positive. I was sure it would pass by unnoticed. I didn't even mind the pizza or anything else. I was just positive we would have this conversation late in the week and he might bring it up to ask about it and I would say...'"yeah, it was Tuesday."
But I was wrong and that didn't happen. He remembered on his own. He thought about the little simple things that make the biggest differences to me and not huge splashy stuff that passes in a day. I was committed to not reminding him and not bringing it up this year the way I might have in the past. There were no big splashy plans that were dashed or expectations that couldn't be met. It has turned out so much better than that. It is always the simple things to me like waking up to a clean kitchen unexpectedly on a morning when it is never clean and cheap pizza after realizing maybe something bigger and better might be more appropriate. But you see, not for me. Not after being told beforehand that the day meant something more than just being a Tuesday. That was all I was looking for. I was only looking for the smallest gesture, the simplest thing that would make it an action and not just a word. I got it in the actions I wasn't, really wasn't expecting and it's the best after all these long, long years. So I am so looking forward to this evening coming home to a clean kitchen and a cheap pizza to celebrate tonight.
Today is November 23rd and if it were 1979...well, that would be the day me and Jay got married.
TT
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