I have been thinking a lot about where I am at (married with kids), versus where I was at when I was single and thinking that I didn’t measure up to all of my friends who were already married with kids. Most of my close college friends got married soon after college, I think I went to 6 weddings in the first couple of years after we graduated. At first it was cool being the single one, I had way more freedom, which allowed me to be wide open. As the time went by it did start to get to me. I would often ask myself “what is wrong with me” I kept putting more and more pressure on myself and I think it really started to hurt my self confidence. I am by no means model material, but I know now that I can clean up nicely and am not too hard on the eyes. Back then when I was single I had a very different view of myself. I am really not sure what it was, but I think it had a lot to do with the fact that I had no confidence, but I also think part of it was that I hung my future on every date on went out on. Like you, I could tell whether things would work out  or whether we had the physical connection within the first couple of minutes of talking to someone to my date, and if it wasn’t there I would shut down. Instead of just going out and having a great time, I was always looking for the one. I guess one day I woke up with a different attitude, out of the blue I asked this lady out for coffee. We would run into each other at a place that we both ate lunch at frequently, and one day standing in line I nervously  turned and probably said something very awkward. But she said coffee sounded good, I think we met up that weekend, had coffee and a great conversation, but at the end of it we agreed that romantically we weren’t a fit, but we enjoy each others company. I remember she had the greatest laugh. You know one of those that immediately make you giggle. The point of that story was that we hung out every now and then, and in the process I ended up meeting someone who I went out with for a couple of months. At the end of that relationship is when my business trip to Charlotte was and where I re-connected with my wife.  I think my comfort zone was the fact that I could never find the right one, that nobody met my standards, and until I stepped out of that zone and just started meeting different people for the sake of meeting different people, the feelings I had for myself changed.

Now I look at relationships totally different, I feel like everyone I meet has something to offer me, something that I can learn. I no longer measure people, they just are, and I have made some amazing acquaintances.  I took a job working with Habitat for Humanity helping volunteers learn how to use the tools, and the various tasks that we had them doing. Through that I met amazing people and had some very engaging conversations about lots of different topics. I think that is what is most important in life, filling your life with people that you find stimulating both physically, mentally, and emotionally. You know my wife stimulates all three of those, but there are other people who may be great conversationalists, or who may be one of those people that needs an ear for all of their problems.

My wife and I have been having a great couple of weeks, and we have really found this renewed vigor in our relationship. It makes me very happy, but we continue to expand our conversations and are able to have really honest conversation about what Jay represents, and what we want our relationship to look like as we get older.

I will have more later

Matt