My Husband: The Romantic

To be fair, Jamie can be a romantic, thoughtful guy and there was full disclosure before we got married that he hates to do dishes. In fact, his friend Carolyn was so disgusted with his kitchen that she would regularly clean it for him. I also happen to be OCD about the sink and hate to have dishes in there. As much as I’d love to have the kids unload the dishwasher, I have it in my mentally-ill mind that they can’t do it fast enough and if the dishwasher sits unloaded for hours on end, that means dishes will pile up.

So, I do the unloading in the hopes that throughout the day, my family will actually put their dishes in the dishwasher vs. dumping them in the sink. Despite my best efforts, it doesn’t happen and I’ve learned to live with it during the day. But after dinner, I always insist that we clean the kitchen and run the dishwasher. And I refuse to go to bed, even if we have a party until late, with dirty dishes in the sink.

It’s too bad my OCD doesn’t extend to the rest of the house.

The other night, we were watching my favorite show on TV, NBC’s This is Us. There was a scene when the doctor who delivered the main character’s triplets was walking through his home. His wife of 50+ years had passed away 14 months ago but there were memories of her everywhere. Her prescription bottles. Her clothes. Her perfumes.

It was dually heart-warming and sad. I turned to Jamie:

“When I die, will you keep a shrine up for me?”

“Of course! It will be a pile of dirty dishes.”

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