Marriage Musings

Since I am obviously an expert on marriage by now, I thought I’d offer up some thoughts. 

I have a friend who I can send on an hour-long rant by simply uttering two little words: love languages.  She will groan and roll her eyes and talk about how this phenomenon has forever stained relationships.  However, there are also those who will swear by this book.  They say things like:

“I never really knew who I was until I read this book!”
or
“This made my marriage last 3 years longer than it would have otherwise!”
or
“Now that I know my wife’s love language, we never fight!  In fact, we never even talk because we just get each other!”

Well I too wanted to never have to talk to my life partner, so I looked into it.  On their website, they have a convenient quiz that will, of course, change your life forever by telling you which your love language is: words of affirmation, quality time, physical touch, acts of service, or receiving gifts.

So I took the quiz.  It told me my love language is quality time.  Well, I do enjoy spending time with my beloved, so I shrugged and sent the quiz to him.  After thinking about it, I realized that yes, I am often begging my housemate to spend more time with me.  YES! I thought. All my marriage woes are solved before they have even begun!

I encouraged him to take the quiz so I would know how to make him eternally happy as well.  He took it and his love language is…drumroll please… quality time.  Hmmm…

Well why do we need to talk then?  Shouldn’t we be so in sync that we spend all of our time together and never need anything or anyone else?  Needless to say, this is not the case, so it got me thinking.  And for me personally, here is what I think my true love language is: all of the above. Hold on to your hats there, friends!

Sometimes, I absolutely love when my mr. strokes my hair.  Other times, it’s super annoying and I swat his hand away.  Sometimes, when he makes dinner for me, my heart melts.  Other times, I want to tell him he was supposed to cook the potatoes before putting them in the soup (okay, I have said this). 

One day, a cheesy note will bring tears to my eyes.  The next day, I will roll them upon reading.  A well-thought-out gift can make my whole week better, or it could… you know, not.  Maybe I’m one of those crazy confused women the movies portray, or maybe I just like a lot of variety in my life.

Either way, love languages are definitely no magic solution.  In my mind (and in my marriage), love just naturally produces all of these things, and I enjoy them as they come.  Yes, sometimes I need one more than the other, but at the end of the day, I really need them all.

High maintenance, I know.

What do you think?  Do love languages make you vomit or swoon?