Keep the Crazy to a drip

I have never been much of a planner. I trust that eventually, most of the important things I need to do will get done, and the ones that slip through the cracks usually stay forgotten (at least by me). It doesn't matter to me if the grocery shopping gets done today or tomorrow, as long as we have food for tonight. Lennie is my polar opposite when it comes to this, however. He craves a plan. He starts forming mental to do lists the moment his eyes crack open in the morning, which he will then revise 4,000 times during the course of the day.

For example, we were out running errands the other afternoon, ahem, early voting was included *cough* OBAMA *cough*. Lennie started verbally hemorrhaging plans while we were in the car.

"OK, we could do the voting now, then we could do a quick grocery shopping, then pick up Connor, and be back in time for Sayde's bus. Then you can cook dinner and I'll talk her to Tae Kwon Do. Or, we could vote now, I'll drop you off to do the grocery shopping and I'll go get Connor by myself and meet you back at the store, and then we could go back, wait for the bus and go to the State Fair tonight. Or, we could do the State Fair tomorrow night because Sayde really needs to go to Tae Kwon Do one more time this week. Or, you could go get Connor, and I'll do the shopping. And you could take Sayde and I'll cook. What are we having?"

After the words, "OK," my eyes glaze over and I start to drool. Thankfully, he never notices that my head is lolling around on top of my neck as long as I occasionally mutter, "Whatever, doesn't matter to me."

I really think that this type of tuning out tolerance is a major key to a successful marriage. You've got to let your spouse get their crazy out bit by bit before it explodes all over the place. Kind of like when the phone rings and I'm closer to it but don't make any motions to pick it up. Lennie just rolls his eyes and answers it. A little drip of crazy is easier to mop up than the whole freaking vat dumped out at once.

This has nothing to do with my story, but Friday was a milestone for Sayde. It was the first time I ever heard her say she ever said, "Crap". I'm so proud. I told her to put her Tae Kwon Do uniform on inside the house rather than in the yard and she snapped, "Well that's a lot of crap." So we had the talk about what words are not OK to say (which is kind of funny coming from me, but someday when she goes to college, I'll tell her she's not allowed to toke up either so the hypocrisy will at least be consistent) Proudly, I made it until first grade before I told my mom that the "School lunch tasted like shit."