Date More, Divorce Less

Obviously, I realize it isn't actually this simple. But it was the argument I used for Lucy last week when she was lamenting the fact that her Dad and I were heading out for a date and leaving the kids behind with a babysitter.

"But I MISS you when you're gone," she argued, with her sad, pouty face.

"I miss you too, sweetie," I said.

Okay, so that part was pretty much a lie because even though I LOVE her deeply and intensely with a mother heart that is big and grateful and so happy to be with my children when I am with them... This Mamma needs to get out every once in a while. When I do? There is no missing of the children. There is MUCH loving of the husband. Which is the point I was making to Lucy.

I told her that for her Dad and me, staying in love is a serious business. And it's a business that affects our entire family. We don't go on dates because we don't like being with our children. We go on dates because we LOVE being with our children. Both of us, all of us, together.

With so many kids and so much to do, it's easy to forget that there's a man I fell in love with long (or not so long but a still completely appropriate amount of time) before we became parents. But dating helps. (Dating and kissing in the kitchen, especially when those kisses are punctuated with your children making gagging noises behind you.)

So we DID go on a date last Friday night. We went to eat incredibly delicious and authentically wonderful tacos (corn tortillas, fresh cilantro, fresh onion... apparently this is the way you are supposed to eat tacos, say my friends from Mexico. Sign me up, please and thank you.)

After dinner, we were excited to try out the one and only place still open in our little tiny town after 8 PM. Not really. I think there are maybe four places still open after 8. But this place was new to us so we were excited to give it a go. There was live music in the corner, homemade desserts available for order, and much to my delight, a collection of board games on the back shelf just begging to be played.

So we sat and listened to good music and ate cheesecake and drank an incredibly good milk shake and remembered that yes, actually, we are in love and all this work that we do and all this time that we spend growing children is worth the effort because it's him and me and me and him and together, we're pretty stinkin' fabulous.

And also, I thoroughly kicked Josh's tail at a game of Scrabble. I just thought you might like to know.

He hasn't given up here, but by this point he
already knew it wasn't good.

That's the word right there, on my second turn that pretty much
won the game. Deviates. And also, that cheesecake was really good.