On Thursday, we'll be exactly three months out from our wedding. I'm really excited, obviously, but we're now down to the wire when it comes to the visa and license we need to get married in the UK. I've also started preparing for the spousal visa that we'll apply for after the wedding so that Jon can live in the US with me. It's a lot - there are a million details that need to be worked out, a million pieces that need to be coordinated, and a million loose ends that need to be tied up. Obviously, because I'm taking the lead on everything, it's stressing me out. And when I get stressed, I make sure that Jon is stressed too - after all, misery loves company.
We've had some bona fide arguments over how to manage the practical side of our wedding process, but we've also had our share of those frustrating fights where neither is right but neither can let go and the whole thing just escalates until, finally, there's some sort of metaphorical explosion over Skype and then a few horrible seconds (or minutes) of silence before apologies are muttered and, haltingly, accepted.
I don't hold grudges; usually, I'll have lost the motivation to be angry after just a few hours. But, even after we've said our "sorry" and "I love you" peace-makings, I do need to be left alone to sulk/glower in my head for a little while in order for all the strong feelings to dissipate. The more intensely I can let those emotions run loose, the faster they'll wear themselves out.
Jon doesn't work that way. In his mind, once the apologies have been accepted, we can immediately snap back to being madly adoring of each other. And, bless him, he doesn't accept that I have a hard time switching gears as quickly as he can. He pleads, "Can't we just speak lovingly to each other?" I resist as long as I can, because I'm stubborn and I want to wallow in feeling everything, but he wears me down eventually. How could he not, when his choice to find joy in our conversations even when I'm being a pain in the you-know-what is such an obvious delight to him?
