Your Peace Offering Stepped on My Testicle

It's tempting for many, especially at this time of year, to fall back on Charlie Brooker's eloquent position regarding love. After all, it's a loaded topic, forever imprisoned on a pedestal by both the lucky and unlucky in love, many of whom know better but act otherwise. We pretend that love isn't susceptible to the same power relationships and false advertising that our other institutions are infected with. So, when love falters (as it will, from time to time), we get huffy and disillusioned. Because love is supposed to be different, it's supposed to be too important for that. And because every one of us occasionally mistakes cynicism for wisdom. Our standards for love are high because what sets love apart as a value is that when love is real, it endures through the storm in a way others won't. It might come out bruised and dented, but it's there.

I'm 26 and I'm happily married and if I think that I know more about love than anyone else, I should be struck through the scrotum with a fish hook and dragged into the Potomac.

Speaking of my scrotum, here's a story:

Mrs. Half-Drunken Scribe and myself got married last May. In September, we moved into our new apartment. A few weeks into our tenure at the new place, she and I are feeding the cat (you remember Olivia, I trust--she'll be important later), brushing our respective teeth, and generally doing the things that are a part of our process of going to bed on a weeknight. Because we're multi-taskers, we're also arguing about something. I can't remember what. No, really, I can't. And neither can she. Why? Because it was a small and stupid argument. The kind of small and stupid argument that spelled the end my relationships once upon a time. Whatever it was, she and are going back and forth, very likely knowing that the argument is stupid. But we remain entrenched in it because neither of us can handle the psychic impact of the conclusion: one of us winning a stupid battle and the other--horror of horrors--being wrong.

A part of me, I think, senses the impasse. It's the same part of my brain that's always eager to play this next card. And though it means I'll be forever bad at arguments and extemporaneous debate, I can't bear to shut this part of me off, for fear of losing an integral part of who I am.

I begin deliberately irritating her. Not pissing her off, mind you, that's different. I don't believe in picking fights. But, I will sometimes try to annoy her with little things, like responding to her serious inquires by reenacting this scene. Or replying to her questions as Batman (if she says "I swear to God," how am I not supposed to respond with this?). What can I say? She's cute when she's mildly aggravated. A lot of guys do this in relationships, responding to her every groan with a bemused laugh until she's genuinely angry. I don't know how that works with gay couples--some kind of ongoing loop of childish antics, I guess. Although, without the reaction, what's the point?

Anyway, I retreat to bed because that seems the best place to avoid the discussion. At least until I remember that it's also her bed. Before long, L walks into the bedroom, holding Olivia aloft and says "I bring you a peace offering." She plunks Olivia down on to my chest and the cat, as she often will after being involuntarily transported, turns around and walks away. Struts away, in fact, in that way that cats do when they don't have any place to be but don't want to be where they are. Cats live in the moment; there is no past, there is no future, there is only "I'm not involved in this shit." So she's strutting away. And, maybe this is just the way she's walking, but as though making a point of doing so, Olivia's back paw lands on my right testicle. Righty, the one that hangs a little lower than the other.

She doesn't step hard, mind you, and most of her weight had landed on my thigh. Everything's still intact. Pain signals move slightly slower than the "something happened" signals.

The wife takes her first cue from my wince. She's grown kind of fond of me and wants kids one day, so, for a second, she genuinely feels bad for Righty. Then she sees me unclench and knows everything's fine and breathes a sigh of relief. And then she laughs, evolution's Everything's Okay alarm.

This symbolizes marriage. Somehow. Karma is involved; you act like a dick and get it back in a note of imperfect poetic irony. There's fleeting physical pain that's so superficial, it demands laughter for medicine.

It's also beautifully mundane. She and I don't have the independent wealth-financed lives of leisure, world travel, and gym time that either of us would like. We go to work every day and come home tired and sometimes resentful of whatever the Metro's cooked up for us. We drop our shit on the floor in the entryway, collapse onto the sofa, and together we summon the necessary strength to cook dinner. And she does grad school on top of it all, so the amount of room I have to complain about any of it is about as roomy as a... not-so-roomy thing.

While not every day is wine, roses, beer, and X-Box, we do the banality together. If that seems unromantic, well, it is. She and I do romance, sure, but that's our business. The point is, the fictionalized exaggerated version of love that we're sold from childhood is fine when kept in context. But it's as much about the everyday trivialities; sharing a fridge for seventeen years, as Brooker says. In between, you buy her flowers, just because. And you let him play video games for another hour or two, just because. If you can't do that, then the better parts of it--the big moments you've been promised--won't mean a thing, if they happen at all.

Are you upset because it's Valentine's Day and you're alone? Because you're disappointed? Because you're expected to put in some effort? Yeah, fair enough. But remember that Valentine's is just the avatar of the entire concept we've bought and sold to ourselves since forever. If you want to be cynical and say that you're not buying into today, go for it. Post those "Fuck Valentine's" Facebook statuses (that's sure to stick it to The Man). I don't have the moral ground to hash that out with you and it's probable that you've earned your dyspepsia. However, it might pay to consider how you ended up here. And remember that you can only blame an abstract concept for so much.

"It's not all Disney princess shit," as the wife says. She's so sweet. On the third anniversary of the day I proposed to her, I love her as much as I did then. Happy Valentine's Day, kitten.