Pennies with Holes

We’re driving back to my boyfriend’s apartment from my mom’s house, and we pull up to a stoplight. As I sit behind him in my vehicle (we had left it at my moms for the weekend while on a quick getaway) and for the one hundredth time I’m trying to pronounce the name of the dealership on his license plate frame. It dawns on me (because I am woman and I am petty) that his ex-girlfriend probably rode with him to Kokomo to pick up his car. We had ridden past several dealerships before and while talking about their selection he mentioned that he had gone shopping there before, just not for himself. My brain is chaotic as it is starts to recount what she must have felt like, shopping with my now boyfriend who at the time was her long term. There are certain points in relationships, when everything is going well and you start to do more together – and I’m not talking hanging out with friends and meeting families. I’m talking more…grocery shopping, cooking, riding together to run small errands that would take less time had you rode alone. And car hunting. When you’re strolling that dealership parking lot and discussing what you like and don’t like in vehicles and, he may even be speaking for you when the salesman comes over so that you don’t get haggled since “they don’t treat women fairly” on car lots. In these moments, the inside of you smiles and thinks, ‘this must be what it feels like to be married. Look at us, walking this parking lot/grocery store/new recipe and we’re making it work. We’re a team, this is us.’ In this quiet moment, you may even say your name except this time instead of the last name your parents gave you, you use his. Then it really hits you, and you ask yourself, ‘am I really trying this right now? You are trippin, hardcore.’ Or you may say, ‘hell yeah, that’s the one right there.’

There also comes the moment when you start doing a lot, maybe even everything. You’re cooking, cleaning, sexing, sexting, learning his love language for him because; if you’re going to be a wife you should show him you know how to be one. You two have drawers and draws at each other’s homes, definitive sides of the bed and maybe even gave out the spare key. Laundry is being done together, you’re picking family up from the airport, and he’s packing your lunch for you or bringing you some on the days he works from home. That’s when the illusion begins to set in. Even if you’ve discussed being married, you still aren’t. You’ve talked about having children and perhaps even what you would like to name them, you still aren’t married. You could have met his best friends from elementary, middle, high school AND college; mom, dad, great auntie Faye, Granma Odessa, and her best friend too, you still aren’t married.

Now before you go further into this and say, “well everyone doesn’t want to be married. That isn’t always the goal! Women have more going for themselves now! We are not our grandmothers, desperately waiting for a man to come whisk us away in a fairytale!” Shut up. Shut. It. Up. This is not for you so if you’ve made it this far, discontinue reading. Just like women who say they don’t enjoy receiving flowers, LIES. It’s not about the flowers, or the chocolates. The card that came with them-it’s that he thought of you when you weren’t with him. That he thought of you enough with a loving heart (granted he’s not doing it for some large or small mistake he made) and a kind mind and said, ‘she’s gonna dig these.’ Diamonds and bags may be your thing, and while I love those too, let’s not get it twisted, it’s the spontaneity that goes with flowers that I can appreciate. In any event, I digress-kind of…because you still aren’t married. Should your boyfriend know that you love him and his cousin Francine who is much older so he calls her his aunt unconditionally? Yes. Should he know that should he get pulled over and taken into custody that you’ll bail him out? Yes. Should he know that you will cook for him but that mostly it’s because you have to eat too? Yes. He should not however, receive husband privileges, since he is not your husband. HE SHOULD NOT RECEIVE HUSBAND PRIVILEGES SINCE HE IS NOT YOUR HUSBAND. Also remember, time means nothing. People swear it does, it does not. It’s nothing more than the numbers the hands touch on a clock. There are women who have been girlfriends for 20 years, and women who have gotten married after 20 days-you see where I’m going? Time means nothing. So, don’t get caught up in the numbers on the wall. I say all this to say, no matter what stage or phase you are in, enjoy it. Take it one day at a time. One. Day. Love him for sure, just remember to keep yourself in that love loop too.

#hope #love #boyfriends #girlfriends #relationships