Sunday 26 October 2014

What do you do for love?

The other day, I went window shopping. Which, strictly speaking, wasn't window shopping at all, since I entered the stores - but I had no intention of buying anything. It was a beautiful, sunny day, yet bafflingly, the stores were crazy busy. (I usually never go shopping when the weather is nice, I much rather hang out at the farm - but the weather was playing tricks on us that day. It was supposed to be raining. Do people always go shopping even if it's nice out? Or did they get caught in the same trap as me?)

Anyway. 

What struck me, was the amount of husbands/boyfriends accompanying their wives/girlfriends on shopping trips. And I'm not talking the man-friendly electronics or hardware store: we are talking real girly stores! I went to a book store, an antiques store, a home decorating store, and - the pièce de résistance - a fabric store. There were guys in all of them! And not single guys, maybe looking to pick up a date, but guys in relationships, trudging behind their women, with slightly pained expressions on their faces.

I was in awe.   

It would never, in a million years, occur to me to ask my husband to come to a fabric store to me. To be honest, it was quite unfamiliar territory to myself, and I didn't last very long. 
I'm not a sewer, and all those rows and rows of fabric, lining, and whatever else they had, was quite overwhelming.  
But I, at least, don't have a Y chromosome that is impeding my understanding of these feminine domains. (Even though it felt that way. Those ladies were speaking a foreign language of ruching, pleating and hemming that I had absolutely no concept of.)

It got me thinking. Either these ladies have a powerful tool of persuasion to get their husbands to tag along (what is it?? Help a sister out!), or they have a tradition of going shopping together on the weekend. Whatever it is, I thought it was sweet. And obviously, my next thought was: "What do Rich and I do for each other that we may not fully understand, but tolerate out of love?"

Here is my (hopelessly incomplete) list: 

He tolerates my crazy (it's really more of an obsession) love for our little Corgi-girl Lily. She was supposed to be "our" dog, but she's a 100% mine. And I'm loving every second of it. Rich probably pictured our having an inside dog differently, but he acts like he's totally fine with it. And I love him for that. 

I support his (obsessive) love for birds. We have hundreds of them, and despite claiming all.the.time that he will "cut down by half", it hasn't happened yet after all these years. It never will. But I'm a-okay with that. It makes him happy, and they sure look pretty, don't they?

Once in a while I will get the urge to re-decorate, or randomly string fairy lights all across the living room. He didn't say a word. It was only after I took them down again, stating that "they looked ridiculous", that he expressed his gratitude for doing so. He had not liked them at all, yet was supportive.

I will always feed the animals for him if he's busy, away or simply too lazy. You're welcome hubs!

He supports my habit of taking pictures of everything. He will even take pictures of me if I really beg, or reluctantly agree to the occasional selfie.

Again, he with all the animals.
I, being fine with it. (And supportive!)

This picture has nothing to do with any of this. I just thought it worth posting. 
October, you sure are pretty!

What will you do for love? 

xo Miriam

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7 comments

  1. Umm who wouldn't support a love of Corgis???
    Your pictures are so beautiful - animals, animals, animals! And you're right, October is such a gorgeous month, what a great photo - the lighting, the leaves, the sun...I love it :)
    You're right though, what you do for love really says a lot about someone. I unfortunately put up with a relationship for a year and a half that was almost completely one-sided: I did so much for love and got so little in return. Now, I'm not a diva, but there has to be some give and take. I think, from all of your posts, that you've really got yourself a great guy there :) How sweet!
    ~ Samantha

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  2. Fredrik and I shop together but in actuality he likes to shop more than I do and I need his help in places like the fabric store as my Swedish does not cover it and I get all confused with the metric system and how much fabric I want. If I want to really shop and get new clothes I like to go alone though so much easier and faster.

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  3. My other half drives me to near insanity with his obsession with Volkswagen cars! It's not that I dislike them (I drive a VW myself) but there is certainly a lot more to life than trudging around all the shows, watching people spending endless hours polishing their prized chariots, and then threatening you with beheading if you dare to so much as breathe on it! It all bores me senseless, but I do it because I love him, and he puts up with my 1001 and bottles of nail polishes colonizing the house, without so much as a sigh! It's compromise that moves us along! ;)

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  4. Ahh, I love this! You two are a great match. And a little compassion and compromise goes a long ways, huh?

    -Amy

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  5. Relationships are all about compromise. I am crazy about my cats and not all men get it. haha. And I wish I could take more pictures. My family looks at me like I'm weird when I take too many pictures. So, then I end up with tons of cat pictures haha.

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  6. That first picture of Lilly is too cute!! P will go shopping with me, though we don't shop a ton (I buy tons of stuff online) ;) When we are on vacation he will walk through clothing stores with me. Half the time he ends up finding something too :) I think P and I are lucky because we have similar interests. He is also really adaptable too, so he find ways to make most things fun even if he is not 100% into.

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  7. The one about the lights made me laugh! Eric will actually accompany to many a girly-store, but our reason is less romantic: we share a car that I am learning to drive (it's a stick shift). So right now, he is my driver. :) What do we do for love? Well, he has accompanied me to the ballet, and I let him listen to Metallica (sometimes) when we are in the car together.

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