Felipe says, "And love is always complicated. But still humans must try to love each other darling. We must get our hearts broken sometimes. This is a good sign, having a broken heart. It means we have tried for something." p 277
Felipe is the older Brazilian man, who hosted a party Liz went to, who Liz flirted with, who held doors for her, danced with her, called her "darling". "Then, again, I noticed he called everyone 'darling' - even the hairy male bartender. Still the attention is nice . . ." p 267.
Call me thick. Call me slow, but I think this is the guy she falls in love with. And, she decides, based on past experience, to not marry him. I think, in her next book (in real life, for that matter) they're forced to marry to get him into the country.
ANYWAY, as to his insight into the complications of a relationship - even choosing the color of a blender to be added to the wedding registry at Potter Barn can get complicated. Dudes! Here's a piece of advice given to me that I think can be helpful: You have to care! Or, at least care about the fact that she cares.
It may seem like a "Running Man" game of mind reading, but it's not. She just wants to have a discussion. She may already have decided on the red one and you want the blue one. She may already have decided on the wooden salad tongs and you couldn't give a rats ass about salad tongs (and, forced to decide, you'd pick the metal ones - because, hey, metal is easier to clean, it's more durable . . .) but she still wants the wooden ones.
And, we love our women, right? And, somewhere, deep down beneath our meat-head male ego and our Grizzly Adams logic, we want them to be happy. So, we have to participate. They need to know that we at least care about the time and the effort they put in to making our future house or apartment a home.
And, as much as the box set of Steve McQueen DVDs, the first set of Craftsman tools we still love, The picture of you and Cal Ripken, Jr., or the tickets to the Monsters of Rock concert we went to in our 20s still make us happy, so does the perfect blender, the perfect set of towels, the perfect picture frame, and, yes, the perfect set of salad serving utensils make her happy. Because, those things have specific meaning to her, the same way our favorite 1/2" socket wrench has specific meaning to us. As we linger over which is the perfect drill with the LED work light, level, keyless chuck, with carbide bits, 14.4V . . . so will she linger over the perfect set of silver wear.
Screw it! It makes her happy. My favorite pen makes me happy. Your favorite set of strings on your guitar may make you happy. And, if a tune-up with a K&N air filter, high-performance platinum spark plugs, and synthetic oil make you drive around with pride, then perhaps you can care a little bit about the thread count of the sheets she'll slink into, the color of the towels she'll dry her naked body with or the pots and pans she may like to cook with while quietly humming a lovely tune to herself. Holy Crap! Just I get totally sexist there?
So, in the spirit of equality, consider this: When helping clean up after dinner, I don't want crappy pans that are hard to clean. Also, my fiancee likes to hang shelves. So, she wants an easy-to-use drill with varied speeds, a reasonable torque control that doesn't race to 3,000,000 rpms and is well-balanced.
We both want a nice living space. We both want a nice home. We like to make decisions together, because the relationship, as complicated or as much of a pain in the ass as it can be, still matters. We're partners. Our opinions matters to each other. That's why we ask it. I've bucked at her answers, only to conceded two days later that she was right (the proper use of the word "alight"). She's done the same with me (An announcement at the reception that dessert is available and people can serve themselves). We're still learning. But, if we do it out of love, the misunderstandings will be few and the fights will be short.
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