In Marriage, You Have a Choice: “You Can Choose to Stay, or You Can Choose to Go”

In marriage, you have a choice. You can see truth, or you can see lies. You can focus on self, or you can focus on another. You can choose to forgive, or you can choose to let your anger simmer and grow to a rolling boil. You have the choice to take offense or to take a minute. You have the choice to see the good or to see the bad. Well, actually you can see both, but you choose which one to focus all your attention. You have the choice. Marriage is pro-choice, I guess you could say, for men and women. You can choose to stay, or you can choose to go. You can choose to work on it, or you can choose to wave the white flag of defeat. You can choose forever, or you can choose forever if; forever if everything goes well. In marriage, you have a choice.

My husband wears his feelings on his sleeves. I’m not saying he’s some blubbering crier or anything like that. I’m just saying that if he’s happy you know it, and if he’s not, you know that too. He doesn’t hide his emotions [as] some men do, or perhaps it’s just that he doesn’t hide them well. He isn’t always the epitome of openness, but I can read him like a book.

“What wrong,” I asked my sullen spouse.

“Nothing,” he quipped quickly, without making eye contact.

I sighed. I hated it when he was like this! Ugh. It drove me crazy.

His silence reigned. He looked on expressionless at the highway while he drove. Sheets of dreary water dripped down the windows, and the gray sky seemed to mirror his mood. Normally quite the conversationalist, in this particular state he could barely answer a simple question. Any comment sent his way would be likely answered by a single grunt, similar to how I imagined a caveman replying to his cavewife when she refused to be carried away by his club upon her head or swoon at his masculine, mastodon hunting skills.

I considered my options. I could try to draw him out. I had already asked what was wrong. He had replied nothing. I knew something was bothering him. He knew I knew. He didn’t want to talk about it.

I sighed loudly.

He pretended not to hear my exasperation.

Silence continued.

I could always stop talking, I thought. Yes, that might work. I could quit trying to joke with him. I could stop asking if there was anything I could do. I could just sit there beside him and not say a single solitary word.

We’ll see how he likes it?! Ha.