Darcy and I are writing complimentary blogs this week. We’re posting hers today and mine tomorrow!
Gunnar and I have officially lived together for about a month, and I am here to report that it has felt very….. ordinary.
My Mom says that if a relationship is right, living together should feel like home. Thus far, the transition to living together has felt seamless, relatively boring, and like I’m just at home.
The biggest change for me, of course, is that I am now Gunnar’s primary caregiver. He’s been feeling great, so I haven’t had much to do in this role aside from helping out with his standard daily CF care routine. I didn’t think this would be a huge adjustment to begin with, but I’m pleasantly surprised at how easy it’s been.
We’re living out the difference between “in love” and just “love.” “In love” is all the fun stuff we’ve done over the last few years – the initial rush of a relationship, the date nights, the vacations, the weekend trips, the adventures. Now that we live together, we get to experience the part of our relationship that’s left over after all the fun stuff – the mundane stuff.
I took a class in college called “The Theory of Everyday Life” (liberal arts for the win!). It was about the banal and how the banal could actually be quite interesting. A classmate wrote an entire term paper on “hair.” Hair – it’s beautiful, we style it, we color it, we comment on how soft and long someone’s hair is. But the second it becomes detached from the scalp, it is completely repulsive – ew there’s a hair on the back of my chair. Fascinating to really think about the why.
I’ve really enjoyed living out the banalities of everyday life with Gunnar, even those related to CF. I sterilize his nebs, I make different bolus feeds for him every day, and I cook high calorie dinners. I also clean the toilet because **air quotes** people with CF can’t do that.
Gunnar reciprocates. When he tries to put on Top Gun, The Patriot, or some incredibly stupid Dustin Hoffman movie about an infectious disease that I can’t even bother to look up the title, I throw a hissy fit until he turns the channelkindly ask him to turn the channel, and he does. And yet, when I rewatch Grey’s Anatomy from start to finish for the second time this year, he patiently retreats into his phone and lets me watch (though he may secretly like Greys (we are finishing up Season 2, so peak Greys story arc with the bomb/Denny Duquette/Burke getting shot).
My love for Gunnar has been reaffirmed by the joy I take in our boring life living together. Enjoying the banal together is truly a wonderful thing! And my Mom would tell you that the contentedness I feel doing chores for us is truly extraordinary.
