Yours, mine, and ours

When Neal and I were engaged, we were told to read and discuss certain books to “get us ready” for our pre-marital counseling with Neal’s minister. (Since I lived in Illinois, it was difficult to find someone who would take the time we had to do it with is, so we are eternally grateful for him for doing it with us in one long session in person along with a couple online “sessions”. I know, technically we didn’t have to have pre-marital counseling, since Misty married us and not at a church, but we wanted to make sure we had asked ourselves all the “big” questions and had answers that we could both live with for the rest of our lives.) While we were in a bookstore looking for one of these books, I picked up another one in the same section (“Relationships,” I think) and started browsing through it.  It was also for couples who were engaged and were trying to discuss things that could cause issues in their relationships before they came up, but one section made me pause.

“Neal, look at this. What do you think about it?”

He read the paragraph I pointed to over my shoulder. After we both finished the section in the book, we rolled our eyes at each other and then I put the book back on the shelf. We later talked about it and agreed that we didn’t agree with it.

What did it say?

I don’t remember the exact wording, but the gist was that you cannot let your spouse be your best friend. Neal and I discussed it in more depth and agreed that your spouse should not be your only friend, but there is no harm in your spouse being your best friend.

Why shouldn’t he be? After all, he was my best friend before we got married, before we started dating. He was the one who had my back when I felt abandoned by so many others (and while I was going through a weird identity crisis). Even after all that, he asked me to date him and then to marry him. The dating part was a hard decision for both of us. Could we give up our best friend if it didn’t work out? We decided to chance it, and I’m glad we did.

But he’s also still my best friend. He’s the one that when I am hurt or angry or sad, I immediately want to call him or find him and get a hug or talk it out. He is the one that I look for first for advice or discussion on things that are weighing on my mind. He is the one who I know will always be available when I truly need him (and I for him). These things are obvious to us, but not to every married couple.

I was talking to a coworker about having affairs (not with each other) in light of recent pop-culture events, and she said she couldn’t even imagine cheating on her partner. I told her I couldn’t either, but I knew people who had. I have a hard time reconciling the person I know with the person who could do that to another person, especially since I’ve been on the harshest end of that relationship in the past. I read this blog post, and it reminded me of all the things Neal and I have in place to secure our relationship. In addition to discussing almost everything with each other, we also have relationship rules we put in place before we even got married. We don’t encourage close relationships with the opposite sex, for obvious reasons (I feel like I need to disclaim that we are both heterosexual, after reading the comments on the blog post linked above.) We don’t flirt with other people (and try to avoid situations that can be misconstrued as flirting with someone else). We are careful in our online presence and who we “let in” to our non-online lives via the internet. (After all, Neal and I met through just blogging, remember?) We have other, non-online things in place that just kind of discourage cheating as well (although they aren’t that way for that specific reason, necessarily).

Neal and I have two phones, but at any time either could have one or the other phone. We live in a secure building, so one is designated our “home” phone and the other is designated our “cell” phone. (The home phone is hooked up to the call box outside our building for visitors to ring us if they need buzzed in.) It creates some confusion for friends and family, I think, most of whom have “my phone” and “my spouse’s phone” instead of the way we have it set. This works well for us on multiple levels, but it also keeps us accountable. We often see advice columns about how “my husband/wife wants my voicemail/email/login-for-whatever password, but I think it’s an invasion of my privacy!” I scoff at those, because they are just ridiculous to hear.

What about the “old days” when whoever got to the mailbox first got all the mail? Or the one who got home first got all the answering machine messages (or, before that, the one who got to the phone first answered the call, not even knowing who it was)? Sure, people still cheated, but most of the times I see these queries in advice columns, they are lamenting the fact that their spouse found out something unsavory about them. “How could he/she break my trust like that?” they often cry out, although they have also broken their spouse’s trust and often in worse ways.

Neal and I share an email address. I don’t usually open his mail, and he doesn’t usually open mine, but there aren’t very many secrets contained therein either. We both also have junk mail/online email addresses (separate ones for commenting, filling out online forms, etc.) We both know the login information for each other’s spam addresses as well. Sometimes I’ll let Neal know of something in my junk mailbox and have him jump on to look at it and vice versa. We know there’s nothing scary hiding in there.

We have other ways to “check and balance” each other out in the face of the temptations that are/might be out there, of course, but I think the main one is that we discuss things regularly and make sure we’re still on the same page about important things. Another important one is that we don’t talk about the other person to outside people. I gripe about small things (Neal’s tendency to be late and probably my tendency to go from silly to cranky in 0.2 seconds when I’m sick or tired) in passing, but I have never and will never badmouth my husband to anyone. Not my friends, not my coworkers, and not my parents (or his). That’s an important ground rule. If I’m disappointed with Neal, I let Neal know, not everyone else.  I don’t blog things about him (or about me, if I think it might be personal or sensitive to him as well as myself) without asking him if it will bother him (and usually asking his advice on making sure it sounds right, anyway. That’s kind of what happens when both halves of a couple have English education degrees, I think.) Knowing this basic rule makes it easy to put a hold on a fight or heated discussion and go back to it when we’re both cooled off. We don’t run off and call our moms or friends to complain about each other, but use the time to think about what we really want the outcome to be.

I think the fact that Neal is my best friend makes it even less likely that infidelity will occur on either of our sides. I don’t have big, scary secrets from him, and neither does he from me. We know the past and present of each other and each consider the other to be our only possible future. We have an openness in many ways that we don’t take advantage of (and don’t feel we need to), because we know the trust is there. I could read Neal’s emails, but I don’t have to. He could read mine, too, but he doesn’t have to. (I hope that makes sense.)

I know not all couples do the same things that we do, and we obviously don’t expect everyone to. We know what works for us, and that includes being best friends and being open and honest with each other. Hearing all the couples who are burned by hiding secrets and having everything separate from their spouse has led us to being as open as we are, especially knowing the dangers the internet itself can present to a couple. Our culture prizes independence for self within a couple at the expense of trust and openness. “My cell phone, my email address(es), my facebook account, my mail, my bank account statement, my credit card bill…how dare he/she ask for information relating to any of that! It’s all mine!” We just don’t happen to believe all of that mineness is as important as being able to trust the other completely and to ensure that this bond, this life-bond, actually lasts without tearing or breaking. This is our way of doing that, and it works for us.

No, thank you.

I have a pet peeve. Okay, I have lots, but one in particular is on my mind right now. We have a family member — let’s call him Family Member Z — who seems to have a gratitude problem. Every year, whether we are at the family gathering or not, we give Z a Christmas present that we have painstakingly picked out. (Yes, I really mean “painstakingly,” too. Z is the most difficult person to find a present for that I have ever met.) We wrap it lovingly (as you know from how much effort I put into wrapping gifts for everyone) and take care with making sure he has something to open from us on that special day. We usually do pretty good for getting gifts, too, which amazes me every single year, because I am just never quite sure whatever we get is something he’ll use.

Every single year, we never receive so much as a “thank you,” whether we are there in person or not. This year, it’s already March and as far as we know, he never even opened it. (Okay, I lied. We know he opened it because others were there and saw him using the present immediately, but we haven’t heard anything from him.) Normally when we are there in person, he throws a gift card he got the day before at us on Christmas, but this year we haven’t even heard “thank you for your thoughtful gift” or “go bite me” or, well, anything at all in return.

I’ve decided that I’m done searching for Z’s gift. As Miss Manners says, “If they don’t say ‘thank you,’ then they probably didn’t want a gift. You should problem not burden them with one again.” Sure, I’ll throw a gift card at him when next we see him, but I’m not taking any time with getting him anything else again. He apparently doesn’t need or want the gifts we have been giving, so I’m done taking all that time to search and find something nice for him to disregard.

I’m so sorry…!

“I’m sorry if you felt offended by what I said” is not an apology. “I hope you weren’t offended” isn’t one either. “I’m sorry you took what I said the wrong way”? Nope, still not an apology.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t more careful in what I was saying. I did misspeak, and I apologize for that.” That’s an apology.

How do I know the difference? I said the second paragraph to someone today, because I did something I shouldn’t have done and I said something VERY incorrectly. It was my fault, even if unintentional. The first paragraph were all things said to me today, and it didn’t feel sincere when they were apologizing for how I might have felt instead of what they said/did.

When you are apologizing to someone, you cannot simply apologizing for their feeling a certain way or their taking something wrong. You can only apologize for what YOU said and/or did to that person. Saying you’re sorry they didn’t like what you said is ridiculous and, more than likely, untrue. Saying you wish you hadn’t said something a certain way is more effective (and hopefully true).

I did and said something today that, while intentional, was wrong. In honesty, if I had thought about it more, I would probably have done some things differently (although I probably still would have said what I did as I did, unknowing of someone else’s feelings until after I said it).

Why do so many people think something such as “I’m sorry your arm hurt when I punched you” or “I’m sorry your nose wasn’t strong enough to take that punch I threw” are apologies when it applies to feelings? Take responsibility for the fact that you misspoke or didn’t think long enough about what you were saying/doing and apologize for that.

I’ll probably have another apology to make (to a student) tomorrow. I am truly sorry for doing something that could be upsetting to her (although I hope not). I’m not sorry for how she feels, although I am regretful of my part in her feelings and I’ll own up to that.

Why is that so hard to understand these days?

Here it. Comes. *rocks out*

(Yeah, I realize that the post title comes from BS2 instead of FIF, but I couldn’t resist.)

“Convenience” fees?

Update (2/21/10): I heard back from Steph, who said that (in part) the reason behind it is to get more people to switch to automatic bill pay. I’ve had so many billing SNAFUs with Qwest’s billing that I refuse to allow them to automatically take money out of my account, and many of the other people who are outraged about this are saying they refuse to sign up for automatic billing as well. Another issue I have (along with others) is that there was absolutely no notice of the change. If you, like I do, wait until a few days before to pay the bill online, all of a sudden you’re hit with a bill pay fee (and I’ve read other accounts of people who paid via their phone, which is possible, only to be hit with a $4.00 fee instead of just the $1.00 fee for the online bill pay) and you have no choice: Pay it or be hit with late fees. (By the way, the reason I deal with Steph from Twitter is that their phone reps are rude and unhelpful and the executive customer service person I dealt with was extremely unhelpful as well. Steph has always been polite and very helpful, so I do give the Twitter reps a lot of credit: It’s not their fault that Qwest is going to this silly system, but the more people who speak out against it, the more Qwest knows that it’s a ridiculous fee to levy.) I have checked my past bills and all emails I’ve received from Qwest, and there was NO notice of this fee addition. The small print on the bills still tells you that you can pay online or via your phone’s bill pay function and does not mention the additional fees associated with this. If you, as many, have been paying a particular way for years, this is completely out of the blue. I wouldn’t be so upset about it if I had at least had some notice of hte change. (I was also told the change was rolled out different months for different states, which is why some started in December, some in January, and apparently mine in February. The fact that this has been known for so many months and still no notice to people that it would be starting and, more importantly, when it would be starting for each state is just bad business. /update

Okay, you’re all probably sick of hearing my “Tales of Qwest” already, but bear with me on this one.

I logged into my Qwest account this weekend (which, in and of itself, is always a gem to do. I always try to log in with Firefox and have tons of issues with none of the buttons working properly. I then decide to start up Chrome and finally actually get logged in. I then have to navigate to the correct payment section to pay my bill and pray that the buttons work — sometimes they do in Chrome, and sometimes I just have to keep trying or come back later) and discovered that they are now charging a “convenience fee” for people who pay online.

I always have wondered why businesses go to this model of payment, when it makes absolutely no sense. I emailed Steph at Qwest’s twitter customer service (whom I’ve written about before) to find out why they did this all of a sudden (with no notice to customers, I might add, so I was afraid I’d either have to pay the ridiculous fee or be charged a late fee, neither of which sounded like a good idea). Instead of answering the question, she gave me ways to pay the account balance without going online.

Which makes me wonder: Why have an online payment service if you’re going to make it more difficult to use than another way? I’m assuming they have paid to have this set up correctly to take the differing ways of payment, so why waste their own money?

But back to the other issue, as you can tell, paying online isn’t really “more convenient” for me, the consumer, because I’ve always had so many issues with Qwest’s website anyway (and I’m not the only one, as I’ve found through keeping an eye on their Twitter page). In fact, it’s much more convenient to write the check and mail it out in the envelope provided than to go through all the rigmarole of figuring out which browser today will actually open the freaking site (sometimes one, sometimes the other, and sometimes neither!) The only reason I’ve ever used the online payment was then I could be assured Qwest didn’t get my payment any sooner than they needed to. (Hey, after all I’ve been through, they don’t need it any sooner than the due date. I deserve to make more interest on my money than they do.)

On their end, however, it’s much more convenient. Having worked at places where bills were paid in two different ways, I can tell you that online payments are MUCH more convenient for the company you’re dealing with. If you send in a check, someone has to open the envelope (especially if you don’t use the postage-paid envelope and have one of another size) and then pull out the check and the payment slip. You can’t do too many at one time, for many people don’t write account numbers on their checks (I don’t, so I have nothing against those people), and you might mix up payments. (Not everyone pays the full amount every time.) You then have to figure out their account info and put the payment in. I know they do electronic checks now, so they at least don’t have to hand-stamp the backs anymore. Then you have to destroy the checks (unless you work somewhere they keep the physical payment information after the e-check has gone through).

Pulling electronic payments are much easier, more fool-proof, and seamless with the database. I can’t imagine that a company as big as Qwest wouldn’t have it so their payment information pulls from the payment center database and automatically applies it to each account in the database immediately and with very little (if any) human interception.

So the convenience fee is for, well, what exactly? The convenience of Qwest and other companies to higher fewer accounts receivable people to handle the payments? The convenience of Qwest to pull the information from one database into another without dealing with envelopes and paper cuts and e-checks that have to be run through? My convenience of trying to figure out even how to log in to my account from one day to the next, since things keep doing odd stuff on Qwest’s site (on all of my comps, too, not just this one)?

Good thing I can always do my own e-checks, I guess. I’m not sure how this saves Qwest any money, but they sure know how to tick off a long-term customer even more!

I emailed Steph back to find out exactly why this was instituted. She insists it was in place as of December 14th, but I have two payment emails that show I paid later in December and again in January and neither had a convenience fee attached to it.

“Convenience fees” are ridiculous and just another way to stick it to the people who pay your salary, companies (including airlines, utility companies, and anyone else who adds this ludicrous fee to any type of payment). You should be happy that I’m your customer and willing to pay you anything! This is where my choice as a consumer will probably come in very handy soon.

Just not enough (repost)

I have never done a repost before on my blog, but in a discussion with some students at work a few weeks ago and then reading this blog post shortly after (especially the comments), the following post’s thoughts came back in full force. A lot of my regrets from elementary school and onward aren’t what I did to others (because I was definitely not a bully), but what I didn’t to to defend others. The students I was talking to were talking about instances of bullying they had been subject to, and one commented that he’d never been bullied, but he had been witness to it. He had never spoken up, but was at that point realizing that maybe he should have. I made this comment on the blog post linked above, because I find the difference to be drastic when someone steps in:

I work at a school where we had training on how to deal with bullying. A statistic we were given said that a bullying incident where no bystander said anything lasted, on average, 23 seconds. A bullying incident where someone spoke up lasted an average of 7 seconds. That may not seem like a ton of time, but when you are the one being bullied…that’s a lot.

I’m so glad you spoke up, and I completely agree with your comments on why kids are growing up to be bystanders. My biggest regrets from jr. high and high school aren’t things I did, but the things I didn’t do: I rarely stepped out to speak up for my less fortunate peers (and no one ever spoke up for me when I needed it either). A little help goes a long way…

Neal and I went out for lunch together today and decided upon Subway, which is right near our house. When we arrived, Neal saw through the window that it was filled with elementary school children and we, at first, thought there were no open tables. After ordered, we realized that there was indeed on booth left open, still surrounded by the tiny bobbing heads and Donald Duck voices that children this age all seem to have (especially in cacophony). We decided to forge ahead and be brave in the face of shrill voices and tiny rocketing bodies all around us.

We sat down and began eating, discussing my doctor’s appointment from this morning (ARGH is all I have to say about it for now) and Neal’s papers that he’s grading. I happened to glance over at the tiny two-person booth across the aisle from us. Sitting all alone and looking quite forlorn was a small girl with a mottled pinkish winter hat on the table next to her and dirty-white moon boots (okay, not the real deal, but pretty danged close and really high up on her tiny legs). She was finishing up a few things and hanging onto her yogurt that she wasn’t going to finish. No other child in the room was alone. In the table next to us was a little girl surrounded by three boys, the boys hitting each other with their Subway bags of litter while the little girl giggled at their antics. The other two-person booth by the girl across from us had two little girls in it who were a whirl of movement and talk.

Only this one was alone, not talking, not really moving, not frenetic—just sitting and waiting. Neal said, “Don’t you wish you could tell them that they will look back on this and really dislike themselves for being like this?” I agreed. I can remember instances of childhood where I was teased or bullied, but I never let on that I cared to those meanies—and I always had friends to grouse to and complain with about those types. I never remember being alone like this, alone with myself in a room full of happy, laughing, talking people. I know that I was never a bully, but I can definitely look back at times that I really hate myself for not speaking up in someone else’s defense. I never dished it out, but sometimes I didn’t try to stop it either.

“Don’t you wish you could tell her that it won’t always be like this? Do you wish you could see into the future and could say, ‘One day you will be head of your own company and these other kids will be your janitors!’” Neal nodded. “I really wish we had bought some cookies and that it wouldn’t be weird to give them to her out of the blue,” I said. My heart aches for these lost children, the ones that seem within themselves. My work with children who have been abused or neglected really opened my heart in a much more empathetic way than I felt when I was younger. I felt a lump in my throat, glancing out of the corner of my eye so as not to seem as though I’m staring at the girl.

When they were getting ready to leave, a woman came over and sat with her, asking how her lunch was. They had received prizes in their meals, I think, and the woman asked her about what she got—a bracelet. She asked if the girl wanted her to help put it on. The girl nodded and immediately pulled up her sleeves, holding out her skinny arm. I heard her voice for the first time. “Yes, please!” as her arm bolted outward and “Thanks!” when it was done. (Another adult in the group came over earlier and sat in the other two-person booth, putting one of the girls there on his lap—instead of sitting in the empty seat across from this girl. I’m assuming he was the teacher because we’d also seen him stopping the boys next to us from flinging their bags around at each other with a simple glance and a “Hello…”)

Neal and I looked at each other and smiled. Sometimes it just takes a little attention to be remembered forever. The kids all got up to leave, lining up, and trooped out together in a large bunch.

Yet this is only my story. I don’t know her story at all or why she was alone. Perhaps my sorrow was misplaced and she’s really mean and snotty, but I don’t think so from her reactions to the woman who sat with her. Whatever was going on, I hate seeing the casting out of fellow people begin at such an early age. “Kids can be so mean and cruel,” Neal reiterated. Indeed they can. And, remembering back on my elementary and middle school years, kids can be the cruelest to the kids who never feel acceptance—even in their own homes from their own parents or family members. I remember the biggest bullies (not the big mean ones but the snobby ones who were “the best”) were always saying awful things to the kids who were dirty or who smelled or who couldn’t afford nice clothes or the foster kids who were in and out of the school within months (if not days). I remember the kids who could least expect to take it were the ones who were hassled the most—the ones who didn’t realize they were worth more than a shove in the lunch line or a nasty word while washing hands at the bathroom sink.

Now I remember wishing, years later when I thought back on those days, that I could go back and let them know they were worth more than they thought, than their parents thought, than their peers thought. They are worth more and deserve better than life was giving them.

But even an outspoken girl such as myself didn’t speak out enough. I didn’t stand up enough and say, “Stop it!” I didn’t push forward enough and demand better for the other kids.

In some ways, that makes me just as bad as the kids who were doing the teasing and bullying. I know I spoke up some and demanded better some and said, “Stop!” some. But—in memory—some just isn’t enough for me.

(Originally posted April 8, 2008)

What?

This kind of thing really makes me feel ill. I don’t have much else to say about it, but…I’m just sickened right now.