I snatch an envelope off the counter and smear poetry ink over the seams and around the grocery list. Pancake batter sizzles and finally bubbles. flip. flip. flip. While they cook, I lean onto counter and write. When he walks in, I quickly hide the envelope in a drawer of measuring spoons and mason jar lids. I grasp at hot glasses, bowls, and plates and unload the dishwasher. Out of the corner of my eye I watch him fill a glass. I turn my back to him, but I still hear the gulps underneath the sound of plates being stacked one atop the other. He’s here only because he is thirsty. Changing oil, mowing the lawn, and trimming horse hooves can do that to a man.

.

It must be hot today cause he’s chugging and gulping like he belongs in a barn.

.

By the sound of things, it must be the sort of thirst I feel when a blank page and two minutes collide.

.

I’ve tried to explain my love of words. He doesn’t understand. He is an engineer. He is a right is right and wrong is wrong, mathematical equation, chemical documentation sort of man. And he needs a tangible explanation. I’ve gone at it before, I’ve tried to explain to him, to open his eyes just a little to how my heart beats. Once I did it with food. He likes food. So, this is how I feel when I peel back things other than ‘tater skins. You know how a paring knife cuts, right? The splotchy skin falls into the compost bucket. I even dig the black rotten spots with the knife tip and fling those into the bucket too. A pen on paper does this for me, too, only the scraps don’t go in the compost heap with the rotting veggie peels. It’s like that for…

.

Interrupting he says, What? I don’t get it. Good for you though.

.

And more than once he’s told me that this artsy-fartsy stuff just doesn’t make sense.

.

I say nothing this morning. I move to the stove and flip another pancake. He pats me on the back and sets his wet glass down in a countertop puddle. He swipes his lips with the back of his greasy hand and leaves. I sigh.

.

My envelope is flopping around like a fish in the drawer so I resuscitate it with more ink. All at once he pops his sweaty head back in the door. He taps his cheek in a come hither manner and leans in for a kiss. I don’t see the 38-year old man, but the 17-year old boy who was my best friend in high school. I see those same teasing eyes and cute smile and I melt a little bit. Around the edges at least. Even if he doesn’t see me for how my heart beats on paper, he sees me as his wife. His friend. But not as a cohort in discovery through the written word.

.

Dang those books and movies where the man “gets” his wife and has a soft spot for her literary escapades and begs to read her words. Dang them all to pieces. It just doesn’t happen like that.  I reckon it’s cause we don’t live a Hallmark movie sorta life. Nor are we pressed between the pages of a hardback book. Ours is just a real one with grit and goo and arguments and feelings and bills and broken lawn mower blades. 

.

Ugh.

.

He simply takes my kiss and goes back outside. I let feelings of teenage love slide and replace it with bitter thoughts. These fester while I tend to another skillet of pancakes. By the last pancake I am covered in all manner of resentment. It sticks like syrup. What am I? Does he see me? Does he know me? Am I only the laundry lady & cook & toilet-scrubber & dinner-maker?

.

I lick my wounds and ink my poetic angst on the envelope and write around the

beans

lettuce

tomatoes

bananas

& oranges.

.

I set the table, place a hot pad in the center, fill the glasses with fruit smoothies and I pray: Lord, help me to see the way that he loves me.  And let not my desire to write be bigger than the desires you’ve always had in mind for my heart. Help me to love my man the way You want me to. And help him to love me that way too.

.

.

.

Please join my friends today at sites for:

* On, In, And Around Mondays

* Playdates with God

.

.