My Clique (Pt. 2): Interesting Things I've Learned from My Wife (Hubby Takover!)

Hi All! 

I'm back to spreading light and positivity on the blog today. As a part of my "Clique Series" My husband is my guest poster. He totally surprised me with this post! He shared a beautiful essay during the Wedding Series blog posts, and he's back with another great one. Here he is in his own words:

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So my wife was looking for some guest bloggers, so here I am back to enlighten y'all with my vast wisdom (not my words, hers). 

Living with TJ has been a learning experience for both of us and one that ultimately brings us insight on the other's world. In thinking about how I would characterize some of the early months of living together, I think this video captures it:

Over time, we've found our groove, and I've even learned a few things. I'd like to share a few with you today. 

HGTV

I never owned a home prior to livng with TJ and never paid a lot of intention to interior décor (even though I thought I had a pretty nice bachelor’s pad in my younger days). I would say that 30% of the programs on Toya’s DVR are HGTV programs. Here are a few of my favorites:

• Property Borthers: This is a show that I'd love for us to be on because they help in purchasing and renovating fixer uppers.

• House Hunters & House Hunters International: This is one of our favorite shows, as we each try to predict the winning house (which I usually guess correctly for most episodes). We like to watch the international version to get ideas on where we will next go to get our passports stamped. 

Music

I am known for being a huge music head and pretty much up on sounds, old and new. I will have to give props when they are due and recognize that my wife has put me on to some music that I either didn’t give a chance or needed to give it another spin. Some of these songs include:

• DJ Jazzy Jeff ft J. Live - Practice: This is one of Toya’s favorite study songs and one that I’ve adopted for my "Get Hype" music mixes.

• Mos Def & Talib Kweli - Little Brother: I am one of the 25 people that bought a copy of The Hurricane soundtrack and somehow didn’t recognize this song. Toya did, and it’s a song I listen to like it just came out.

• Steely Dan - Peg: I hope you think this was limited to that hipping and hopping music. My wife has an unabashed love for 70s and 80s smooth rock that may only be matched by yours truly. This is one of her favorite songs from that era.

• Fela - Water No Get Enemy: I cannot lie, I had heard about Fela and knew it had been sampled in some of my favorite songs but I never really listened to his music. Well that was 'til I met Toya who played this song often. After being exposed to Fela’s music we eventually went to see the Broadway play, and I really began to get into his music:

Patience

I could have gone for a smart-alecky final entry, but I thought ending with this was best. Living together is a true test of patience, as it goes hand in hand with having a good attitude. I'm not bringing up having patience in a bad way or being patient about little things like forgetting to close the lid on the toilet or not putting the dishes in the washer. Having patience has come to mean growing together and sometimes saying sorry when you may not have been the one who was wrong. It means going to a show or participating in an activity because you know that will make your spouse happy. It can even be watching HGTV when game 6 of the NBA playoffs is on. Patience is expressing the positive when it’s easy to point out the negative. Patience comes from a deep sense of unselfishness that isn’t easy or readily accessible when you merge two established lives, households, habits, values, etc. Patience is waiting for goals to come to fruition when they seem impossible; that usually involves supporting the other person when their patience wavers.

Patience is a skill I work on every day. I’ve learned that through good communication and checking my ego, patience is something that continues to grow over time. Honestly, my wife has shown A LOT of patience via putting up with my idiosyncrasies and habits. We continue to grow daily in this area and I hope we can continue to build a love story similar to the one in one of our all-time favorite movies, Up. 

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Until next time . . . I'm going to wipe my eyes. That scene from Up does me in every time I watch it.