Religion & Politics / Beach & Bend Concert Trips / Garage Shenanigans
In the wake of our miscarriage in May, my relationship with Nicole was strained for a while. Obviously we were both beside ourselves mourning the unexpected and sudden loss of a wanted pregnancy. In the days and weeks after, we tried to cheer ourselves up and decide when to try again. Our grief seemed to make us turn against each other and there were a couple weird fights. We haven't been seeing completely eye-to-eye on hot-button political and religious topics over the last few years (Thank you, Coronavirus...) and we'd always managed to find a common ground but this time was different. Some of the fighting was mean and disheartening. It was unlike us. It kind of culminated earlier this month when we suggested to each other that maybe we should take a break. The grief and pressure we'd put on ourselves was affecting the marriage in strange new ways that we weren't used to. The miscarriage happened right at Mother's and Father's Days, too, making it that much harder.
Thankfully, Nicole and I did what we do best: Communicate, come together, and find common ground. We had a very long talk one afternoon and reminded ourselves of the commitment we'd promised to each other when we were married. We're a team, we're good together, and we're in love and good marriages are always going to be work worth working for. We'll always have political and religious things that we may not completely agree with each other on, but that's life. People change. People grow together in lots of ways but maybe not every way and that's okay. Things are good right now between us and I hope we continue down this happy path.
Nicole's best friend, Abby, opened up a relative's Washington state beach house to us for a weekend earlier this month. It was a great opportunity to catch up with them, see their three toddlers, and of course relax on the beach. It was such a short trip that not a whole lot happened. We'd brought Chip with us and there was a mild scare when I accidentally dropped the poor dog down a short flight of stairs. He hit his head and bit his tongue but was ultimately fine. Whew! Immediately after that trip, we had to race back to Oregon to catch a Goo Goo Dolls concert in Bend. It was a great show! They played some new stuff that the crowd appeared to agree with and it was a pleasant evening. Of course we spent a day in Bend simply thrifting but all we were successful at finding were more music CDs to add to our growing collection. We're at about 400 CDs at this point which is pretty good considering we started at zero last November. Speaking of our CD collection, we've begun listening to them in the car on our drives which is a very nice nostalgia boost. CDs are fun and they really are a cool snapshot into the sound of a moment in history.
My summer home improvement project this year is to remodel our attached two-car garage. The previous owners bisected the garage by erecting a simple wall that shields from view anyone doing work in the laundry area. Then up against the "false wall" they constructed a makeshift workbench out of some old shelves and leftovers and it's been like that since. With this strange wall in place, you cannot fit a car into the garage. That's a huge thing for me since I've always wanted a garage to protect a car. So the plan is to completely remove the false wall, junk the old workbench, and build a new workbench from scratch that would go against the perimeter wall. Then all my tools would go up on pegboard above the bench. This would free up the entire garage so we could begin parking inside or even do car work. It was ambitious and also involved moving electrical stuff around too.
It started with finding plans for a workbench that I liked and simply putting the new workbench together using a bunch of 2x4s left over from the fence build a year previous. With the new simple workbench in place, I was able to move tools and junk to it which cleared out the old workbench. I then gave away the cabinets and wood that made up the old workbench to a coworker. Last up was to demolish the false wall. Thankfully, I was able to simply deconstruct it and save all the wood for future projects. With the wall gone, it really opened up the garage and it looks radically different to suddenly have so much space. I've still got electrical work to do (New lighting basically) but the hard stuff is over at this point. Soon we'll be enjoying the new garage and using it for it's intended purposes.
Thankfully, Nicole and I did what we do best: Communicate, come together, and find common ground. We had a very long talk one afternoon and reminded ourselves of the commitment we'd promised to each other when we were married. We're a team, we're good together, and we're in love and good marriages are always going to be work worth working for. We'll always have political and religious things that we may not completely agree with each other on, but that's life. People change. People grow together in lots of ways but maybe not every way and that's okay. Things are good right now between us and I hope we continue down this happy path.
Nicole's best friend, Abby, opened up a relative's Washington state beach house to us for a weekend earlier this month. It was a great opportunity to catch up with them, see their three toddlers, and of course relax on the beach. It was such a short trip that not a whole lot happened. We'd brought Chip with us and there was a mild scare when I accidentally dropped the poor dog down a short flight of stairs. He hit his head and bit his tongue but was ultimately fine. Whew! Immediately after that trip, we had to race back to Oregon to catch a Goo Goo Dolls concert in Bend. It was a great show! They played some new stuff that the crowd appeared to agree with and it was a pleasant evening. Of course we spent a day in Bend simply thrifting but all we were successful at finding were more music CDs to add to our growing collection. We're at about 400 CDs at this point which is pretty good considering we started at zero last November. Speaking of our CD collection, we've begun listening to them in the car on our drives which is a very nice nostalgia boost. CDs are fun and they really are a cool snapshot into the sound of a moment in history.
My summer home improvement project this year is to remodel our attached two-car garage. The previous owners bisected the garage by erecting a simple wall that shields from view anyone doing work in the laundry area. Then up against the "false wall" they constructed a makeshift workbench out of some old shelves and leftovers and it's been like that since. With this strange wall in place, you cannot fit a car into the garage. That's a huge thing for me since I've always wanted a garage to protect a car. So the plan is to completely remove the false wall, junk the old workbench, and build a new workbench from scratch that would go against the perimeter wall. Then all my tools would go up on pegboard above the bench. This would free up the entire garage so we could begin parking inside or even do car work. It was ambitious and also involved moving electrical stuff around too.
It started with finding plans for a workbench that I liked and simply putting the new workbench together using a bunch of 2x4s left over from the fence build a year previous. With the new simple workbench in place, I was able to move tools and junk to it which cleared out the old workbench. I then gave away the cabinets and wood that made up the old workbench to a coworker. Last up was to demolish the false wall. Thankfully, I was able to simply deconstruct it and save all the wood for future projects. With the wall gone, it really opened up the garage and it looks radically different to suddenly have so much space. I've still got electrical work to do (New lighting basically) but the hard stuff is over at this point. Soon we'll be enjoying the new garage and using it for it's intended purposes.