The Pacifier

     I start out each morning by hopping in the shower and shaving my head. On the windowsill I have a mirror, a can of shaving gel and a razor. I shave my head before even stepping under the water, because after my head gets wet, I don’t get as close of a shave. Afterward I rinse my head under the water and start on my beard, which must be done as symmetrically as possible or the world would end.
     As detailed a shaver as I am, aside from getting dressed, I basically step out of the shower ready for the day. My morning shower is crucial. Without it I would sleepwalk until I got back in bed at night.
     The next morning I pull back the shower curtain to find my boyfriend, Carlos, has taken my can of shaving gel and razor and put them back into the cabinet. It drives me crazy but I say nothing.
     Instead, we enact this ritual every day. I take out my razor and gel, use them and leave them on the windowsill. He comes in after me, puts them back in the cabinet and takes his shower.
     Today I decided to get back at him by taking his soap scrubby things (loofas, they’re called?) off of the showercaddy and putting them in the cabinet. It was trivial, but felt good. I wonder if and when he will notice.
     It would be of no use to argue over something that always plays out the same. I will say that I use those things every day, why put them away? He will say he does not want to see anything out on the windowsill and remind me I agreed to do this before we moved in together. I will say, yeah, and you also said you wouldn’t nag me about stupid stuff like this back then, so we’re even.
     This is how two starkly different people cohabitate. He’s the anal one who wants our home to look like no one lives in it and I’m the careless one who let’s things lay wherever they may fall. Yet, I am groomed to the millimeter and he lets his sideburns grow wild until I am forced, yes forced damn it, to sit him down and trim them. My reasoning is, well, I’m the one who has to look at him after all.

     A lesbian couple whom I refer to as “our lesbians” took us out to dinner at our favorite restaurant recently and they declared what they and Paula Abdul have long known: opposites attract. They know this because they mirror our differences in many ways.
     One is a neat freak, while the other is not. One is private about what information she will share with friends while the other deems no subject off limit. One will eat anything while the other is exasperatingly picky.
     Upon discussing this over pasta, I wonder how true it is that opposites attract. And if it is true, why is it true? The tone of the whole idea makes it sound like a natural, fated, unexplainable mismatch that works out joyful for everyone, like how cow shit fertilizes soil for new spring trees to grow or how the miraculous beauty of childbirth is worth the hemorrhoids that follow.
     I can’t say I find all the ways Carlos is opposite me all that “magnetic pull”ish. In my mind, I pictured myself dating, oh I don’t know… someone with a big mouth who orders his burgers without mustard or onions and doesn’t see the point in making the bed.
     Instead, I am with someone who asks me to please move as little as possible while I sleep so as to not mess up the sheets; someone who makes the bed while I am still in it. Instead, we engage in the silent loofa/shaving gel battle and make it work.
     In doing this, how much should a couple compromise their feelings? How much are stubborn people supposed to venture over to the other’s side before they feel like their own needs don’t matter any more? Is this the healthy thing to do or will we regret it one day and blame each other? When does the art of compromise become the art of delaying the inevitable?
     These are the questions I ask myself when I rush to wash the dishes. It’s scary to hear friends say they had a boyfriend or girlfriend for like 5 years, but they ended it and now it is over. Ended it? What? Why would you do that? Carlos and I have been together for 3 years now. Am I to believe it possible that in just 2 years time things could change so drastically that we could end our relationship? I just can’t even imagine it. Not us.

     I clearly remember the day my parents renewed their vows. My mom was between the weight she gained when I was born and the weight she would gain after my little sister was born, so she was thin and beautiful in her white dress. Her hair was up with a curly tendril dangling on each side of her face. My dad wore a white dress shirt, gray slacks and a matching tie. It was the most dressed up I have ever seen my lumber mill-working father.
     The head priest at my Catholic school performed the ceremony, the same priest who would later teach my class sex education, much to our confusion. They were married in a small, private room that was upstairs from where masses were held. To the left of my parents were their best friends at the time. To the right of my parents were me and my sisters, sitting on a pew and watching. My little sister, Julie, was less than a year old, so that would have made me around 6 and my older sister, Angie, around 13.
     Whenever a time comes when everyone is supposed to remain reverently quiet my first impulse has always been to laugh. It’s like an allergic reaction when instead of breaking out in hives, I break out in giggles.
     Growing up, this was most often while in church. Anyone who has ever gone to a Catholic mass knows not only is it mind numbingly dull, but those in attendance are expected to remain absolutely silent until the designated recite and response portion of the show.
     At 27 years of age, I still have to think of ancient Greek warriors pillaging villages, grabbing infants and swinging them by the feet until they crush their skulls into stone walls, or something equally as gruesome, so as to not start laughing during prayer. There can be no doubt, if someone invites me to dinner, asks everyone to join hands and bow their heads while they say grace, I am picturing sacks of puppies being dumped in the river until I hear “amen.”
     When my mom and dad renewed their vows, this was not necessary- at first. I was in love with the whole idea. Watching them, my mom in a white dress and my dad out of a baseball cap, was enough to keep me captivated.
     Until I started uncontrollably farting. I don’t know what triggered it, but to make matters worse, pews are usually made of wood, so those farts resonated. Well everyone laughed and attempted to recompose themselves. My mom told me to stop laughing and I tried. Honest, I tried.
     My dad’s best friend, however, could not stop laughing. His fat face turned red and was about to turn blue, he held his breath so hard trying not to laugh. This made me laugh more and in turn, keep farting. Finally, I had to wait outside so they could finish the ceremony.
     Perhaps, they should not have. My parents were just not meant to be together. They fought more and more over the next 12 or so years and when things became really heated I would step in. I’d go to my dad and talk him down, then go to my mom and do the same. I somehow always knew the right thing to say to make them forget they drove each other nuts, and remember they loved each other.
     When I was 18 I moved away to college. Six months later my parents separated after 28 years of marriage and deep down I felt it was my fault. I wasn’t there to patch things up, to play mediator and placate the situation.
     I had thought it better for everyone if they just got a divorce for some time by then, but I did everything I could to keep them at peace. It is what I thought was right because I could not stand to see them angry with each other.
     Maybe, though, just maybe, if I had just sat put that wedding day and farted my little heart out, they couldn’t have finished the ceremony and none of that would have been necessary.

     When my parents divorced I swore that I would never be like them. I swore I would never compromise my feelings for the sake of staying together and that I would never carry the hope to stay with someone forever.
Were my mom and dad opposites who attracted each other or just not in love enough?
     If a couple can be together 28 years and then suddenly decide, “You know what? I’m over this,” what hope is there for me? Am I placating a situation that will one day just make the fallout all the more painful?
     Or is this merely the way it is done, what every couple has to do, and the lucky ones just happen to last?