While my mother was out of town recently, I recorded several episodes of Oprah for her. I don't watch Oprah, but mom loves her and I guess this is the final season of her talk show and mom claims that every episode is "sacred", anyway mom came over yesterday to watch some of the like 15 shows on my DVR and one of the episodes featured Jenny McCarthy who I have always liked since I first saw her on that MTV game show thing way back in the day. She is beautiful yes, but she is also really funny and silly and super smart and enlightened. So, I stopped what I was doing and joined mom on the couch to watch.
Jenny was promoting her new book, Love, Lust & Faking It: The Naked Truth About Sex, Lies, and True Romance and she talked about her split from Jim Carrey and her son and how she got started with Playboy. She was very funny throughout, but also she talked about how women can manipulate without even recognizing they are doing it. Like the silent treatment, we all do this one, and yet it can be very manipulating. I know that Smug-Hub and I both are fans of giving each other the silent treatment at times and we both hate it.
I haven't read the book and may or may not get around to it, but I was struck by one thing that she said. She said that people aren't honest when a relationship begins and that can lead to major problems later. When a man asks you if you like Soccer, and you say "oh yeah, I love Soccer" and then later down the road, throw a fit when he wants to attend another tournament of games that span a long weekend, you can't be surprised that he will not have a clear understanding of the problem. When he asks if you like Soccer, say "no and I hate pizza and I don't care for your mother either" only then will you have an even playing field for the relationship.
The other thing that she said was that people come into your life to teach you and once you learn the lesson, they may no longer need to be in your life. So, that begs the question, are relationships supposed to last? Are marriage's supposed to be for life? I personally hope so. I love my husband so much that I can't breathe when I think about not being with him anymore. If he is only in my life to teach me a lesson, I hope its one I never learn. I need him, I love him. He is a biggest supporter, my friend, my lover and my sounding board. He sees the real and true me and loves me anyway!
One of the biggest reasons that I hear of couples falling apart is money. Lack of money, too much money, one person making more money than the other, etc. I hate money. I wish that I had a bit more of it, so that I didn't have to worry about it as often, but I truly hate money. I believe that it is evil. Money makes the politicians untrustworthy. Money tears families apart. Money makes CEO's approve bad products. Money makes judges and cops dirty.
I hope for a day when I have enough money to make my ends meet, but I never want to have more than I need. I never want to be rich, to raise a rich spoiled brat of a child or to become one of those women who talk about their possessions in brand names (for example: Honey, bring me my Gucci bag! Instead of "hand me my purse").
I used to work for a man who had been raised by wealthy parents and who raised his children with money. He was spoiled and wanted what he wanted when he wanted it, so much so that he ran is company into the ground. His wife had a business from which she drew a salary, plus he gave her $2,000 a month as her "allowance" and she used the joint credit cards for gas and groceries. All the household bills were paid from the joint checking account, including the cleaning lady and the gardener. I have no idea what she did with two grand a month on top of her salary, but she was always talking about needing more. His children were sent money every month on top of the money they made working whatever job they had at the time. They sent him their bills for everything from new rugs to clothing.
I don't want that for myself or my family. I want only to be comfortable with what we have. I don't want to be woken in the night worrying about how one bill or another is going to be paid. I want to have just enough and never more than that...
great post!
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