So, Do You Like ... Stuff?

I fell for my wife because she is beautiful and then I fell in love with her because she is thoughtful, kind, amazing, hard-working, principled … lots of adjectives that are good. Also because we share so many interests. Seriously, we are so darn compatible . It’s something I didn’t put much stock into while being lured by her magnetic force of attraction—I would have married her on the spot after our first date without any thought as to how she takes her coffee. But every day that passes I realize more and more just how soulmate-y we truly are. We find the same things funny, first and foremost. We share the same faith, which is kind of important. We come from similar backgrounds and share the same values, and therefore have matching parenting strategies. We express the same level of indignation at things like genetically modified organisms and Sheriff Joe Arpaio. And yes, we take our coffees the same—light cream, no sugar—and become equally frustrated when the dunderheads at Dunki...

Note: This column appears in the 9/29 issue of The Glendale Star and the 9/30 issue of the Peoria Times I have done a lot of dumb things around the house. I don’t like to brag, but it’s kind of my thing. I’ve put stuff together backwards. I once wiped down our stainless steel refrigerator with a damp paper towel almost immediately after my wife told me not to do exactly that. I have placed items on the ledge of our upstairs hallway, thinking to myself, “I really shouldn’t put this here,” and then knocked it off the ledge later after forgetting it was there. I have spilled water on our laptop computer. I’ve hung pictures on the wall that have fallen down in the middle of the night and scared us half to death. Last year, while putting up Christmas lights and assuring my wife I’d be careful, I carried our ladder out of the garage, but it got caught in the hanging garage door string and caused the unhinged garage door to slam down with the force of a hundred stampeding horses, right in fro...