The Fight

I pay the bills at our house. That does not mean that the bills are all paid with my income. It simple means; I balance the checkbook, manipulate the funds, and write out the checks.

This has not always been the case. For our first several years of marriage, the delightful (tad bit of sarcasm today) Mr J paid all of the bills. He had to know exactly where every penny was going.

This was cool with me as it freed up a lot of stress on my end. We were beans and rice poor. A good day was having enough funds at the end of the day to be able to add some meat to the meal.

Someone once told me that you know you are poor when you are making “wish” sandwiches for lunch. As in, I wish I had some meat to put between theses slices of bread.

Well, we were wish sandwich poor. Those were good times though. We were both starting from scratch. No home, no furniture, no dishes, etc…

But what we lacked in material wealth, we made up for in raw determination… grit.

… And the ability to entertain ourselves on the cheap. *insert sex… lots and lots of sex*

As the years rolled on, we pulled ourselves up; bought a little home, some decent furniture, even some pots and pans.

It is almost sad to make enough money that you can afford alternative types of entertainment.  I yearn for the days when our choices consisted of SEX… and SEX. Shall we do it in the shower or on the floor? The bed or the neighbors shop? (That was one of our favorite places… hahaha) If he only knew what was done on his tool bench!

Back to the bills…

One day Mr J decided that I should pay the bills. Seemed logical to me as I am crazy about filing, ledger sheets, balancing acts, etc.

Much to my dismay, I quickly learned that the love of my life was doing a horrible job with our finances. Bills were always paid after the due date, just squeaking by before cut-off dates.  *cringe*

This was traumatic! We had the money…

So I jumped in, rearranged payment dates and all was good in my world again.

UNTIL… I missed a car payment. It was complete over-sight.

Mr J came down hard on me… I remember the day as if it were yesterday. October 19th 2002. We were driving on the 610 Loop,

 

I was going thru a stack of mail and stumbled on a late notice. Oh Shit!

Of course, I blurted out the “Oh Shit” part, which almost had Mr J running into the back of another car. I don’t curse in real life unless I am angry, scared, or completely frustrated…

(Well, there is the occasional cursing during wild sex, but that is more of an uncontrollable moaned slippage)

Back to the missed car note: I quickly explained my miscue to my hopefully sympathetic hubby. Why do I always find the need to be so completely honest with this man? I could have tucked the notice in my purse, paid the bill and he would have been none the wiser.

Dear Mr. J decided to ream me about my procrastination for what seemed hours. I think he brought up every time I let the laundry pile up, to one time a month before that I went to bed without doing the dinner dishes. And when was the last time I actually cleaned the fish aquarium? He then turned to me and said, “If you are going to be so lazy about the bills, I will just start paying them again myself!”

I snapped… had a total tourettes moment. I glared at him and said (Yes, this is a quote. No, I am not proud of my mouth.) “You? You want to come down on me for the way I pay the bills? You butt-fucked the bills!”

*Side note ~ When googling for pictures of someone with their mouth opened, as in jaw-dropping, you will find way too many pictures of inflatable women.*

His jaw dropped. We did not say a word to each other the rest of the day. Which is very rough because I never seem to stop jabbering.

Silence is a scary thing after an argument. It leaves you with too much to think about.

The next day Mr J told me that my out-burst may have saved our marriage. He was proud of me for sticking up for myself and had to bite a hole in the side of his mouth to keep from laughing at my B-effing the bills comment.

To this day he will ask me if a bill has been paid or are we butt-fucking them this month?