You don't fight?

J and I don't fight.

A friend once asked me, "How in the world do you and J never fight!?"

I don't know. I guess for me, it's like, how in the world could we? I love him too much to want to hurt him in any way, which would include fighting.

Don't get me wrong, we've certainly had disagreements. I've been annoyed and sighed a little too loudly or rolled my eyes. But we've never raised our voices to one another.We've never gone to bed unhappy with the other.

We just don't. There's no secret or magic to it all. We're just on the same page for all the important stuff (and some of it took some give and take from each of us to get there). And all the little stuff, well, it's just not important.

We respect each other. We love each other. Which makes it all easy. I mean, if he says x, and I say y, we can typically conclude with z and both be happy. But if not, if x is really important to him, and y isn't really at all important to me, then we go with x, and vice versa.

For instance on a very minor level, it's super important to me that we purchase free-range chicken and grass-fed beef, and preferably local. J doesn't care what kind of meat we eat. So obviously we go with what I want. I prefer gluten-free tortillas, though occasionally I'll go with sprouted whole grain. But if we are making chicken enchiladas, we have corn tortillas because J just won't budge on that one. And that's okay. We compromise in some areas. But really, the areas we are making compromises are the small things, so it just doesn't seem like a big deal.

I don't know. It's funny. The adults around me were always fighting while I was growing up. People yelling was the norm. I figured that's how I'd end up too if I were ever in a relationship. But I'm not. J is just so freaking calm, it's hard not to be as calm and stress-free as him. He doesn't sweat the small things, and I've definitely benefited from taking a page from that book.

So unless it's something that I can seriously say will make an impact on our lives 20 years from now, or be extremely important to us 20 years from now, I let it go. It's just not worth the fight.