Marriage is a Gin & Soda in Business Class by Lucia Iglesias
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Photo Source: Wikimedia Commons
For Dom and Laura — 4. July, 2024
As I have only been married since January, I'm far from qualified to offer any advice on the subject. However, lack of experience has, unfortunately, never stopped me from making bold pronouncements before. Take, for instance, the time I was walking down an apparently deserted corridor in highschool and loudly declared to my friends, "I will never, ever have sex in my life!"—just as a rather formidable history teacher came down the stairs, tactfully pretending not to have heard me.
Chapter One: Everything for the Story
A friend recently had to spend two weeks in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit). The event made me all the more thankful for how calmly my son arrived in the world. As I remarked to my husband, "I'm so grateful the NICU wasn't in our story."
Of course, the NICU is the kind of creature that appears in the story uninvited. These woods are deep and dark and full of beasties. As a younger adventurer, I kept my guard up at all times, imagining monsters behind every tree. Now, however, I have a companion on the path beside me and I no longer keep my fists clenched in my pockets. We hold hands and walk side by side. Though the monsters still lurk, I know that when we face one, it will be good for the story.
After all, who would keep reading if it were all honeysuckle and talking foxes? We need something to thicken the plot. When we are beset by beasts, we fight shoulder to shoulder and come out stronger. Everything is for the story.
Chapter Two: A PhD in Me
I once heard the advice, "You should try to have a PhD in your spouse." Since I tend to take things too literally, I demurred. I do not have extra hours in the day to spend studying frisbee-golf and pretty math and Magic the Gathering.
However, if I take my literal-tinted glasses off for a moment, I can appreciate the truth of the statement. In fact, my husband has studied me so closely he knows certain sides of my character better than I know them myself. He sees what I choose not to see.
“They might be afraid of you,” he explained, when I was trying to understand an irritating encounter. My shoulders went up. My claws came out. “There’s nothing to be afraid of!” I wanted to shout. “I’ve never hurt anyone in my life!”
But I remember the beasts from Chapter One. If I turn to fight my husband, I leave us vulnerable to their attack. “Tell me more,” I said, sitting on my claws.
Chapter Three: Gin and Soda in Business Class
I once arrived at SFO for the trip home to Reykjavik only to discover that my departure flight had been canceled. The Delta desk agent rebooked me through a different airport and it was only as I was walking to the TSA line that I looked at my new ticket and discovered I had been issued a seat in Business Class.
This was my first (and likely last) experience in Business Class, so I indulged myself with two gin & sodas over supper because alcohol is taxed astronomically in Iceland and I only order cocktails on the one warm day of summer.
Although the gin was perfectly ordinary gin and the soda equally unremarkable in and of itself, I can still feel the weight of that drink in my hand and remember the clarity of the glass.
Marriage is that gin & soda in Business Class. I am still me; my husband is still himself; and yet, now that we have been admitted into this exclusive club, everything is slightly different and slightly better. The goodbye kiss in the morning is slightly better because he can say "Goodbye, wife." Buying second- and third-hand furniture is slightly better because I can say, "My husband will come pick it up at 11." Hanging laundry and washing dishes are better because the ring glitters on my left hand.
I have reading nooks all over the house—curated corners covered in pictures of scary grandmas and three-eyed owls. My husband tolerates these uncanny crannies because he knew what he was getting into when he married a witch. But much as I love my familiars, when I curl up to read, I often find myself in the old armchair beside the shelf of his most prized frisbees. My owls miss me, but I miss my husband more. When I can’t be near him, these frisbees, which are dusty with little flecks of his soul, have an inexorable hold over me.
So, is marriage the faerie dust that makes the mundane magical? Well, if there's anything I ought to have a PhD in by now, it's High Fantasy, and the one thing I know about magic is that you don't get something for nothing. The currency varies, but Belief and Will are usually worth more than gold in the economy of magic.
Epilogue
This “short congratulatory note” is now more than 800 words thick, so I had better slam my laptop shut before I use the word "I" again. Remember, you'll receive a lot of advice in the days ahead, but one thing we can learn from my formidable highschool history teacher is the value of tactfully deciding what you do or do not want to hear.
Travel light, adventurers!
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Lucia Iglesias left California and fell in love with the son of a potato farmer in Iceland. She lives in Reykjavik and loves every month except March. Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The Rumpus, Shimmer, Cosmic Roots and Eldritch Shores, the Bronzeville Bee, and other publications.
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