Showing Appreciation

I recently had a discussion with someone I care a great deal about. It involved feeling and showing appreciation. Needless to say, being your typical male the discussion rotated around me and my need to feel appreciated. Half way through this discussion, the other half of this conversation asked me if I appreciated her and if I did, how was I showing it? Being of a one track mind, these questions kind of threw me and my rant pretty much devolved into "Uh, Um, Duh."

So now, in the bright sunlight of a brand new day I am pondering what she asked. Forgetting the rightness or wrongness of my feelings of not being appreciated (Prolly wrong), do I appreciate her and everything she does for me and if I do, do I show it?

First part first, do I appreciate her and everything she does? That one is easy. I grew up very poor and even though we always made do and were happy, there was really never enough of anything. I remember my brother coming home from school, carefully washing his one suit of clothes and hanging them out to dry so he'd have clothes for school the next day. I remember when a big bowl of Mac and Cheese wasn't the side dish, it was the whole meal. Like my brother, Benjamin, I remember working in sweltering heat, picking veggies and such so that we'd have food to eat. So I remember wanting and needing everything.

Now, I can open up my dresser or trunk and find drawers full of clean new clothes. I have shoes for all occasions that aren't the $9.00 Wal-Mart shoes that might last a month. I open up my refrigerator and freezer and see weeks of food, veggies and even desserts stocked up. I wake up in the mornings and can make a cup of high quality coffee and sit at my high speed computer surfing the internet. Most importantly of all, I go bed beside and wake up beside the most amazing woman in the world. So, in answer to the first question, Yes I appreciate her very very much. More than words can ever express.

Now on to the second, much trickier question. Do I tell and show her everyday how much I appreciate her. Do I express my amazement that she has stayed with me all these years when God and my friends know I am not easy to live with. Do I show her the awe and gratitude I feel at all of her hard work in keeping us fed and with a roof over our heads? Do I give her all the thanks and love she deserves for putting up with all she puts up with?

Being typically male, my first impulse is to say "Of course I do." Being a fairly intelligent and mostly honest person, the official answer is "Probably not." She works so hard and puts up with so much grife from me and from her job. She comes home exhausted, hot and sore everyday. I think that she deserves so much more appreciation than I give her.

So, starting today, I make this resolution in front of God and all my readers. (You two know who you are) I will do everything in my power to make her understand just how grateful I am for everything she does. I will do my best to quit being so damned whiny all the time and care more about her. She deserves all of that and more.