I’m going to put it as simply as I can; my wife and I found each other again, after several years. It’s better than that, really. We’ve learned how to talk to each other to find peace with one another, rather than to beat the other. We’ve learned how to listen and to work things out so we can be happy together. I’m so grateful, I find it difficult to put into words. After 3,000,000 words on this blog, I’ve never been so happy and stuck for words to describe it. It is love and joy and relief, and it is good.

My wife and I spoke yesterday morning after I’d been at the office a while. We both expressed what a wonderful evening we had the night before. It was a perfect evening together that ended in us watching our favorite show, holding hands and falling asleep on the couch. My wife asked how we could possibly keep this going at this pace without burning out (now, there’s a good context and a bad context to that question – her context was delivered in the good way – as in, “Please, Dear God in Heaven, how can we keep this going because it’s awesome?”). Thankfully, I’d already had the same thought and fear and meditated on it thoroughly. I had answers. I know what we have today is doable, and I am freaking stoked about it.

[As a rule, I refuse to use the work “sustainable” outside of my conversations with my wife who “gets me”, because it’s generally a fair bet a person who uses that word in a sentence has no idea what they’re talking about.]

Anyway, the evening before, I’d asked my wife if she’d ride the tandem with me on Tuesday night. She was working from home and attending one of my daughter’s rare early tennis matches so I had a feeling she’d ride Tuesday night, but I wanted to really ride with her. Not just on singles. My wife said she’d like to tandem during a phone call early Tuesday afternoon, and so it was.

The main A/A-Elite mixed group went off first, then we followed a minute later. We flew going with the headwind and did well north and south, but struggled in the headwind, relying on Big Joe and Dave to handle some of the up front duty. On the second mile, something occurred to me and I decided to share it with my wife rather than risk forgetting it – one more reason we’re going to make what we have last. To keep it simple, we’ve never had anything resembling what we’ve built over the last few months. Best of all, we’ve made it safe for each other to express that love however we feel it. The passion is real and it is fantastic… but that can also be terrifically horrifying in that, the general thinking is; if it burns hot, it burns fast… then burns out. And so, my thought that hadn’t occurred earlier was this; we’ve learned to talk to each other (and listen, my wife interjected) in a way we never have before. The way we talk and listen is set up to help us keep this alive and well. It was a significant point.

Anyway, we had a fantastic ride, the four of us and Jess and I headed home afterward to a wonderful dinner of chicken and gnocchi soup – leftovers from dinner the night before when my daughter made the soup from scratch. It was another wonderful evening together. It’s actually been a stretch of great days and evenings. We’ve needed this for a long time.

And a note to my riding buddies who read this page: I’ve been a little too selfish when it comes to what I want to do and how that relates to my marriage. I have to even things out a little bit with her before I find my new normal. I’ll be the same rider, just a little less self-centered. Thanks in advance for your patience while we get this sorted.