Buy the Stinking Roses
If your family is like ours, you have a budget and try to stick to it. Maybe you can’t afford to go out for a nice dinner every date night. Megan and I are in a similar boat. That doesn’t mean that we should just drop date night entirely. Sometimes we do go out for a sit-down dinner; but, more often than not, we just try to make Saturday night a time for intentional intimacy.
Last night was a good example of this. We’ve had two occasions to eat out at sit-down restaurants recently and had pizza yesterday after a long workweek. So Megan made something tasty from scratch and we had a pleasant dinner at our dining room table, not in front of the TV. Although there is nothing wrong with a TV dinner, we need that time of intentional mental and emotional intimacy to talk and enjoy each other’s company.
We followed up dinner with several rounds of Uno. We are both competitive, so our conversation lagged while we played. Here we practiced intimacy through time and attention. We were both engaged and focused on the game, which makes it more fun for the other. We weren’t on our phones or letting ourselves be distracted by all the other things going on in our lives. We just played a simple game together, which eventually led back to a conversation.
In general, we don’t keep a ton of sweets around the house, especially during Lent. So when Megan said that she would love some cookie dough, I took the opportunity to add to the specialness of the evening. We ran to the local grocery and, while she was walking to the back for the sweets, I stopped and grabbed a half-dozen roses. They’re nothing fancy, just some simple red roses from our local grocery store for $7. She was thrilled. To be honest, her reaction was not that much less excited than when I got her a rose arrangement at a local florist for her birthday that cost $70.
How quickly can we burn through $7? Coffee, soda, snacks, beer, etc. many of us might spend $7 on our way to or from work without hardly thinking about it. Now if it’s a choice between feeding your kids and buying roses, then I’m not saying to neglect your kids. But if you have some discretionary funds, treat your spouse to something special every now and then. When you stop for that coffee, skip the snacks and buy a rose or your wife’s favorite treat.
There are so many little, inexpensive things that we men can do to show our love and affection. When we can so easily spend time and money on trivial things, we really don’t have an excuse to not spend time and money on our wives. Buy the stinking roses! God bless you all and your marriages.
