JohnActon posted:Back in Dec 84 I traded some guns for an enormous Flyer collection, on my fourth pickup load the wife came to the back door and shouted down to me at the garage door. "The trains go or I go!" I responded, " So sorry you feel that way." We divorced two months later. We went to TCA meets through out the southeast the whole time we were dating ten years earlier and she seemed to like the trains. Once we married she lost all interest in the trains. J
I emphasized that last line for effect. If I had a nickel for every guy who had the same thing happen.
I'm now convinced that when women tell you that you want to be honest and open with them, they really mean they want t know all the stuff they'll have to make you change once you get married. I saw so many friends in re-enacting circles who left the hobby within months of getting married (many of whom met their wives at such events or they were in the hobby after meeting them). It got to a point that if a pal in that hobby got married, I'd tell him that when she forced him out of the hobby, to give me a call. Sad part was, I was right at least 75% of the time. Anyone I knew in the hobby who was married got into after he had been married.
My wife tried it, too. I was ready, and deep inside I'd never been so scared, when she started the, "You need to think of what's important" talk (woman speak for, "I call the shots now for everything"), I walked over to the phone, grabbed the phone book, handed it to her and said, "I understand compromise is something I'll need to learn, but you knew this is who I am. If that's not acceptable, you made a huge mistake in getting married to me. I'm sure there's plenty of lawyers in there who can help you if you want out." Inside, I was just shy of having a heart attack I was so scared.
Now, I realize she was testing me. Things are totally different now, and we've adapted well to one another. She even pointed stuff out to me in a hobby shop recently.
But at first? That could have been me as well. If she'd grabbed that phone book and started making calls, I'd miss her horribly today. But it still would have been the right thing for me, even if she had.
Women who demand their man changes everything make me sick. If a guy did that to a woman (and also blocking her from her friends and family, things I've seen countless times in newly-married pals), we'd call that abuse. I'm not saying they all do that, but I've seen it so many times...
