She's ready to move on

[Michael Mc C]

W was sick this a.m. Being Wednesday I have to go to the client site instead of working from my home office but told them I would be leaving early afternoon - thought I'd surprise her.

Was about 30 minutes from home and she called to tell me her older brother (step-brother), who she hasn't seen in the 20 years we've been together, was coming up to visit their Dad (bro is stationed in Germany). We knew he was out here, just didn't know when he was coming to visit.

Things got a little stressful during the conversation (for both of us) because of the short notice and the long list of things we had to do tonight. By the time we hung up, though, things were fairly smooth (I hate short notice on ANYthing). When I got home, her nephew was here unexpectedly as was one of S8's friends. Instead of dreading all of the unexpected happenings during the afternoon I walked inside, smiled at my wife, and said "Not bad for an afternoon that turned into a cluster f".

She laughed, gave me instructions about what was left for finishing dinner and she went to visit.

3 1/2 hours later, kids were just going to bed, and she came home. We sat together while she ate and she told me how good it was to see her brother - their dad is very sick. Her other brother and one of her sisters also visited. They had a really nice time and have made plans for everyone to get together at my house this weekend or the following.

I listened to her stories, joined in when I had something to add and just let her kind of run the show. We had a really nice evening considering how the afternoon had shaped up.

I know that I did the right thing by not doing "more of the same". I knew this is NOT how she wanted to get together with her brother. She wanted all of us to meet him. No sense adding more stress when she had no hand in creating the situation.

As we got up from the table and parted company she said "Hey, thank you for understanding."

That was nice to hear. She finally saw a difference in me, something unexpected.