I love the rock polisher analogy, life does throw us around and wear us down around the edges. It's nice to think we come out "polished" from the experience.
I speak as someone who did resurrect the old marriage and make it shiny and pretty again. It can happen. Someone once said to me that a long marriage is a process of falling in and out of love over and over. That may be true. I don't know if it is supposed to happen that way, but for us it has happened that way.
I see you and BBJ and so many others on this board struggling with life, young kids, unhappy marriages, sick parents, and jobs, and I remember how unhappy I felt when my kids were young. (I haven't really experienced the sick parents part yet, though.) Now that my kids are pretty much grown, I look back and think those were very happy times. I just didn't realize how much I enjoyed all the things we did -- the ballet classes and recitals, the cookie baking, homework, school projects, trips to the beach. When they were going on, they were all torture (except the ballet stuff, I knew I loved that.) And as we look back, those were good times for my husband too. After all, we were young and strong.
Where am I going with this? I think there is value there. I could have a new husband, or a different lover, and we would enjoy dinners out, and vacations, and evenings at home. But somehow being with that person who experienced it all with me is a good thing. And I have found that when I reject him my husband looks unattractive, and when I am loving to him him shines brightly and looks handsome. It took me forever, but I do think the butter is on this side of the bread. A long marriage and intact family is a wonderful thing, and it is worth the work to create it.
