Unlikely Couples

Today is somewhat of an "anniversary" for me an my husband.  Well, not April 18, exactly.  But it's a special day to be sure because this is the 24th annual TAX SEASON we've survived as a couple.  My husband is the brilliant CPA and works diligently every year to bring home the bacon, and I am the one who spends it. We've been together for almost 28 years if you include college and all our friends will tell you that we are probably an unlikely pair if first impressions mean anything.  He is quiet and reserved where I am talkative and outgoing.  He is dignified and sensible where I am silly and enjoy making a fool out of myself.  He is very steady and predictable, but I have mood swings that make me feel animated and excited one day, and emotional and weepy the next.  He is the Yin to my Yang.  We completely balance each other out.  You would think he would get frustrated having to deal with an unbalanced character like me (this is where a friend would say, "Oh, don't be ridiculous!") but my tendency to overreact when he will chill makes us such a good match.  We're like a chocolate and vanilla swirl ice cream cone. 

I have found that we aren't the only ones who are attracted to opposites.  I love to watch the Ellen Degeneres show and she plays her favorite videos of animals playing or snuggling together.  Quite often they are completely different species!  The absolute STRANGEST I've seen is the one in this blog with the cat and the dolphin.  Think about this when you watch it.  These are creatures that would NEVER encounter each other in their natural habitat.  Yet they are doing their best to embrace each other as if they are long-lost friends.  The cat is showing affection with head butts and face wiping and the dolphin eagerly comes back for more.  I also have to comment that this cat is quite comfortable on a boat which in itself is extraordinary because just getting my cats into a car requires crates or sedatives, maybe even both.

So how do we explain this strange attraction?  Is it chemistry?  Does the cat smell the dolphin and think, "Mmmm....fish breath?"  Does the dolphin smell the cat and think, "Here's an hors d'oeuvre I've never tried..."  I don't think so.  They don't look like they want to eat each others faces like some teenagers I see when they first experience a chemical attraction.

Is it me or is this an odd pair?

So we celebrate today, the first day tax season is over, because he has been working incredibly long hours for months.  And I know it could be a lot worse--there are wives whose husbands travel for a living, have on-call jobs and disappear at a moment's notice, or are deployed now protecting our country.  My hats off to you, ladies!!  But I chose a man who will come home every night, dog-tired, but he's there, grasping the remote control in his hand as he drifts off to sleep on the couch.  We like this time of year because we have to "reconnect" and this is just another way of saying I don't choose the reality shows anymore and he gets to catch up on all those "This Old House" episodes he recorded.  Ho hum.  It's okay.  Somewhere in that humdrum we find the balance again and will do the human version of the cat/dolphin greeting and life is good.