Degrees of love

As Chuck, my perpetual thermostat adversary, walked through the living room, I could see he realized that I had tampered with the thermostat setting. He quickly glanced at the Honeywell unit on the wall.

“Chuck, I lowered the temperature to 74 on the thermostat,” I confessed.

“I know, and I raised it a degree to 75.”

“What??? Now I know why I’m practically melting in here,” I exclaimed, wiping my brow with a bit of drama.

The truth is, I wasn’t sweating, but it was our usual back-and-forth banter about who controls the thermostat.

Chuck says that as you get older, you get colder. My reply is that women have unique internal thermostats. Menopause breaks them, and they cannot be controlled or replaced.

Chuck cannot understand why I like a light blanket covering me. I want to be cool enough to need a blanket. He says that’s an oxymoron. I say it is my being comfortable.

And then we laugh.

Once in a while, I tend to make a sound that lets Chuck know that he got too close to the car in front of us. He also might see me using the invisible brake on my side of the car.

“Janet, would you rather drive?”

“No, Chuck, I’m trying to save you from feeling guilty if we have an accident, and I would get hurt.”

“Janet, thank you. You are so thoughtful.”

And then we laugh.

If anything has strengthened our marriage, it is that we have learned to laugh with each other, never at each other.

You’ve heard of the six degrees of separation Kevin Bacon hypothesis … now we bring you the one degree of Leonards! (Photo provided by Janet Hart Leonard)

Love is patient and kind. 1 Corinthians 13:4 NLT

Patience and kindness are critical to a strong marriage and, yes, a happy marriage. In the fifth verse, it says, love is not rude.

Clever but harsh words are heard by the heart. A careless remark that puts down a spouse is never funny. NEVER.

Constant ridicule in a relationship will destroy the love a couple once knew. Comments like, “I was just kidding,” do not lessen the hurt. The hurt can be hidden for only so long. “You can’t take a joke” is a gaslighting attempt to blame the other person.

I’m no therapist or counselor, but I’ve lived long enough to see the harm that hurtful words can do.

Critical words are like a hatchet that slowly chops down a loving relationship. If a young person ever notices that the person they are falling in love with uses a hatchet (harsh words), I plead for them to run away. They may hide the hatchet for a while, but it will show up again and do even more harm because the one holding the hatchet thinks they can get away with using it.

I’ve never heard harsh words come from Chuck Leonard. I’m not saying he never has thought of them … and he might have reason to do so.

One Sunday morning, as I was leaving the house, I pushed the garage door opener inside the garage at the same time I pushed the liftgate button on my key fob instead of the unlock button. Yes, I did it. The liftgate jammed into the garage door, and the motor kept trying to lift the big garage door.

I ran inside the house and was babbling hysterically.

“Chuck, I did something stupid.” I ran back outside.

My ever-so-kind husband took my keys, got in my car, and moved it forward. The garage door motor died a quick death. Wrapping his arms around his frantic wife, he whispered, “Honey, it can be fixed.” I didn’t think I could love that man more than I already did. I was wrong. At that moment, I loved him more.

Chuck Leonard is patient and kind. He could have said what I was thinking: “Janet, how could you have done such a stupid thing?” He knew what my heart needed to hear, “Janet, I will always love you even if you do what you just did.”

Now, about that thermostat: I just raised it to where he likes it. I don’t need the blanket; I’ve got Chuck’s love to keep me warm.

He can point to the new garage door motor if he ever needs to remind me how much he loves me. “There, Janet, is how much I love you.”

And then we will laugh.

Janet Hart Leonard can be contacted at janethartleonard@gmail.com or followed on Facebook or Instagram (@janethartleonard). Visit janethartleonard.com.