All You Need Is Love (but a glass of wine helps!)

It’s amazing what a hug, a ready ear and some gently encouraging words can do. Especially when they’re all from your husband and accompanied by a glass of wine. For various reasons, I had a horrible day yesterday. We all have them; those days where nothing seems to go right and you’re thwarted at every turn, every email, every phone call. One of those things you can deal with but when they all start piling up on top of each other, you start to crumble. I won’t go into the reasons, suffice to say that by the end of the day I felt very fragile. The Husband came home as the printer was playing up and refusing to print the last-minute job I had been forced, through some of the unfortunate incidents of the day, to complete. I was crouching in the half-light – I had been so focused on getting the job done so I could finish for the day that I hadn’t even noticed that I couldn’t see properly – as he came in to say hello, bringing with him the stench of smelly feet (thick socks + safety boots + heat really aren’t a particularly nice combination). Unfortunately, by that time, I really was not in the best of moods and I snapped at him. I was feeling stressed and the assault on my senses was simply too much. He walked into the bedroom without saying a word and left me to finish what I was doing. Eventually I coaxed the printer into doing what it was supposed to and I was able to pack everything away and slump on the sofa, utterly drained by the events of the day.


The Husband re-emerged, showered and smelling fresh, and immediately, silently, went into the kitchen. I thought that he was cross with me for having shouted at him when he only wanted to help but when I looked round at what he was doing, he had brought out two wine glasses and was in the process of pouring a generous glass of deep red liquid, accompanied by that wonderful glugging sound. He walked over to the sofa upon which I lay half comatose, passed me a glass, let me take a sip, then hugged me. Only then did he ask me what was wrong. Now, don’t get me wrong, like any man he can sometimes get it completely wrong, misread the signals and offer the opposite to what I want and need, but yesterday he saved the day. I poured out everything that had gone wrong and he listened. And listened. And listened. Which was exactly what I needed. He didn’t try to fix anything – the usual male response – he just listened and offered understanding noises and nods of the head. And just like that, wine glass in hand, comfortably snuggled up to The Husband, Grand Designs Revisited on the telly (I don’t know what it is about that show, but I always find it incredibly soothing), I began to feel a whole lot better. Nothing seemed too insurmountable, too terrible, too important.

And that’s when you realise how much you lean on each other when you’re thousands of miles away from home. We’ve only been here a couple of months – not long enough to be friendly with anyone enough to just pick up the phone and unload my day onto them. All our closest friends and our family are on other continents. That can sometimes be hard but as long as The Husband and I have each other, we will never feel lonely and we will always be okay.