As New Yorkers, life wasn’t easy living in Brooklyn. With three little ones, life had lots of ups & downs. Sometimes, it seems, we had a lot more downs than ups; however, having a wonderful, though feisty wife and three adorable kids, made life seem more pleasurable.
My wife and I married in 1981. I love and loved her and vowed to make her happy. We had two main rules: No one was to walk out the door when things got tough, and the word divorce was not to be part of our vocabulary regardless of what we went through. We have stuck to both rules and of course added some other ones for a healthy marriage.
We first had a son and then two girls. The older daughter could not stop talking. What was my favorite song for her? Yakity Yak, & Don’t Talk Back! But it worked out OK since our son didn’t talk until almost five and the youngest only spoke gibberish, giving us a chance to only hear one non-stop conversation all day long. She spoke for all three and we were fine with that; having to say things only once, made life easier.
By the time our kids were all grown up-ages 1, 2, & 4, life was beginning to turn for the better. We had been living in the neighborhood of Bushwick, on a third floor in a 2 bedroom apt. Winters were cold there, especially when the landlord was visiting Puerto Rico while we froze our buttooshkies. We applied for brand-new housing & were really excited about moving out. But that was in the works. Meanwhile, life went on in Bushwick as usual.
Since I was the only one working, we normally only bought chicken as meat with having steak once in long while. I remember this one time I couldn’t wait to get home for some delicious steak. As soon as I got in I could smell something wasn’t right and it wasn’t the kids. I asked my wife what had happened to my juicy steak and she said, “I’m sorry, I was involved with the kids and the meat burned.” Well, we said grace and ate that hard, leathery steak. Since we had splurged on steaks the previous weekend, I’d figure my wife could redeem herself next day. Next day was filled with yum, yum, yum, as I could almost taste this onion-covered, mouth-watering steak! But as I opened the door…again? I couldn’t believe it! Could it happen twice in a row? I would soon learn the answer to that question. It was pretty much the same story as yesterday. More grace and more hard meat followed. I knew Wednesday would be much better, I mean, how hard could it be to rear three kids and cook a great meal? I’m sorry to say (and even sorrier to have eaten), but all seven steaks were crisped beyond recognition. We practically had to rely on dental records to identify them. Was it a plot? Were the kids intentionally misbehaving at din-din time? We had to do the only thing we had done before; go back to chicken!
Dealing with chicken gave my wife the ‘extra’ time needed to hone her craft in cooking. I wasn’t happy, but at least I could eat healthily and live to tell about it. I could also dream of what an unburned steak could look and taste like. I decided to do just that for the time being. I remember being disappointed over the steaks & mentioning it when visiting my parents. Although my dad laughed, when my wife was not around, he called me aside and told me it wasn’t right to mention that in public. I told him, “But seven???” He said, “OK, but that doesn’t make her feel right; it embarrasses her, she’s trying the best she can; that’s something you discuss only with her.” That advice, at that moment, was almost as hard to swallow as the steaks themselves, but I’m glad he gave it and glad I heeded it. Sometimes, we can have less arguments and less hurt feelings in a relationship when we zip our lips. “He that covers a transgression seeks love; but he that repeats a matter separates very good friends.” (Proverbs 17:9)
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