Tonight was date night for my husband and I.

It started off with a beautiful dinner at Mallard Cottage, followed by a soul sucking trip to the mall to buy him some new work clothes, and it all ended with a huge fight and me walking home alone in the snow.

A wise friend, who’s been married for around 30 years now, once told us to always expect conflict when going on the first date you’ve had in a while. All the under-stuff gurgles up and rears its ugly head: unresolved conflicts, hurt feelings. All the monsters that were silenced and suppressed over all the weeks of parenting and managing the day after day after day finally surface.

We could have braced ourselves with armour and sharp swords. We could and built up a huge brick wall against the impending conflict. We could have banded together to crush the onslaught of unresolved issues coming our way. Or better yet, we could have let the onslaught wash over us like a dam-break and trusted each other to get through it.

Then perhaps, just perhaps, we would have been able to laugh at ourselves while it was happening.

“Look at poor us doing that thing we SO expected.”

“I know! But we aren’t fooled. We KNEW it was coming.”

“Yeah! We can face it all together!”

That would have been nice.

But no – we let it overpower us. Much different words were said. We let ourselves get overwhelmed with anger and hurt, and I chose to walk home alone in the cold and the snow.

I blame it on our trip to the mall.

Mostly.

But really, we just need to face the monsters.

Together.