Date Night!

I look forward to my little "date nights" with my wife.  A quiet dinner alone, a movie, an afternoon at the museum...Anything as an escape from the day to day life.

But, even though we call them "dates," they're not really the same as the dates we used to have.  For instance, we used to be that couple that would annoy the wait staff at a restaurant.  "Oh, we're sorry!  We've just been sitting here talking for twenty minutes and haven't even picked up the menu..."  Now, we have heard almost everything that we have to say.  And, frankly, we are just so excited to eat a meal without the usual child interruptions (spilled chocolate milk, arguments about who gets to use what color crayon to help the "pirate through the maze to find the treasure chest full of chicken nuggets," or the littlest one with the constant desire to move from the high chair to the "big boy chair" and back).  We just want to get our food and eat in silence.  Newly dating couples want someone to talk to because they are always alone, and married couples just want a meal where everyone will just shut the hell up.  And, of course, to people who are not married in the restaurant, we sound like we are fighting.  But in reality, that's just how married couples learn to communicate; in loud, quick statements. 

"Get the shrimp!  'Cause I'm getting the steak!" 
"I am getting the shrimp!"
"Okay!"

And what we do is also so different from when we were dating.  Movie selection is not as compromising as it once was.  I used to walk into a chick flick without hesitation while holding her hand.  From our courting process to even early into our marriage, I saw "Sex and The City," "Valentine's Day," and "He's Just Not That Into You."  She also went to see "Smoking Aces," "True Grit" and "Shoot 'Em Up."  We didn't care what we saw just as long as we were together.  Going to the movie now takes too much time and preparation to plead your case on why your selection is better that theirs.  It seems now we don't go to the movies as much, anyways.  Probably, because we don't want to sit alone in different theatres...

Movies are an easy date for married couples with children, though.  Two hours, in and out.  Get home, pay the babysitter, put them to bed, date's over.  Time is a huge factor.  You can't go to anything over two hours, for fear that the babysitter will call with the message that a child is sick...or the dog is on fire...or that the police were very polite.  So, that eliminates a lot of concerts, amusement parks, and dancing at night clubs (however, that last one is completely okay with Gina after she witnessed my latest performance on "Just Dance" for the Wii.  It's nice to be able to see what you look like while dancing to Katy Perry's "Hot and Cold" before taking it out to dance floor).

Really, anything without kids can turn into your own little mini-date.  The fifteen minutes alone before they wake up as you drink a cup of coffee together.  The three minutes that they are in the bathroom and you can hold hands on the sofa.  Or the twenty seconds that you get when your kids are "hiding" behind the curtain in the next room while you just look at each other with a half-delirious, half-numb gaze.  Basically, any period of time at all without the children in the room with your spouse is a "date."  Or at least you have to tell yourselves that, or else you may go months without having one.

It's not that I don't love my kids.  I love them unconditionally.  I would jump in front of a bullet for them.  And they love me and my wife just as much as we love them.  They just don't realize that the way that they show it is really annoying!  And it destroys our stability a little bit each day, every day, all day long.  And, so, if you don't take little, tiny breaks from them, you'll eventually snap.  You'll have that moment when your six year old daughter won't eat dinner and you'll explode into saying, "You will eat what I made!  Because eating is one of the basic fundamentals of living.  So, if you don't eat, you will die!  And I am not explaining to SRS that you died because you don't like red peppers in your spaghetti! They will put me in jail!"

So, tonight, is date night with Gina.  As is every night after the tiny people in our house fall asleep.  And our date night is:  ice cream, a syndicated episode of the office, and her falling asleep on my lap as I play "Angry Birds."  And I know what you're thinking: "You could cut the romance in the air with a knife..."  But I love our married "date" nights even more than our dating years.  Because, unlike those dates, I know that I don't have to worry about screwing up and her never calling again.  I  will always have a girl who will call me.  And that makes me the luckiest "dater" I know.