Four Years Married
Happy four year anniversary to us! A few years ago, I started a new tradition in which I write about one thing I learned about marriage in the past year. You can check out my past posts here:
On to year four…
We do not need a lot to be happy.
I think 2020 was a year of reflection for a lot of people, and while I always felt Sean and I could be perfectly happy with a lot less as long as we had each other, the year of COVID certainly confirmed that.
In the middle of March, our household income was cut by one-third. We had to cut a lot of expenses as a result. Not being able to go to restaurants definitely helped with that. It was an incredibly stressful time, and it only became more stressful when our company announced impending “consolidation” (AKA layoffs) the following month. Ultimately we got through it without losing our jobs, and the paycut only lasted two months, which I realize makes us a LOT luckier than many others. But the lesson was definitely lasting.
Anyway, through all of that, Sean and I were still happy campers. We learned a lot of new cooking techniques and recipes (thank you, Guy’s Grocery Games!). We dyed Sean’s hair. We fell even more in love with our pool. We became experts at both work-from-home and workout-from-home life. And we didn’t miss going out one bit.
We are month 11 of not going out (with a few exceptions here and there -- I can count the number of times we’ve dined out on one hand), and I’m definitely ready for the vaccine so that we can start getting back to normal. But I can say with absolute certainty that we used to spend a lot more than we needed to, and it’s nice to have it confirmed that we can be happy with less.
Another lesson from 2020: Sean and I are built to last. If we can survive a global pandemic AND a 38-hour road trip in a Toyota Camry with two big dogs, I think we can survive anything.