The ties that bind.

Like most people (I imagine), Mark and I have our weekday morning routine. This has been a bit more varied, now that I'm working from home a lot more because of the new job, but it still tends to run along the same lines.

Mark gets out of bed, gets dressed and heads to the bathroom first. He wakes up without an alarm (which I am completely and permanently unable to do) and is the more responsible person of the two of us, so is actually able to instigate the day. As he does his ablutions, I get a few more mintues to laze in bed, talking myself into getting into a sitting position.

Mark moves to the kitchen, gets his cereal for breakfast and I do my bathroom things. Then he returns and brushes his teeth while I get dressed. Then we tend to both sit down on the bed and put on our shoes at about the same time.

It was at this stage one morning recently that I discovered that we are in fact, different people. We see eye-to-eye on the sock-sock-shoe-shoe issue, but it turns out that when tying his shoes, Mark makes the right loop first and holds that with his right hand, while doing the round-the-loop bit with his left hand. Crazy. I'm the exact opposite, holding the stationary loop with my left while my right goes around and through.

There was a moment of stunned silence while we both contemplated the discovery. We talked it through, and worked out the reason for the difference, so everything ended well. We've worked through it and come out stronger on the other side, accepting and enjoying our differences.

But let me tell you, thank goodness he doesn't do the make-two-loops-then-entwine-together...even the strongest love can only survive so much.