- Sep 11, 2006
- 3,698
- 424
- Country
- United States
- Gender
- Female
- Faith
- Christian
- Marital Status
- Married
The Chair: My solution to my husband's studying all the time and leaving me lonely.
We only have 2 bedrooms in our tiny condo home.
The bigger one is obvi our bedroom, which I set the mood with a fun bedspread
curtains, wall art and rugs.
But the smaller one is the "office" and store-room.
My husband loaded it full of stuff of mine and his that he wanted to save for
his future "study" in a bigger house or that I wanted to save for decorating said future house. It was so crammed full of book shelves, books, boxes, bins, art supplies and computer supplies that there was hardly room to move in there.
He put his desk in there and he sits at his computer all the time working on spreadsheets and math for school.
Of course my poor husband was trying to be "logical" but the way he stored stuff was messy and for someone with OCD-ish tendencies, I did not like being in taht room. so obvi I didn't spend time in there.
But he spent all his time in there.
We kept having these fights.
He needs to study like all the time. I miss him. in our own home.
He wants to back out of commitments like always going to church with me.
Sometimes I can get him to agree to make time for a date night on the weekend, but most of the time he doesn't want to be pestered to do things.
I could live with it... IF he didn't always sit in a room where there was no room for me, leaving me alone on the couch or in our bedroom feeling like I'm still a bachelorette since he often stays up past when I go to bed.
So I asked him if I could rearrange the office and get rid of some clutter I know we don't need in our next home.
He was reluctant ... this is HIS space... but finally gave in.
I spent Saturday afternoon consolidating bins of stuff, playing tetris with them under a table, covering unsightly stacks of boxes with dropcloths and throwing away some tacky lamps and old chairs that are broken.
It left a sizeable space on the far wall across from the computer.
That was phase 1.
Phase 2 is I was going to go and get a chair.
When I say a chair, I don't mean one of the dining room table chairs.
I mean a comfy chair that I can sit in and read for hours in the same room with him and not feel lonely.
The problem is, a comfy chair is expensive.
So I was going to go to Target and buy a dorm room dish chair... a little bowl-shaped fake fleece chair with flimsy metal legs that is collapsible.
Not pretty, but it would work.
Then I mentioned it to him... this space in our office was a chance to think about the future.
Someday, we will have a bigger livingroom. And we will have a couch that isn't a futon.
We should fill that space with a chair that is nice and can be part of our permanent setup one day.
OR we could get a tasteful gliding rocker that is intended for a nursery.
Well, we ruled that one out because we still don't know that we would have a baby.
It's still uncertain so why invest $500 in a nursery rocking chair that we may have to just sell or donate down the road because we don't have a baby?
So he said "show me the nice leather comfy chairs"
both of us only want to have one that's a nice modern squared shape and not a sloppy oversize lay-z-boy.
They sell these attractive but cozy ones at Target.com but they are anywhere from $250-$500.
So I told him I can't do it right now.
He decided to come my way, possibly hear my plea... and said "I'll get us one".
So I showed him the one, $300 with fees included,
and he bought it!
I was going to argue that this was $300 and 15 minutes ago he had no idea I wanted a nice chair nor did he plan to spend that money but I decided just to stay quiet.
Now a chair is going to be delivered by the weekend and we will have to assemble it but then it will be ours for the future house and for me to enjoy as a reading chair and not being lonely while he sits at his computer all evening.
Does this seem like a fair compromise we made?
a little space in "his" room and $300 for me to have a way to spend time
without pestering him?
We only have 2 bedrooms in our tiny condo home.
The bigger one is obvi our bedroom, which I set the mood with a fun bedspread
curtains, wall art and rugs.
But the smaller one is the "office" and store-room.
My husband loaded it full of stuff of mine and his that he wanted to save for
his future "study" in a bigger house or that I wanted to save for decorating said future house. It was so crammed full of book shelves, books, boxes, bins, art supplies and computer supplies that there was hardly room to move in there.
He put his desk in there and he sits at his computer all the time working on spreadsheets and math for school.
Of course my poor husband was trying to be "logical" but the way he stored stuff was messy and for someone with OCD-ish tendencies, I did not like being in taht room. so obvi I didn't spend time in there.
But he spent all his time in there.
We kept having these fights.
He needs to study like all the time. I miss him. in our own home.
He wants to back out of commitments like always going to church with me.
Sometimes I can get him to agree to make time for a date night on the weekend, but most of the time he doesn't want to be pestered to do things.
I could live with it... IF he didn't always sit in a room where there was no room for me, leaving me alone on the couch or in our bedroom feeling like I'm still a bachelorette since he often stays up past when I go to bed.
So I asked him if I could rearrange the office and get rid of some clutter I know we don't need in our next home.
He was reluctant ... this is HIS space... but finally gave in.
I spent Saturday afternoon consolidating bins of stuff, playing tetris with them under a table, covering unsightly stacks of boxes with dropcloths and throwing away some tacky lamps and old chairs that are broken.
It left a sizeable space on the far wall across from the computer.
That was phase 1.
Phase 2 is I was going to go and get a chair.
When I say a chair, I don't mean one of the dining room table chairs.
I mean a comfy chair that I can sit in and read for hours in the same room with him and not feel lonely.
The problem is, a comfy chair is expensive.
So I was going to go to Target and buy a dorm room dish chair... a little bowl-shaped fake fleece chair with flimsy metal legs that is collapsible.
Not pretty, but it would work.
Then I mentioned it to him... this space in our office was a chance to think about the future.
Someday, we will have a bigger livingroom. And we will have a couch that isn't a futon.
We should fill that space with a chair that is nice and can be part of our permanent setup one day.
OR we could get a tasteful gliding rocker that is intended for a nursery.
Well, we ruled that one out because we still don't know that we would have a baby.
It's still uncertain so why invest $500 in a nursery rocking chair that we may have to just sell or donate down the road because we don't have a baby?
So he said "show me the nice leather comfy chairs"
both of us only want to have one that's a nice modern squared shape and not a sloppy oversize lay-z-boy.
They sell these attractive but cozy ones at Target.com but they are anywhere from $250-$500.
So I told him I can't do it right now.
He decided to come my way, possibly hear my plea... and said "I'll get us one".
So I showed him the one, $300 with fees included,
and he bought it!
I was going to argue that this was $300 and 15 minutes ago he had no idea I wanted a nice chair nor did he plan to spend that money but I decided just to stay quiet.
Now a chair is going to be delivered by the weekend and we will have to assemble it but then it will be ours for the future house and for me to enjoy as a reading chair and not being lonely while he sits at his computer all evening.
Does this seem like a fair compromise we made?
a little space in "his" room and $300 for me to have a way to spend time
without pestering him?
