Today I Eat My Words

(and maybe my husband will miss this post because he is busy attending his sister’s wedding)

Longtime readers might recall that my husband and I initially connected, like all good geeks do, over a book.  Then he kept up the conversation when we met up again, recommending a book he’d recently fallen in love with and even offering to lend it to me. I niavely agreed, with no clue that this book would lead to a seven year “thing” between me and Tim, a push and pull struggle. And if you’d told me even a few months ago that Tim would eventually win the battle, I would have laughed in disbelief.

You see, Tim and I met at a single’s dance at our church. I’d just about given up on these type of activities, dreading another night of doing the YMCA. Then one night I met this guy, we started chatting, and discovered a mutual love for the English language. I returned home that night, went into my mom’s bedroom (I lived with her after graduating from college), and excitedly told her that I’d met a really cute guy.

Tim’s 3 pm to 11 pm work schedule at the WA Mu call center didn’t allow him to attend a lot of activities, so I mainly saw him at church on Sundays. We’d chat between meetings and, once he lent me The Poisonwood Bible, he seemed to bring it up every time we spoke. I’d started the book, but something about the characters turned me off, the father infuriated me, and I simply couldn’t get into it. This lack of interest, combined with his continued persistence in talking about the book, brought out this stubborn streak in me and I determined  not to read it.

While I didn’t give his book a second chance, Tim thankfully gave me one. While we’ve enjoyed many of the same novels and I’ve even become interested in his video game hobby over the past six years, I still refused to pick up The Poisonwood Bible again. It has become a sort of joke between us and gone on so long that I couldn’t really recall why I didn’t want to read it, but I didn’t plan on giving in.

We ended up making one of our deals recently and, after much silly negotiation, I told him I would read a chapter of The Poisonwood Bible for each evening he arrived home from work by 5:30. He’d stopped doing this long ago, so I figured I was in the clear – or he’d be more motivated to get his butt home. The deal actually ended up working well for both of us – I got my hubby home earlier and he (finally!) got me to give one of his favorite books another chance.

And, as much as I hate to admit it, once I started reading a few chapters for our deal, I couldn’t put the book down. I felt the same frustrations, but the excellent writing, intriguing storyline, and imperfect characters drew me in. There is so much more I could write about this book – including what I loved and things that made me crazy – but that is not what this post is about. In fact, I can probably save it for the book club I’ve just joined where The Poisonwood Bible will likely be one of the books we read, a nomination I seconded.

No, this is the post where I eat my words and, finally admit: Honey, you were right.