Dear Fauchon,
Ever since I met your mother in 8th grade science class, everyone has always commented in passing that your mother and I look alike. Fourteen years later, when we got married, everyone really started laying it on thick. They say a lot of things – people are attracted to themselves, maybe I’m a narcissist, we are 夫妻相(which is Chinese for good couples look like each other) – but the extent of my agreement to all that is we’re both Chinese, and we have a similar skin tone. This couple lookalike thing is supposedly a real enough phenomenon that academics look into it, but all it means to me is either 1) I look like a girl, 2) your mom looks like a boy, or 3) we both look gender neutral…none of that is ideal.
However, when I think about your mom and I in the context of similarities, I don’t have to think too hard or too far back to come up with other qualities or situations. Just yesterday, we went over to your Uncle Mark’s house party where I socialized for an hour before deciding to commandeer his study to watch the Patriots-Ravens game on his computer because I thought it was more interesting than the people there. I never told your mother where I went, but it turned out she lasted only thirty minutes longer before looking for a place to hole up. We ended up sipping on Sicilian lemonades and watching the game together alone for the next two hours. That’s two peas in an anti-social anti-alcohol pod for you.
And then today, we coincidentally wore the same themed t-shirt (The Legend of Zelda on NES is mandatory game-playing as far as I’m concerned). You may not believe me when I say that we are not the loser couple that plans matching outfits, but it’s true. I don’t think very highly of that sort of thing. I even cringed when I went downstairs for breakfast and saw what she was wearing, but I can appreciate the situation in the context of couples and similarities.
We’re pretty similar and it can be cute in certain forms. So does that mean our relationship is in a state of “sitting on a white sandy beach with a non-alcoholic girly umbrella drink in our hands”? No. And I wouldn’t want it that way either because not only would it take away all the excitement and puzzles in my life, but you would also lose the fun of looking back on our relationship.
I know I don’t believe in fate and “the one”, I’m not sure whether I believe in opposites attract, but I do believe that relationships take work regardless of similarities or differences. Some say relationships are like taking care of a plant, but plants don’t talk back at each other. Relationships are much more stimulating (or at least they should be).
Leave a Reply