We decide not to do the full-fledged premarital counseling
where you write up a budget and talk about who takes out the trash and all of
that stuff. My cousin did that before she got married and it was fabulous, but
she and her husband are a lot younger than Primo and I. Primo and I have talked
through this stuff.
But we figure it can’t hurt to have a few sessions and
besides, we have to. So we talk to Father Joe, the priest at my church. Father
Joe is from Vietnam and spent time in a concentration camp there before he
escaped. He has focus.
His most important marital advice
to us is to be nice to each other.
“Husband and wife supposed to try
to make each other happy,” he explains. “If wife say, ‘I have head-aitch,’
husband say, ‘Why you tell me?! Go get Tylenol on shelf.’”
“Is it not better when husband
say, ‘Oh! You have head-aitch. Here two tablets and glass of water?’ That how
husband and wife supposed to be.”
He continues. “This Vietnamese
woman tell me, ‘I don’t like cheese! I don’t like sandwich!’ Then she marry
American man. She study many cookbook so she can prepare the food he like.
After two years, she say, ‘Now I like cheese. There many different kinds of
cheese. I did not know!’”
He talks about his
life in Chicago. “We live in community,” he says. “Six priests. Five
nationalities: Vietnam, Korea, African-American, Philippines, Poland. We cook.
Different food every day.”
“Wow!” I say. “That sounds great!”
“Ahhhh!” he answers. “Korea food very spicy! Very spicy! And
how can someone eat kimchi every day?”
He also suggests
that interrupting someone during a basketball game was not a good idea and that
a person especially should not interrupt a basketball game by standing in front
of the TV.
He continues, “When
I live in community in Chicago, some priest pray, ‘Please let Bears to win
Superbowl.’ When Cardinal hear this, he say, ‘Come to my office.’”
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