He left angry, and I find myself once again wondering what has become of our marriage. He will be back in a few hours, insisting he was merely annoyed, and that I trouble my head too much about such things.

I worry we are growing apart. I am the one who's changing, so I guess I'm growing away from him. There is a push-pull that comes with it -- you don't wake up overnight and find yourself completely remade. There are justifications, subtle jabs, prevarications, and the sad, quiet days when there is nothing to do but lay down and let it all run your over. If only you could see it coming, you think. But no, things are never the way we'd like them to be, are they? They are interspersed with calm days and giddy days and surprisingly normal-like-the-old-days happy times that make the rest of it that much worse, smoothing things over so the next wave will catch you completely by surprise.

I tell myself that the waiting has got to go, and that for as long as I still look to be cared for, I will never be happy. But the old me waited and wanted to be coddled and was, for a long time, happy.

Or maybe there are just the growing pains that come with this latest self-reinvention. I will weather these changes. I will let them pass.