After living in Wyoming cold for eight months of the year for several years, we decided to move to a place where we would never deal with snow again. So we came to Phoenix. Don't laugh. Even when it's the hottest here, in July and August, we can at least leave town. The only thing we have to worry about here, which we didn't have in Wyoming, was melting tires on the hot freeways. So far, we prefer that to being snowed in for seven to eight months.
However, we've had to battle the heat with double insulation over the windows, meaning blinds plus curtains. We recently put up curtains in one of our bedrooms in preparation for our third year of Phoenix summer. Mel is the genius in the family. I (Cheryl) am SO not. That becomes very obvious when we're doing something mental. This week, Mel was at his desk doing the math to figure out how to place clips to hang our blackout curtains. He wanted them to hang evenly, of course.
I said, "Honey, why don't you just do it the easy way?"
"How's that?" he asked.
"You cheat. Fold each panel in half, then in fourths, then in eighths, and clip the corners at each fold."
He frowned. "But that's cheating."
"That's what I said." So I took him back to the bedroom and showed him. And it worked!
Our blackout curtains are up, hanging evenly, and it looks quite pretty. All we had to do was cheat.
Mel has always been known for his intelligence--which is a good thing, since he's a doctor. Me, I'm known for my common horse sense. We have found that our strengths complement one another. I love that in a relationship.
Do you have a relationship in which your strengths complement each other? Are you still learning to work through the differences?