The Climate for Love

Duluth, MN

Steven moved with his wife Sally to a small town in Minnesota where he was beginning his career as a corporate lawyer. Sally was about six months pregnant with their first child and had left her career behind. One night Steven returned home to find that Sally had been crying for several hours. When he asked her what was wrong, she simply replied, "This house is ugly." "Yes," he agreed, "this house is ugly." Sally took his hand and led him through each room, pointing out ugly features."Look at how ugly this house is.""Yes," he agreed, "This house is really, really ugly. Is there anything that I can do?”

She looked around and said, “You can rip up the carpeting.” He spent the next three hours ripping up the carpeting. When he finished, he turned to her and asked, "Does that help?” "No,” she answered through her tears, "this house is still ugly.” By this time he was exhausted, but he couldn't help but agree with her. "Yes, this house is still ugly. What else can I do?”

She recognized the hopelessness of the situation and shared with him the first thing she thought of.“Well, you could let me squish a banana on your forehead.” The strange request startled him. He thought about it for a while and with some reservation, reached up to push his hair off of his forehead and smiled, “Sure, go ahead.” She peeled the banana and squished it, smiling back at him as the banana slowly dripped down his nose. “Do you feel better now? he asked. “The house is still ugly, and I do feel better,” replied Sally. They both started to giggle, and her tears of frustration turned to tears of laughter. They kissed and hugged, banana and all. Later, she thanked him for his patience and for taking the risk to let her do something ridiculous. She understood that there wasn't much that could be done to the house, but Steven's loving and caring responses had lifted her heart, making a difficult situation bearable.