Free Artist's Daughter, The: A Memoir by Alexandra Kuykendall

stench-soaked socks loses the romance about the first time it happens.
    I was fortunate that I was desperately in love with Derek. It helped when the predictable fights about sex, money, and in-laws went down. I didn’t question whether I’d married the right person. I just didn’t understand why everything felt like a song being played out of tune.
    On our first anniversary we let the phone’s rings echo through our apartment until the answering machine picked up.
    “Hi! You’ve reached Derek and Alex.” I could hear my own voice, recorded months earlier, filling the room. I’d been so excited to say those words, “Derek and Alex”—now one number, one unit. “We can’t come to the phone right now,” my voice continued.
    I glared over at Derek sitting on my college futon that acted as the apartment’s central piece of furniture. I softly laughed, hoping that would break the tension. We couldn’t come to the phone right now, that was for sure; we weren’t in the mood to talk to anyone.
    “Leave us a message,” my voice practically sang to the caller on the other line. BEEEEP!
    “Well, calling to wish you a happy anniversary.” My father-in-law’s voice rang through the apartment. “Since it’s your paper anniversary, you’re probably out spending lots of paper money.”
    “Ha!” I said, looking at Derek. You would think—out celebrating our first year of marital bliss! But no, we were fighting. Fighting about my disappointment with his anniversary gift: a wooden drying rack for the dishes. Fighting about the fact that he hadn’t made plans for us to go out that night because he assumed eatingout the previous Saturday night counted as our celebration. Fighting about my generally critical attitude.
    “Is this a joke?” I’d asked as I unwrapped the gift. I was almost speechless, but able to muster up that question.
    “I thought you’d like it. I bought it at that kitchen store at Lloyd Center. You’ll use it every day,” he continued. His motives were probably thoughtful—splurging on something from a foodie store I liked but couldn’t afford to shop at—but his conclusions were dead wrong.
    “You think I’ll use it every day? How about you using it every day?”
    “Why do you always assume the worst of me? I thought you’d like it.”
    It was the kind of fight where the drying rack started to represent his attitude about my role as the dishwasher in our relationship. And that morphed into his perception of my role as housekeeper in general. In his mind, my instant criticism of the gift characterized my general attitude about him. “You always” and “You never” started to fly around the room until we were sitting on opposite sides—him on the futon, me on the sheet-covered chair from my violet-decorated childhood bedroom—staring at each other in silence.
    Our disappointments in the day were representing our disappointments in the last year. Like all newlyweds, we brought distinct expectations to the altar on our wedding day. Mine were based largely on Hallmark commercials and observations from the handful of lasting marriages I saw growing up. My senior year of high school, I’d lived in a newlywed home. My mom and Larry brought lifetimes of experiences and expectations to their relationship that offered unique challenges. So I didn’t see them as a realistic model for what marriage and its arguments looked like.
    There was an upside to all the fighting. It indicated I was starting to feel safe enough to disagree. Derek had married me, and Iknew he intended it to be for life. So I could let my guard down a little. I could start having a voice. I think he was relieved I was starting to have opinions.
    “You don’t pay enough attention to me,” I said when my father-in-law was done leaving his anniversary well-wishes.
    Derek’s face was a combination of disbelief and frustration. It silently barked, Are you kidding me?
    I kept talking. “I don’t feel it. I don’t feel