The Coffee Shop Around The Corner, Part Two (The Fight)

"Anyone can start a business. You could too, you know." Of course, I did what anyone would do -- I started dreaming again. I could see the coffee shop, with a little section for kids to play in, and with the little shelf of author-signed books for sale. I could see the art on the wall, and the bags of coffee, and the cookies on the counter. And I made the mistake of opening my mouth to talk about it.

I am, in some sense, a practical person, as I mentioned before, and I am aware of the failure rate of businesses. I am aware of the fact that espresso bars are not exactly new material, and that I can go to any Barnes & Noble and get a cup of coffee and browse about a thousand books if I feel like it. I know that. But I can't help my heart dreaming about it, right? It just does.

My husband, not surprisingly, says very little, but I feel the tension in the air (my mother has started and lost two businesses). And I say, "I don't plan to run out and try this tomorrow, but it's one reason I started the personal finance blog. If we can pay off our debts, and save some money -- if I can prove to myself that I am responsible enough to do those things, and to do them slowly and systematically -- then, and only then, would I look into writing up a business plan and seeing what might come of it." My husband is silent. The minutes go by. Then he says, "You do know most businesses fail within their first year?" Silence descends.

Then the fighting started. I argued that I was smart enough to know businesses failed, thank you very much, and all I wanted was him to respect the fact that I was capable of doing such a thing, that the one thing that would make me consider divorce is the constant squashing of my ideas. He argued that he couldn't be expected to agree and support all my crazy ideas, because so many of them were improbable. I pointed out that my entire life had been improbable, from going to university to flying to a remote Japanese island and learning the language in a year, running my first marathon, marrying him and having two kids! Moving cross-country! Traveling 5,000 miles with an infant and a 5-year-old! I do six improbable things before breakfast!

Silence.

Then I dropped the big one. After all, I say, I gave up a lot to get married. I will never travel again, not like I'd hoped to. I can't skip off to any interesting job I want. I am, for all intents and purposes, trapped here. So why must I also trap my mind? Can't my mind, at the very least, be free to travel to improbable places? Spend improbably money? There's a place in this world for people like me, right? The dreamers?

The silence lasted all the way home.

To be continued in a later post...