“You’re going to make choices that don’t seem important. There’s little ones like, what’s side of the bed do you want? Yeah, oh, I thought that was trivial. That’s your side for LIFE right there!” –Ray Romano

Last night, while watching a favorite film, I noticed that two of the characters, a long-married couple, ate dinner at a wide, rectangular table. The man sat at one end and the woman at the other, with two seats on each side of the table between them. It was clear from the story that they had always sat in these places, and for many years, children or guests occupied the middle seats. Once the children had grown and moved away, the two remained in their separate corners, still in love and still separated by the gulf of habit and space.

This stuck me as odd, even though I’ve seen similar tableaux my whole life. Yet when I eat a meal at a long table with M, it never occurs to me to sit so far away from him. Oh, I’m sure it’s more proper to do so, particularly when there are guests over for dinner, but my place has always been by his side.

When we first met, I think we sat this way to be closer as we were flush with the headiness of new love. But we’ve been together for nine years now, and the seating arrangement hasn’t changed. We always choose to sit near rather than far.

M and I have adopted similar arrangements for other activities too. We walk down the street, and he’s typically on the side that’s closest to the road. During a movie or show, he’s on my right. In bed, he’s usually on my left. I could be wrong but I don’t think there was ever a moment where one of us formally declared, “This is my side.” It just happened naturally, and now, over time has become our tradition, part of what Stephen King describes as the “interior language of marriage.”