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Several years after leaving the institutional church system, my wife asked me a question as we were driving.

"Mark, do you think I'm properly submissive?"

I was silent for a few moments. Often, when someone is silent after a loaded question, it means they are reluctant to answer. I'm sorry to have made Kimberly worry for a few beats.

"I honestly don't know. I don't think about you that way any more."

I surprised myself with my answer to her question. And then I was delighted. It meant that at some point I had stopped measuring her performance toward me. She is who she is, and I love her.

You see, I was the product of a system in which every relationship was measured by dominance and submissiveness. We had certain expectations for everybody to live up to. Is your wife submissive to your satisfaction in every way? Is your husband the spiritual head of the household to the proper degree? Are your children properly conformed to the collective expectations? Are you in mental and verbal assent with the opinions of the appointed inner circle? Have you volunteered enough of your free time to the operation of the franchise? Are you writing a check (which can be evaluated), or are you giving cash (which can't be traced to you)?

We lived in a pre-fabricated set of relationships. You could walk through the door and instantly enter into them, if you had determination and the right vocabulary. But you know, love was not required, not really. Blood, sweat, tears, resolve, stomach acid, but not necessarily love. All that was required was to be sorted into the right slots (whether it be unto men or unto theories of men), and things would turn out okay. When you come right down to it, we were people all desparately wanting things to turn out okay. And we found systems that made promises.

It's been a dozen years away from that now, and tales come to my ears. For many, there was no payoff. It would have been better for many of us to stay home and discover love for one another before signing up for anything else.

Don't evaluate her. Love her.