Barrett-Jackson

The Barrett-Jackson is a car auction that focuses on classic cars. Every year it's held in Scottsdale. Ever since I moved to Phoenix, I've had the pleasure of making it out to the show. This year, I got to attend the show because Chris's company had a booth.

This is a picture of Chris and his boss, Chris, at their booth.

The most popular item they had in the booth was this touch panel coffee table. It's a control system for audio/video built on top of the Apple operating system.

Chris and I got to have lunch together then I headed off on my own to look at cars and watch the auction.

This year my perspective on the Barrett-Jackson was certainly different than it was in years past. Before, I was only concerned about the show for the few short hours I was attending. This year, I was obsessed with how many hours the show was keeping Chris away from me. The show started on Sunday, January 13th and ran through Sunday, January 20th. During that time, Chris spent at least 12 hours at the show. Some days closer to 15 hours.

Having Chris come home late at night, often after I had gone to bed, was much harder than I expected. I was very lonely the first couple days then I became angry. It surprised me that I would react in that way, but I was angry that he wasn't around and emotionally disconnected from him. It made me to want to push him away. When we finally got to have some time together (on Friday night when I actually went to the show), I was so angry and frustrated that I didn't want to go. Luckily, I knew that this emotional reaction wasn't healthy and that as soon as I could spend some quality time with Chris, all would be right with the relationship again. And it was. I just needed some time to warm up to him again. (Sounds silly, I know.) We had a great time Friday night at the show and then at the bar afterward.

This year the Barrett-Jackson taught me how hard it is to maintain a relationship when two people aren't spending time together. Text messaging and talking on the phone can't take place of sitting down and having dinner together every night. I'm lucky that Chris and I both have jobs that allow us to be home every night. I'm convinced that in order to maintain a healthy relationship, we should only work jobs that keep us apart minimally. That means I can't go back to the type of job I had before Integrum, where I was traveling a couple times a month. That means Chris and I can never have a long distance relationship again, like we did for the first two years we were together.

Coming to these conclusions about our relationship and how to keep it healthy was good for me. A totally unexpected lesson to learn from a car auction, but a good lesson all the same. I'm so lucky to have a healthy relationship right now. I'm 100% committed to keeping the relationship healthy over time. Chris and I are very lucky to have bosses and companies that value families and relationships. In fact, I was very, very impressed that Chris's boss admitted to struggling with all the time away from his family just as much as we were.

It was a tough week, but it's over. Sunday night when Chris came home (before dinner, even!) we went on a date and just hung out together. It was brilliant. I took a picture of Chris to commemorate the moment. Looking at it now, he sure looked tired. Poor thing. I'm sure glad that the Barrett-Jackson is over until next year.