The Good Cookie

a Laura Numeroff-inspired marriage story

Good cookie (noun): The quickest way to tell if a Marine has been on his or her best behavior is to locate the round, gold Good Conduct Medal attached to a red ribbon with a blue stripe down the middle pinned on their chest. The medal is awarded to any active-duty enlisted member of the United States military who completes three consecutive years of "honorable and faithful service,"... Meaning, they didn’t have a major mess up in that timeframe.

Good cookie (definition as it stands in the Swoboda household): Mr. Swoboda presents Mrs. Swoboda with a “good cookie” at the end of most days. It’s a kind word, a recognition of what she’s done that day. It’s his way of telling her she’s seen, like a perfect attendance award for showing up to serve the family.

The Good Cookie entered the marriage circa 2016 when both parties read The Five Love Languages and discovered that Mrs. Swoboda needs words of affirmation to be a healthy participant in a military spouse position (and also, see: “life” in general).

Mr. Swoboda designated his love language as acts of service, and thus, Mrs. Swoboda packs his breakfast and lunch 99.9% of the time when he’s home.

They are aware this trade-off sounds like the 1950s, but it’s working as they exchange good cookies for orders of scrambled eggs in a Tupperware container, a side of toast + avocado cup included. When she’s feeling fancy, there’s a yogurt parfait.

While admittedly, Mrs. Swoboda grumbles at 7:00 am to make breakfast and slaps together the sandwich, she knows it’s worth it.

Because if she asks for a good cookie, Mr. Swoboda can count on the fact that she’ll ask for a snuggle as well. If he gives her a snuggle, she’ll then want to talk about her day for at least twenty minutes. After he listens, he’ll hug her, and she’ll ask for a kiss.

When she receives the kiss, she’ll ask him to turn off the lights. The lights are turned off, and she peeps from the darkness, “Will you please prep the coffee pot?” In the morning, she turns on the coffee pot and makes his lunch. He gathers up his things for work, and in ten hours, he returns home again.

The kids run to him at the door. Mrs. Swoboda smiles at him (or sneaks past him for a few minutes of peace on the front porch, or blazes past on the way to gymnastics drop off, or harumphs at him from the kitchen if it's been “that kind of day”). He empties his lunch box, and they do the dishes together that night, leaning into one another.

As he settles in to work on his school, she wipes down the counters. Before she heads upstairs Mrs. Swoboda asks for a good cookie. Mr. Swoboda gives her one and requests which leftover he’d like for lunch. She walks upstairs knowing their marriage is no longer a dough, and thankfully not crumbly right now. It is fairly sweet. She mentally awards them a medal for what they’ve fought for.

This post is part of a blog hop with Exhale—an online community of women pursuing creativity alongside motherhood, led by the writing team behind Coffee + Crumbs. Click here to view the next post in the series "Love."