Liking the same things

I've mentioned this in passing I think. More early in our relationship and not so much in recent years, this was a phrase I'd hear every now and then.

"We don't like any of the same things! Why are we even together?"

Usually this came after much debate about which movie or TV show to watch. Or, worse, on a night when Hillary wanted to watch something and I didn't. At that point, the idea of watching something alone was not a comfortable one for her. Fortunately, she eventually got over that and went through numerous great shows that I would have been bored silly with.

We didn't have a lot in common when it came to popular culture. She liked pop and country music with a particular dislike of rock and electronic music. I liked basically everything other than country with a preference for rock, metal and electronica.

Our movie preferences effectively didn't line up with a very few exceptions. (Marvel cinematic universe, Arrival, Sneakers, Ocean's Eleven, Deadpool and various Pixar movies. This is close to exhaustive.) We liked similar TV shows for the most part, but I'd enjoy a couple of seasons of most shows then be done once I felt I really got the characters. Hillary would want to finish out all seasons.

I think this actually worried Hillary sometimes, especially early in our relationship. What if we ran out of commonality and just became utterly different people without anything in common?

I didn't reflect much on that aspect. I think I intuitively got that while we didn't have similar media preferences, we did have something else that took up far more time. We enjoyed being with each other. We liked talking to each other and doing things together. We had similar high level goals for life.

Most importantly we were a team. We weren't the same person and that wasn't needed. We balanced each other and in many ways our personalities and interests didn't overlap and that worked very well for us.

I don't think I heard that sentiment more than once in the last half of our relationship. Either Hillary had come to the same conclusions that I had or she had just accepted that this aspect of our relationship would never be perfect.

That was okay.