Maria and I both have the same problem, in an odd kind of way. As I get older, I am bothered by my inability to contribute to life on the farm in the way I once did.

Maria, who is an artist, is troubled by her inability to contribute as much financially to the running of the farm as she would like. I have known women women – and some men – who are delighted to have someone who pays most of the bills. Maria will never be one of them.

She is always reassuring me that I contribute in many different ways to the farm. I am always reassuring her that even gifted artists rarely make enough money and that everything I earn is ours, not mine.

We don’t really believe each other when we make these reassurances. When I first moved to a farm in upstate New York, I was alone, and I reveled in doing things for myself, even though I often needed help.

I dragged hay around, wrestled with sheep, stacked firewood, ran mowers and even tractors at times. Maria is a success by any artistic standards, but artists do not make a lot of money. Neither do writers, but I can still earn money from my blog and some rapidly dwindling royalties.

My legs are stiff and sometimes sore, and I have angina, an offshoot of my heart disease. There are many things I used to do that I can’t do – like stack firewood.

Maria and I have been butting heads all week because she wants to stack most of this load of two cords – she knows she will be too busy to stack all the rest that is coming.

She wants to do it, but she also loves doing it. It’s a great time to be outside, and it feels good.

I have our good friend and hard worker Nicole lined up to stack the other six cords that are coming through the summer. Maria told me it is important to her to do some of the stacking because I pay most of the bills, and because she likes it.

I admit it bothers me to see her working so hard for so many hours, we can afford to get help, she doesn’t need to do this. But the truth is, she does, and I need to hear that.

This stacking is very hard work, but it is up to her, and I have shut up about it, and am working to accept it.

She spent the last couple of days stacking this wood carefully in the wood shed. She agrees that Nicole should get to stack most of the rest.

For two days, I’ve been hearing non-stop thumping day and night. Maria looks very happy to be doing this work, she feels she is contributing and that is important to her. I paid for the wood, and that is important to me.

She is tired, but happy tired. I remember that sweet feeling of doing hard but necessary physical work. I love taking care of the farm, as she does, and I do it in every way I can – ordering hay and wood, dialing up repair people and handymen, and paying some (not all) of the bills.

But it is never enough. I so hate to watch other people do my work, even our work. Sometimes, I just have to go into the house, I can’t bear to look. I’m not sure she knew that, and it is hard for me to talk about it.

I need to understand that she needs to contribute in any way she can, and she needs to understand that it is very painful to me to watch her work so hard on the farm doing things I was once able to do.

I’m fine with being older, I’m good at it, but some things are hard to accept.

Writers are lucky, because as long as their heads are functioning, they can work and contribute forever. Artists who are responsible need to be creative about it.

I doubt either of us will ever get over this nagging sense that we aren’t doing enough, and for different reasons. But more and more, we are able to stand in each other’s shoes and see the world through the other’s eyes. That, I think, is  a big part of what love is about.