I guess I wasn't clear in what I was trying to say, because of habits we formed when first dating, when I couldn't speak Japanese well (I had been living here for about a year) and her imprecise English we really had to learn to listen to each other and to be clear in what we said and meant. Not to say that we never fight but even now we seldom have that "I thought you said/ I assumed you meant" kind of fight. We dated for two years before getting married, my Japanese improving the whole time. Now I have been here 26 years and we have been married 23. Still I think that learning to listen to each other and not guess at what was said has led to our being happy today. Of course now my Japanese is much better than her English. I was interviewed on TV a couple of months ago, take a look if you are interested, it is subtitled in English:
https://youtu.be/GScAcHtm2UE?list=FL...9Iaadk0yRxno0A