relationships...i am so intrigued by them...i love hearing how a couple met...how a couple makes it work...the "little" and the "big" things that make a relationship special...
we each inherit a legacy of marriage...defining ourselves with or against our parent's marriage...in this sense, children are given a chance to finish the work of an earlier generation, studying the past and then applying the lessons to their own lives...this doesn't always guarantee brighter outcomes...but hopefully you can take from it...lessons learned...
my own parents...are looking at celebrating fifty years together next year...one of my favorite things about them is something that i have never told them...it is almost like my little secret...a moment that brings me such joy and such hope...
i have the key to their home...so when i come over to visit them...i just help myself in...after all they gave me the key for a reason...right? when i enter their home...i walk through the living room, then the dining room...to get to the kitchen...this is usually the time they notice that i am there...during my walk through the house...the most wonderful sound is heard in the house...
my mom & dad talking...a lot of times laughing...about anything and everything...
sometimes it still amazes me that after so many years...they still can sit with each other...every day...and talk & laugh...it truly warms my heart...every time...
this year, i began a new chapter in my life...armed with the defeat of a relationship from prior year...but also with a strong sense of idealism...relationships end...i get that...and for me...the most important thing...is to learn from it...to evaluate your own actions...what could have been done better...what should have been avoided...you shape yourself against the grain of unhappiness...i don't believe in luck...but i do believe that you need to be in the right mindset...be in the right place...to meet someone new...my romantic side sees it as if i whirled around the dance floor a little recklessly and somehow landed in the arms of the right man at the end of the night...but truthfully, i think my current happiness is made up of some unknowable combination...as unknowable as love itself...of work and circumstance...it has to do with my own yearning to still a shaky sense of family and the joyous moment of meeting someone who so deeply makes me happy...
i'd like to describe him to you...his amazing character and integrity...his care and encouragement...his beautiful blue eyes and distinguished face...and the meaning he has brought to my life...i could tell you the stories that make up the very marrow of our budding relationship...the ways he has helped me know myself, his devoted love of family and friends...or the way that emotional subtlety and outrageous humor reside together so comfortably in him...i could tell you that his care for me both draws me out and steadies me on the beam...or i could simply recount the time, he...knowing how uncomfortable i felt...grabbed my hands...and softly counted steps in my ear...as he danced with me...but then i'd be trying to convince you of something that is mine alone to know...there is no way to explain why someone walks into a room and awakens your most primal dreams...
several weeks ago...i was seated next to a gentleman at a dinner party...he's in his midsixties and has been married for 38 years...when i asked him what essential bit made his marriage last, he grasped uncomfortably for the answer. "she's still my best friend," he said, then slightly grimaced at his own corny explanation. "we amuse each other...we have a shared interest in our children." his eyes closed and fluttered as he concentrated, searching for more. "a long marriage can sometimes feel like a life imprisonment," he said, suddenly opening his eyes again. "but love also changes again and again and again over the years...don't expect that what you have now will be what you have down the road. you won't even recognize why you first fell in love." he shrugged, offering one last possiblity. "and some people are just lifers."
i felt torn...i respected the words of an intelligent man who has been married for decades...i tried to weave his weary appreciation into my own future...imagining me feeling the same way...and i also shrugged off his words with the impishness of a teenager...i am impatient with those who resist marriage after having chosen it...who don't endorse it fully...why not just love love? why let time wear it down? i hope that won't happen to me...
perhaps my determination and optimism won't carry me effortlessly into the future...i may have to lose my grip, to let time have its way...my gratefulness for having a happy life on the back of many sad losses...i continue to face the coming days inevitable and unpredictable...making it up along the way...i may have to draw on strengths i can't be sure i have or face the frightening truths about ourselves that long-time intimacy can so often demand...
or maybe i'll just be a happy lifer...
still, i go forward with the only reason i can think of...the hopeless romantic in me...believes in relationships...believes in two people making it...believes in love...
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