My mom is staying a few weeks for the holidays as per usual. Except 'per usual' isn't what it used to be. I love her, but still it is a little bit of an off fit, like as if the pipes have been sweated askew now. She's better than most everyone else (well, she is my mother, so she's obliged to roll w the punches as best she can). As my friend Amy puts it, misery loves company and so your company might very well bail if you stray. And so it has been. Sunnie barely talks to me. It's not like a relationship is oo la la easy to make work in real life. It is a lot of simple showing up. It is a lot of laundry. But still, I want to be doing that work, as best I can. I hope it matters. I make soup. Meanwhile, he is sick right now, he is no yogi, he coughs and worries and works long hours (too long) and does not know how to breathe through his ears. Mom says "he is older than you are really, he's too worn down to have kids of his own anyway".
I hide in the bathroom from her.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
she&him (aka the delicious zooey daschanel) - please let me (smiths cover)
I’m reading Committed: A Love Story because my lover asked me to marry him, 17 times, then I said yes one night and he stopped asking, which I immediately assumed was the beginning of the end, and a nanosecond later I decided (rightfully, I still believe) that such careening around the mere subject of commitment let alone the practice of it did not bode well some kind of way. I started buying books about it.
I think what he meant, at least in part, if not exactly actually “marry me” was “take me seriously” and I said “I do” – now what?
Taking someone seriously, your commitment to them seriously, the possibility of enduring relation seriously, taking the promise of happiness seriously…that’s not a one-time act, like a leap of faith, and once you leap you fall then land wherever. Then again, it is like that. That, and what’s for dinner (and who will cook it), night after night.
Let’s skip the obvious (for now) – that neither of us is fully legally divorced quite yet. We should both be done with that in January, clearing the psychic and legal decks officially. That neither of us trusts legal decks anymore, after those experiences. That neither of us fully trusts the lack of trust in legal marriage either (even my gay friends want marriage more than not, so don’t get all high and mighty – we are all very conflicted on the subject of long haul relationships that are acknowledged by ourselves [iffily] and others [perforce if necessary, god fucking damn it]). That is he is appreciably younger than I am. That I probably cannot have another child, that he has no biological children (and has wanted that keenly all his life and was the number one reason he married [I can’t throw stones at all on that score – I did that same thing, did the math and could get at least a baby out of the deals I made, yes indeedy]); that except for him, I would not want to risk even thinking about having any more children whatsoever. That he is broke (not poor, which is like a disease you’re born into, but BROKE, as in his career cost him well over 100k in education expenses – his “gina loan” alone is 32K, for the core classes he took almost exclusively with me) and thus I keep the lights on (as I would anyway, so no skin off my nose) and that the disparity is an endless irritant to him, like an existential yeast infection he’s always scratching at. Those last two factors, babies and brokeness = we worry we cost each other too much, and what that means or will/could mean over time….
On the other hand, randomly beginning anywhere in the upsides list to note, I’ll note the fact that the boyz embraced him wholly, with an honestly that only kids (and animals) can bring to judgment; their simple faith in his existence in relation to themselves (“we have a bow shooter in the family now” Bruno says about his JOED archery creds) reads like a cosmic endorsement, as if they turned him over and found a label that reads “suitable for parental ft. dude use”... I start there in the list of upsides because it’s down a ways, past the items of the list that are about his infinite tenderness towards me. I haven’t been writing because to do so would be mostly every day to note instances of that tenderness, like a hot stone on a wrenched twitching muscle.
Right now, he is at traffic court. Several hours ago, I told him to disappear, that to do so is delicious, to have nowhere you’re supposed to be and thus you can wander or drive around and Just Be. I meant that, and God knows I love to disappear and wander myself on a pretty regular basis. Now, a mere 5 hours later, I’m ready for him to come back. That almost watery motion in me like a tide that is not controvertible by any list(s) of how we “match up” or not: I worry that he is dead. The tides of worry come in, love welling up. But/and I know that worrying that he is dead will not keep him from dying (to me) necessarily. Now will it?
What will? (What might?)
I’m reading Committed: A Love Story because my lover asked me to marry him, 17 times, then I said yes one night and he stopped asking, which I immediately assumed was the beginning of the end, and a nanosecond later I decided (rightfully, I still believe) that such careening around the mere subject of commitment let alone the practice of it did not bode well some kind of way. I started buying books about it.
I think what he meant, at least in part, if not exactly actually “marry me” was “take me seriously” and I said “I do” – now what?
Taking someone seriously, your commitment to them seriously, the possibility of enduring relation seriously, taking the promise of happiness seriously…that’s not a one-time act, like a leap of faith, and once you leap you fall then land wherever. Then again, it is like that. That, and what’s for dinner (and who will cook it), night after night.
Let’s skip the obvious (for now) – that neither of us is fully legally divorced quite yet. We should both be done with that in January, clearing the psychic and legal decks officially. That neither of us trusts legal decks anymore, after those experiences. That neither of us fully trusts the lack of trust in legal marriage either (even my gay friends want marriage more than not, so don’t get all high and mighty – we are all very conflicted on the subject of long haul relationships that are acknowledged by ourselves [iffily] and others [perforce if necessary, god fucking damn it]). That is he is appreciably younger than I am. That I probably cannot have another child, that he has no biological children (and has wanted that keenly all his life and was the number one reason he married [I can’t throw stones at all on that score – I did that same thing, did the math and could get at least a baby out of the deals I made, yes indeedy]); that except for him, I would not want to risk even thinking about having any more children whatsoever. That he is broke (not poor, which is like a disease you’re born into, but BROKE, as in his career cost him well over 100k in education expenses – his “gina loan” alone is 32K, for the core classes he took almost exclusively with me) and thus I keep the lights on (as I would anyway, so no skin off my nose) and that the disparity is an endless irritant to him, like an existential yeast infection he’s always scratching at. Those last two factors, babies and brokeness = we worry we cost each other too much, and what that means or will/could mean over time….
On the other hand, randomly beginning anywhere in the upsides list to note, I’ll note the fact that the boyz embraced him wholly, with an honestly that only kids (and animals) can bring to judgment; their simple faith in his existence in relation to themselves (“we have a bow shooter in the family now” Bruno says about his JOED archery creds) reads like a cosmic endorsement, as if they turned him over and found a label that reads “suitable for parental ft. dude use”... I start there in the list of upsides because it’s down a ways, past the items of the list that are about his infinite tenderness towards me. I haven’t been writing because to do so would be mostly every day to note instances of that tenderness, like a hot stone on a wrenched twitching muscle.
Right now, he is at traffic court. Several hours ago, I told him to disappear, that to do so is delicious, to have nowhere you’re supposed to be and thus you can wander or drive around and Just Be. I meant that, and God knows I love to disappear and wander myself on a pretty regular basis. Now, a mere 5 hours later, I’m ready for him to come back. That almost watery motion in me like a tide that is not controvertible by any list(s) of how we “match up” or not: I worry that he is dead. The tides of worry come in, love welling up. But/and I know that worrying that he is dead will not keep him from dying (to me) necessarily. Now will it?
What will? (What might?)
