MEETING & GREETING

The man I love. Gary does not read my blog, so he will have no idea I posted this photograph. He is beautiful to my eyes. He won’t think so, but it’s true.

Love consists in this, that two solitudes protect and touch and greet each other. —Rainer Maria Rilke

When my husband and I take our morning walk, we wander apart as much as we walk side by side. “I am going up to check that,” Gary will say, gesturing at something pink higher upshore. Yesterday morning it was a used diaper in a pink plastic bag. If it’s still there tomorrow, he’ll pick it up.

That is not what we talked about for quite a while that morning. We talked about candor and honesty in our relationship. We reviewed our history. We acknowledged our shared trust. I have since been thinking about love and family.

My mother and I were always very close. She had mental health problems and sometimes that made for painful or awkward moments, but her mental health while I was a girl only hovered on the edge of my awareness. The therapy. Medication. Hospitalization. Her furious insistence on trivial matters was just the way it was. (She had to be the first one to open a magazine that came in the mail. Tape, glue, and scissors were hidden.) She was my mother.

I told my mother most everything. Yes, I was one of those girls. I never revealed the worst, but mostly I told. I told her about boys I liked at school. We talked and talked and talked. We had family discussions about people I knew from school. We argued about gun control and hunting and race relations. My parents used their new reel-to-reel tape recorder to record family conversations about boys I knew and other issues. Conversation and debate were valued in my home.

Yes, I understand now that some of this is odd.  (Weird?) It only occasionally seemed uncomfortable at the time, and I was not in a position to judge. This was my family. (Some things are actually bizarre—strange enough that I do not see how I could use these events in fiction, and I have cannibalized most of my life for my fiction.)

When I began dating my future husband in 1969, I did not discuss him with my parents. This was not a conscious choice, it was merely the result of my absolute conviction that Gary was better than I deserved or was ever likely to meet again, and my determination that our relationship would last. I was not going to muck it up. Gary went further in that he believed we were destined. So we worked at our relationship. We made some smart choices.

For one, we played no games. We were and remain entirely honest with one another. Do I tell him every thought that crosses my mind? No. But mostly he knows and I trust him with that knowing. He knows me and I know him equally well.

It was my mother who pointed out early on, “You never talk about Gary. I think you must not care much about him.” She smiled but was wary.

I did not rise to what I now recognize was bait. I was merely surprised at the time. I think I smiled and shrugged. Did I tell her she was wrong? Not that I recall. But since then, I have thought a lot about that comment from my mother. She was threatened, of course. Did she think he was a bad influence? Did she judge him too old for me? Was it really that she did not care for him or about his family? He was never going to make enough money to support me in the manner she hoped I would become accustomed? Probably bits of all those things.

I never discussed Gary with my parents. I never complained about him to them either. I had complaints, of course I did. I have had my grievances and so has he. We have quarreled. We talked about them. We were loud. We were apologetic. I considered leaving the relationship. I yelled and ranted and we hurt one another’s feelings. We apologized. We tried to do better. Sometimes we were successful. Mostly we said little or nothing to anyone else. This was between us.

Even now, when I recognize that someone is more forthcoming with a friend than a “partner”, I figure it’s a bad sign. I might joke about Gary’s “failings” but there is no running to others about them. I did not complain to my mother about Gary. I did not complain to my girlfriends about Gary. I never once complained to his parents about Gary. They would have been hurt, I think. They would not have been able to help. If I had a problem, I complained to Gary. We discussed our issues between us.

We shared the good stuff with others. We did not intend to portray a false impression of our relationship. Sure, we argued, we bickered, we hurt each other. But only we could address that between us. Our honesty was honestly shared.

Outside of Gary, I am inclined to lie about annoyances. It is unfortunate, perhaps even dishonest and unhelpful and mostly the result of how I was raised as a girl. Do you like turquoise clothing? No, but I will say yes. Is that okay with you? No, but sometimes I will not admit that. Did I hurt your feelings? Only to Gary will I immediately admit: Yes. Yes, you did.

I love him and respect him and we have both worked hard to build a relationship of trust and openness.

If that used diaper is still there tomorrow, Gary will take along an extra plastic bag to use to pick it up. Yes, he is a bit of a germ-phobe. He wakes up too early in the morning. He wants to be asleep by 8pm. He still listens sometimes to old rock-and-roll that I could never hear again and be satisfied.

These are not things I expect others to help me change. These are not even things I expect him to change. He has a list, I know, of my troubling habits. These are not character flaws. These are merely the ordinary wackiness any of us must learn to live with if we hope to have a family.