"I don't want to make any mistakes."
"You're of the wrong species then."
~ from the movie PS I Love You
I was more than antsy last night.
There was a point where I swear
the computer was calling to me as
insistently as any of my addictions ever have.
I found myself trying to make deals
within my head.
Trying to rationalize a way to go online
or pondering asking dearest one
to go on for me.
I even considered staying up until midnight
and then turning on the computer.
Maybe it will get easier every Sunday that goes by.
If not, there are so many worse things in the world.
I'll try not to make a full blown drama of it.
If it doesn't get easier then it's just telling me
something about myself. And, God help me,
life will do that until I die,
so it won't be anything new.
The wedding went fine.
The bride was beautiful.
She wore pink.
After the initial 15 seconds of taking off my coat
and standing in a swarm of women all in dresses and head coverings,
I didn't give what I was wearing (jeans) another thought.
That is a very hopeful happening.
Perhaps I'm a tad less self absorbed than I normally am.
It was beautiful to hear a group of young men
sing A Capella in 4 part harmony.
Dearest one's family
thinks musical instruments are of the world
so they sing without accompaniment.
I sat there before the service began and prayed
to be open to the beauty to be found,
instead of the nit picky things that I can downright enjoy
finding fault with.
I managed to choke/sputter only once
when the preacher said that he didn't want to make it seem
like love was hard
because it wasn't.
Lord have mercy on anyone who believes that.
I hate that a preacher said that to newlyweds.
At the pre wedding dinner two nights ago
I found myself snippy with dearest one
while visiting with family.
A habit I am so quick to judge in others.
I'm rarely snippy these days.
I've learned that snippiness means there are issues I am not facing.
Denial that I am sinking into.
Being snippy, especially in public, always sends up red flags that I am being
passive aggressive.
That whatever is gnawing at me under the surface
is making an attempt to be given a voice.
I watched as dearest one's body language went into freeze mode.
He got up and excused himself from the conversation we were
having with one of his sisters and her husband.
I sat there and thought about how they could go home and have a conversation
about the state of me and dearest one in that moment.
I see what I do.
We were not in the car on the way home
more than a moment
when I brought up his freeze mode
and my snarkiness.
We talked.
It was progress that it was spoken of immediately
instead of being left to fester into something uglier.
When we got home and he turned off the key,
the inside light came on and slowly illuminated his face.
Dearest one was looking at me and in his eyes
there was the deepest kindness.
I noticed.
I said nothing.
But I still hold it close in my heart.
There are but brief moments when I see,
truly see,
with eyes not my own.
Maybe that's what love is.
8 comments:
This is very beautiful.
Your snart husband demonstrated such classic non-codependent skills that it made me smile, right here just out of bed and all sleepy. Yeah. Get out of the way when I'm snippy too, detach until I wake up and talk about what I'm feeling. Heh.
What love is, is necessary. I am alive today because I was loved once, and still.
I find Love is easy. Maybe just for me, I don't know. It's dealing with myself that's hard. When I start to nitpick or I become snarky, now THAT'S hard to control!
Very nice. I understand the look..I have a dearest one too.
Great post Hope. I have found love to be work...lots of work on both sides, not bad, but work.
I too can get snarky when tired and just like you look at what is going on in me.
Thank you for this post...you know what too...maybe your divine inner beauty is shining through which is why you looked so great in jeans,and were probably the envy of all.
Hi Hope. Oh boy, I'd have been sputtering myself. Love is easy. And Christianity is fun. I wouldn't have it any other way. After all Jesus was having a zippy time coming down from the Father and hanging on that tree for us so why should it be any different for us?
Oops, that was snarky.
You know, preachers don't always actually *think* about what they are saying in the moment. I know I didn't always.
Love may be easy for some, depending on how that word gets defined. For me it's hard but it's good. It's very good but I wouldn't call it easy, not ever.
I'm in agreement. What a wonderful post. It is filled with "reality". You described everything so well. Thank you.
... the preacher said that he didn't want to make it seem like love was hard because it wasn't.
Lord have mercy on anyone who believes that. I hate that a preacher said that to ewlyweds.
If you hadn't spluttered, I would have done it for you.
When I was considering getting married (actually, looking for ways to justify doing the "it looks right" thing rather than "the right thing,") I told a man that I loved my fiancee. He said, "Yeah, well, I love pizza and the Three Stooges, too, but I wouldn't want to spend the next 40 years with either one. There has to be more than just 'being in love.'"
My partner and I have been "in love" a lot longer than we have "loved." The hard stuff is being in an open, honest relationship with the one you love. That takes a bunch of work, because honesty and openness doesn't often come easy to us humans.
The fact that your relationship with Dearest One is as self-repairing as it is testifies to the work you've both done to preserve it. (Including your journey into treatment, I might add...) Celebrate that, and leave the self-nit-picking to someone better suited to do it.
Or, as my pastor used to tell me, "Get down off the cross - we need the wood."
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