marriage

Of Walks and Walks-Through

Posted on by row20blog

This time of year, more than any other, brings a certain sameness.

My husband works in politics, and as each election cycle reaches its frenetic conclusion, I brace myself for what’s coming. Every year, there is a very predictable pattern. In the months leading up to the Tuesday following the first Monday in November, he is going full-throttle. It’s hard to describe political life to those who don’t live it, but I think the most relatable comparison I’ve come up with is that it’s akin to tax season for an accountant, but with a lot more swear words. The week after the election is consumed with wrap-up work. That is followed by an all-too-brief period in which he sort of crashes.

Then, one day, he wakes up and looks around, suddenly realizing he has an abundance of free time on his hands. Organizing is like oxygen to him. He can’t breathe without it. So he starts looking around the house to see what needs to be done. Light bulbs get changed. Little repairs get made. All of this sounds great, right? No. It’s awful. It’s awful because I know what’s next…large-scale organization of the house and its occupants. He sends me emails and texts about doing what he calls a “walk-through” of the house. It is exactly what it sounds like. We walk through the house from top to bottom (damn you, finished basement and loft space), and review “what needs done.” Never does my husband’s total lack of acquaintance with the infinitive “to be” aggravate me more than in the month of November.

I am a stacker. A piler of papers. I make little hills of stuff I need to put away…eventually. This habit of mine drives my husband bat-shit crazy. During the height of the election cycle, I’m exhausted from working full-time and essentially flying solo with the human child and the unruly fur-children, but at least no one is asking me “What’s the deal with this stuff on top of the dresser?” Or on the table, on The Thing, in the entry, etc. By mid-November, he’s not only asking me what the deal is, but he expects me to actually do something about it and he’s really kind of a nag about the whole thing. In my head – and sometimes not so much in my head as out of my mouth – I’m like, “Oh, my God, leave me the hell alone!” I will do almost anything to avoid a walk-through. I put him off with various excuses, but resistance is futile. He is nothing if not tenacious.

This period of time coincides with open enrollment at my work. I will confess to lingering on the “Legal Services” option, wondering if this is the year the walk-through finally drives me to seek legal counsel in the form of a divorce attorney.

But just when I think I can’t take any more, the phase passes. And when it’s over, I survey the house. I will admit this to you, but never, ever to him: it really does look better. We’ve identified repairs and projects that need to be done in the coming year. I hate it while it’s happening, but shit gets done.

He then moves on to the next phase, which is comprised entirely of movies. He spends pretty much the whole month of December at the movie theater. After we had our son and formed some fledgling friendships with other parents we met through daycare, I received a few carefully-worded messages from people concerned that perhaps something had happened with my husband’s job, because they noticed on Facebook he was checking into the local movie theater during the daytime with considerable frequency. I always breathe a tiny sigh of relief when the movie phase starts, because it means the end of the walk-through phase is near.

The other thing that happens this time of year is our wedding anniversary. At first, it seemed really stupid that we scheduled our wedding for three weeks after Election Day. Now, I kind of like it. By the time our anniversary rolls around, the dust has settled enough for me to take stock of the situation, and feel good that we made it through another cycle and another year.

Our first trip to Europe was an anniversary trip. London, Paris, Barcelona, Andorra. I had visions of us strolling hand-in-hand through historic avenues, gazing upward and taking in the wonder of the architecture of the Old World. I was genuinely bewildered when that wasn’t at all what happened.

Things came to a head on our first day in Barcelona. We set out on foot on the cobblestone streets. I was giddy. He was confused.

Husband: “What are we doing?”
Me: “We’re walking.”
Husband: “Right, but what are we doing?”
Me: “We’re walking.”
Husband: “But why?”
Me: “What do you mean, why?”
Husband: “Where are we going? What is our destination?”
Me: “I don’t have a specific destination.”
Husband: “What is the point of walking without a destination?”
Me. “…”

In this moment, the fundamental difference between the two of us hit me like a ton of bricks. It seems I’d completely forgotten who my traveling companion actually was: “It’s not a meeting without an agenda.” “Some is not a number, soon is not a time.” This man does not meander. We may have been in a different setting, but we were still the same people.

We’d bickered our way through two of the world’s great cities already. Neither of us wanted to bicker our way through Barcelona as well. So we took it as an opportunity to learn an important lesson in managing expectations. The next day, we agreed he would stay at the hotel and do whatever he felt like doing while I went out and wandered to my heart’s content. Fortunately, I am happy in my own company and have no qualms about going out on my own. I had a lovely little excursion. In the afternoon, at the agreed-upon time, we met at a museum we both wanted to visit.  On that trip, the lesson learned was the importance of accepting differences as just that – differences, not faults or flaws – and to find common ground.

I’ve applied that lesson many, many times in the years since that trip, in a multitude of situations, in almost all of my close relationships.

We have to know when to recognize and honor our differences – as in the case of Barcelona – and when to challenge them – as in the case of the walk-through. I hate the walk-through, but that side of my husband’s personality challenges my tendency toward complacency. It’s uncomfortable and I chafe every damn time, but it’s good for me, just as it’s good for each of us to walk our own path a bit before coming back together.

Note: There was much discussion and back-and-forthing about pluralizing “walk-through.” “Walk-throughs” sounds better in my head than “walks-through” but I finally had to concede that the “mothers-in-law” and “attorneys general” rule applied here. Stupid grammar.

Every Mistake, We Must Surely Be Learning

Posted on by row20blog

So many things happen when you have a baby. At the top of the list is finding a place to put the baby. In our case, this meant converting our tiny upstairs guest room into a tiny nursery, and my “craft room” into a play area. I am like a goldfish. I will take up as much space as is allotted me. Since most of our guests used the basement guest room, I’d gotten used to having both of those rooms to myself. I also have a difficult time parting with things. When it came time to clean out those rooms in order to have habitable space for a baby, it did not go well. It was very dramatic. There were tears. It’s possible some things were tossed out the second-story craft room window.

I was beyond excited about the prospect of motherhood. It was something I had hoped for madly but wasn’t sure would ever happen. It wasn’t that. But I was pissed that I was the one who was making all the room for the baby, both internally and externally. The baby was taking over my body and my space. My husband gave up one shelf for a few of my books.

In the aftermath, we had purged enough junk – seriously, it looked like a Michael’s craft store vomited in our alley – that the two rooms were empty and what was left of my stuff was crammed into a quirky piece of antique furniture known since my childhood as “The Thing” because no one has a clue as to its intended purpose.

For three years, I shoved my papers, office and craft supplies, books, etc. into The Thing. It was my own real-life Tetris game, trying to creatively stack and arrange bits and pieces to keep them contained, and I was losing.

One day, my husband had the audacity and, frankly, poor judgment to criticize the overflow. I…lost…my…shit. Lost it. I started ranting about how he and our son had entire rooms to themselves, and I had been relegated to one piece of furniture in one corner of one room. He shrugged and replied, “Okay, well, why don’t we convert the storage loft to a space for you?”

Fuck you and your calm logic, guy. But also, thank you. Yes, please, I would love to go to the Container Store and IKEA this weekend. I set about making a refuge for myself in the loft above our bedroom. One would think I learned from this incident that it’s a good thing to give people a heads-up if you have needs that are going unmet. I did not. I tend to learn lessons the hard way, and this was no exception.

Fast forward a few months, and I had a similar meltdown – this one via email – because I was feeling hugely resentful about not having any time or activities of my own. I was righteous in my indignation. Most email responses from my husband are literally one word. Some day I will write a post dedicated to all the ways I’ve used his tendency to simply reply “Ok” to my advantage. I don’t know what happened on this particular day, though, but my normally laconic husband let loose. He said if I wasn’t happy or pursuing personal enrichment, it was on me for not speaking up and I had no one to blame but myself.

That was not an entirely accurate statement. My husband is a true co-parent, but he has a demanding job and an insane travel schedule. Like most moms, my free time tends to be limited to that tiny little sliver between my son’s bedtime and my own. But my husband had thrown down the gauntlet (in writing, no less), so I was determined to take advantage of it.

I signed up for a beginning yoga class. Yoga and I were not a good match. I know that’s a blasphemous statement in today’s society. Most people find yoga calming and centering. My experience was the opposite. In fact, I had a harrowing vision in shavasana that scared the hell out of me. I recounted it to someone who works in the mental health field, and she said, “You know, maybe you’re someone who should not be left too much alone in your own head with your own thoughts.” Yep. That.

The other thing I wanted to do was learn to play the guitar. I’d thought about it for years. My dad played, and some of my best memories are of him and his guitar. I never hear “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” without remembering how it felt to sit next to him on our forest green living room sofa while he played classic rock on his acoustic guitar.

The challenge was working out the logistics of lessons. I knew I needed formal lessons – I’m not someone who can just get on YouTube and pick stuff up that way. I found a company that offered in-home instruction, so even if my husband was traveling, I wouldn’t have to skip lessons. I asked if it would be a problem that I needed a teacher who could come late in the evening after my son was asleep. The owner laughed and said, “These are musicians. Most of them don’t even wake up before two in the afternoon.” Perfect. Sign me up.

So I started learning the guitar. It was hard. And not just for the obvious reasons. It dredged up all kinds of memories and feelings from my school days. I’d always heard playing a musical instrument helps with math and some types of science because it uses the same part of the brain. That makes total sense to me now. Starting guitar lessons took me back to algebra, geometry, chemistry and the spiral of frustration and inadequacy.

One of the things I hated most about being identified as “gifted” was that all the other kids and teachers knew. “If you’re supposed to be so smart, why can’t you do this?” The worst was when I was the one asking that question.

Guitar did not come naturally to me. I started to feel that familiar, overwhelming pressure to “get it.” Guitar, which was supposed to be an outlet and a source of enjoyment, was causing me all kinds of angst.

About a month into lessons, I had a really rough week and didn’t practice at all. I dreaded the lesson. I thought about canceling, but decided to just own up to not practicing and face the inevitable disappointment from my teacher. He let me finish my profuse apologies, and then he said the most incredible thing: “There’s no reason for you to apologize. These are your lessons. I get paid whether you practice or not.”

Holy shit. He was right. This was my process. There were no tests. I wasn’t going to derail the syllabus if I took my time and learned at my own pace. If life got in the way and I couldn’t practice, there would be no punishment. I was driving the train.

It was a revelation.

For the first time in my life, I have the freedom to learn for the sake of learning. I get to tackle something that doesn’t come easily to me, just because I want to. There is zero pressure. I think it’s the most liberating thing that’s ever happened to me.

My teacher told me most people quit about 3-6 months into lessons because they realize how difficult it is. It takes a long time to be able to play anything that sounds remotely like music. I just passed the six-month mark and, let me tell you, I suck at playing the guitar. I am so bad. But someday, I’ll be good. I can’t tell you when that will happen. Guess what? I don’t have to. And that feels amazing.

Note: The title is from The Beatles’ “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” written by George Harrison and mastered by my dad. I finally have some appreciation for his accomplishment. Rock on, Dad. Miss you.