It *really* matters how a person treats the fact that I'm a widow. And even more than just a general person, it really really really matters how a guy who is interested in me treats the fact that I'm a widow. Because that's it- it is a fact. Nathan is a part of who I am. And he always will be. You can't be so in love with a person and not have that love change you... and it's certainly impossible to be married to someone without it changing you. The "two become one" isn't just about sex... it's about becoming a "we" -about being unable to be separated in people's minds. Being part of a whole rather than a whole unto yourself. Nathan is the greatest thing that's ever happened to me thus far. That's not to say that I don't expect more great things to happen to me, and that's not to say I haven't had far more amazing people and events in my life than I deserve besides him... but as of right now, he's the top.
So, as a good friend of mine put it when I was talking about it this weekend, "The guy you want to eventually be with will think that it's great that you had a great relationship before, and tragic that it ended, but equally great and redemptive that you two met."
All I could say after that was, "Exactly. Exactly."
I could never be with a person who thought that my marriage to Nathan is a flaw in me... something that he has to forgive me for and work past and find strength to overcome. If it brings up insecurities in him, I can understand that. If it brings up fear that I will compare him, I get it. If it brings up confusion or even jealousy, I'm prepared for that, but Nathan was not a mistake I made, and I cannot and *will not* accept someone who thinks it was or makes me feel like he views it as such.
I was reading a book... well, actually I was skimming a book, written by two sisters whose husbands were killed in the same accident, making them young widows in the same moment. They talk about a lot of things that I recognize or understand about being a widow, but they also briefly tell about meeting their new husbands after being widows. The thing that is the clearest in both situations is that the men they would eventually marry understand that they have loved and lost and not only understand but respect that in these women. One wonders what he could "possibly have to offer you?" (Because he is younger and has less "life experience.") The other goes and finds her husband's grave site- not when they are getting serious, or even when they are dating, but before the girl had even really shown any interest at all, because he wanted to understand her better. He wanted to better know how to pray for her. Both of those are pretty extreme examples, and while I definitely appreciate the huge gesture of secretly going to find Nathan's grave, I don't *need* that.
But reading it made me cry, because there is a part of what those men did for their wives that I *do* need, if I get anything at all. What I have to have- What I absolutely cannot compromise on, is that this guy, this person, this Mr. Right, he has to get it. He has to understand that part of what he likes about me came from my marriage to this great guy... and losing him was tragic and hard but that somehow God reforged me. He has to rejoice that I found such happiness, and mourn that I had to go through something so soul-wrenching, and rejoice again that the broken road somehow led us to each other. And he can never imply that I need to be forgiven for loving my husband... or he'll never be able to be my husband. I did nothing wrong.
One of the sisters talks about a fear that loving another person means that you will lose the love you have for your first spouse. That somehow this new love will remove your old love from your heart. But that's not how it works and she makes the comparison to a mother and her children. Does a mother lose love for her first child when her second is born? Of course not- love isn't finite like that- Love grows. Each child carves out his or her own special place in our heart and love for one doesn't diminish love for another. Nathan has a place in my heart that is all his, and always will be.
Oh hey, Happy Valentine's Day, ya'll.
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