My house is in chaos. There is a box-lined path to the safety of my computer and my living room is stuffed with collapsed boxes and bins. Why did I also decide that this would be a good time to meet all my normal social obligations and also add a small work out?
Oh I know- I'm completely nuts.
I found myself saddened today by a statement: "Marriage is forever."
It's not. "Marriage is until death do you part." Yes. That it is. Ok, so I know my slogan isn't as catchy but it's a lot more true.
I get what they were trying to say: Divorce is not good and all that, but.. "marriage is forever"?!? God is forever, I even accede that love is forever. And forever is certainly forever. But then I thought to myself... Cut them some slack, Renée. The people who are saying that... the people who wrote that... they've never lost a spouse...it isn't that common of a thing for anyone under the age of 70
And then it hit me. Most of the people I know haven't lost a spouse. And sure, ok, it's to be expected that people my age haven't, but then I realized something....
My mom has never lost a spouse.
My mom's mom has never lost a spouse.
(Sadly, my paternal grandma has lost two. My actual grandfather a little after my dad graduated high school and the man I knew as my grandfather a few years ago.)
But I guess the point is that as a little girl you kinda gauge your life after your mom's. There is an order and a pattern all laid out for you. Grow up, graduate high school with good grades, go to college, meet the man of your dreams, marry him, have kids, ect. And everything that happens to you happened to her, only 25 years earlier. It's a very safe life plan and I know some girls who are adamant about sticking to the timeline their mother forged before them.
I wasn't that much of a stickler, but I did derive some comfort from comparing our lives and seeing the symmetry.
But then cancer comes and screws everything up.
And I'm into completely uncharted territory now... Totally off the map in a "Here there be dragons" kinda way. I don't have a compass or a lodestone or even a dowsing rod. I need/needed to move to a different apartment. It's an outward symbol of an inward change.
But golly gee, it is not easy.
I really miss laughing. It's not that I've stopped laughing... it's just that I don't laugh nearly as often. Nathan and I laughed a lot. He always said he wasn't that funny but I thought he was hilarious. And he would laugh at my silly antics... sometimes I still do the silly things and laugh at myself ...but it turns out a good deal of those antics were just to make him smile.
This upheaval is good for me. This upheaval is good for me. This upheaval is good for me. *wanders off muttering under her breath and navigating very tall stacks of boxes.*
He WAS hilarious. In some ways, he was funnier because he thought he WASN'T. :-) Or, to say it a more precise way: Nathan's humor was not self-consciously funny--he didn't TRY to be funny. And that made it all the more joyous because he was being as God designed him to be.
ReplyDeleteYou're right...marriage isn't forever. It IS as you've said.
Do you spend time talking to your paternal grandmother about what you're going through? I mean, I'd guess that you have and/or do, but on the off chance you don't, it could help.
Renee, I'm really glad you have this blog.