He walked away and didn't smile
The man will leave
The boy will cry
To stand out in his freedom
But his freedom hasn't freed him
And they spoke in faith
They prayed their vows
Her broken face is longing now
To turn back the hands of time
But she doesn't know how
Four years ago today.
How time flies. How time crawls.
It's not that I wish my life was different.
I love my life. I love the person I've become in the last four years.
A person filled with more patience, more compassion, more understanding, more grace that I could ever have dreamed I would possess.
A person who has learned to see the beauty in the broken; who has learned to look for beauty scattered amongst the ashes.
A person who has learned that within the black and white lines of judgement, there needs to exist some space for the greys of empathy.
But there is a part of me that will never forget.
There is a part of me that will always wonder.
What about the promise that we made
And the vows we freely made before God
Wonder what he's thinking of...
The promise
The promise that we made
The longing heart, the searching soul
Will search and never find a home
'Til Jesus comes and takes control
And he takes the promises that you left behind
He resurrects the dead to life
And you can run but you can't hide from your life
Today, I'm breathing in the small mercies of a new day.
I'm breathing in mercy.
I'm breathing.
Safe in the home that this searching soul has found; this longing heart now resurrected and renewed; living again, loving again, I have learned that running, hiding from my life gets me nowhere. Pretending is futile; forgetting impossible. The promise was made. Broken, now, but that promise, those vows, were made. They cannot be unsaid.
And so, though most days he is far from my thoughts, I admit it:
Today, I wonder.
What about the promise that we made
And the vows we freely made before God
Wonder what he's thinking of...
The promise
The promise that we made
And although your heart is breaking now
Just let it go and let God turn it
Turn it all around, yeah
Turn it all around, yeah...
This is my story.
This is my past.
This is what has, in large part, shaped me into the person that I am.
And for that, for the journey here, for the lessons learned, for the hope gained, for the future to come, I am unspeakably grateful.
Oh the promise
The promise that we made
The Promise,
by Cindy Morgan
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Saturday, September 25, 2010
juliahendrikmusic
So it's official.
I now have a music blog, also through Blogspot...
www.juliahendrikmusic.blogspot.com
...and a brand-new music profile on MySpace.
www.myspace.com/juliahendrikmusic
For those who aren't necessarily in the know, much of the last year of my life has been spent towards achieving a lifelong dream: the production of an album of original songs. I'm almost there. Now it's just getting the critical pieces in place to allow this album to be publicized and shared in this technologically driven society.
Oh. And if you're wondering why it's 'Julia Hendrik', here's the scoop:
When I was a little girl, I loved the idea that authors wrote under pen names; that actors performed under stage names; that a person's identity could be something completely different in a public forum than it might be in private. Also, knowing that I wanted to eventually assume my husband's name, I spent long hours thinking about what my alias might be, should I ever pursue a career in the arts that might make me publicly recognizable. I wanted a professional name that would still be very personal, but memorable and interesting as well.
Hendrik is my father's middle name. Growing up, my siblings and I had often heard the story of how when my parents met, my father was calling himself Hendrik - the thinking being that his Estonian first name, Jaan (pronounced the same way as 'yawn') was too often mispronounced. Interestingly enough, my mother, within their first couple of dates, asked my father what his family called him, and decided that she, too, would call him Jaan, not Hendrik.
Foreshadowing, perhaps, their future?
Besides having similarities to the name Jimi Hendrix, a legendary musical great; besides being easily pronounceable; besides the obvious nod to my Baltic heritage; besides all of these things, assuming the name Hendrik also felt like a part of me, a part of my history. It is also a permanent tie to my childhood, to my family, regardless of what my married name might turn out to be. Thank goodness for that, retrospectively, and also in looking ahead to the time when my surname will hopefully change once more.
Plus, I can't tell you just how my dad's eyes twinkled when I officially asked him if he would be okay with me using his middle name as my professional name.
Thus, Julia Hendrik it is.
I now have a music blog, also through Blogspot...
www.juliahendrikmusic.blogspot.com
...and a brand-new music profile on MySpace.
www.myspace.com/juliahendrikmusic
For those who aren't necessarily in the know, much of the last year of my life has been spent towards achieving a lifelong dream: the production of an album of original songs. I'm almost there. Now it's just getting the critical pieces in place to allow this album to be publicized and shared in this technologically driven society.
Oh. And if you're wondering why it's 'Julia Hendrik', here's the scoop:
When I was a little girl, I loved the idea that authors wrote under pen names; that actors performed under stage names; that a person's identity could be something completely different in a public forum than it might be in private. Also, knowing that I wanted to eventually assume my husband's name, I spent long hours thinking about what my alias might be, should I ever pursue a career in the arts that might make me publicly recognizable. I wanted a professional name that would still be very personal, but memorable and interesting as well.
Hendrik is my father's middle name. Growing up, my siblings and I had often heard the story of how when my parents met, my father was calling himself Hendrik - the thinking being that his Estonian first name, Jaan (pronounced the same way as 'yawn') was too often mispronounced. Interestingly enough, my mother, within their first couple of dates, asked my father what his family called him, and decided that she, too, would call him Jaan, not Hendrik.
Foreshadowing, perhaps, their future?
Besides having similarities to the name Jimi Hendrix, a legendary musical great; besides being easily pronounceable; besides the obvious nod to my Baltic heritage; besides all of these things, assuming the name Hendrik also felt like a part of me, a part of my history. It is also a permanent tie to my childhood, to my family, regardless of what my married name might turn out to be. Thank goodness for that, retrospectively, and also in looking ahead to the time when my surname will hopefully change once more.
Plus, I can't tell you just how my dad's eyes twinkled when I officially asked him if he would be okay with me using his middle name as my professional name.
Thus, Julia Hendrik it is.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
aches and pains
Enough with the laziness is what I said. Right?
After not regularly doing anything active for most of the summer, both J. and I went back at it hard this week: gym workouts, intense classes, running.
I am paying for it. Every muscle in my body is screaming.
Monday was a BodyFlow class at the gym. Tuesday was Eva's BCBD class.
As though the class alone wasn't enough to make me hurt for several days, J. and I decided we would on run on Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays...
so it was approximately 4-5k runs each night on Wednesday and Thursday.
Followed by another BCBD class on Friday evening.
This morning, every muscle in my body screaming (my quads, my hamstrings, my calves, my gluts, my abs, my biceps, my triceps, my pecs and my back...oh, my poor, aching back!) I pretty much died after only 2k on our proposed Saturday morning run. I jogged at a very leisurely place back home while J. went on ahead.
Then we stretched for longer than we'd even run.
I sound like I'm complaining. I'm not, really. Although I'm physically sore and completely spent of energy and therefore needing a bit more sleep than my usual 5 hours a night, I feel good. Exercising is a must for me. As lovely as the lazy summer was, I was longing for this feeling of sore satisfaction, of muscle fatigue, of exhaustion. By the end of the summer, I was starting to feel as I did when I was forced into 6 weeks of inactivity after I was hit by a car back in February 2009. Quite simply, I wasn't feeling great. Not physically, not mentally.
J. and I have been discussing this week how much of working out is the impact it has on our mental health. No, I don't look any different now than I did a week ago. It'll take more than a week for the muscles that have softened and atrophied to firm up and strengthen again. But do I feel different? Definitely. I feel better about myself both when I look in the mirror and when I have my moments of soul searching introspection, which happen almost daily.
When I'm not physically active, I get restless. I get anxious. It's as though my brain picks up where my body is inert. I overthink absolutely everything. I get distracted and discouraged; complacent and competitive. I'm not a nice person to be around, and I don't want to be around people.
Forgive me if I've seemed this way of late. I won't be any longer.
Well, as soon as I'm no longer a limping hunchback.
First week workout burn.
Did I mention that it hurts?
After not regularly doing anything active for most of the summer, both J. and I went back at it hard this week: gym workouts, intense classes, running.
I am paying for it. Every muscle in my body is screaming.
It hurts.
It's wonderful.
It's wonderful.
Monday was a BodyFlow class at the gym. Tuesday was Eva's BCBD class.
As though the class alone wasn't enough to make me hurt for several days, J. and I decided we would on run on Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays...
so it was approximately 4-5k runs each night on Wednesday and Thursday.
Followed by another BCBD class on Friday evening.
This morning, every muscle in my body screaming (my quads, my hamstrings, my calves, my gluts, my abs, my biceps, my triceps, my pecs and my back...oh, my poor, aching back!) I pretty much died after only 2k on our proposed Saturday morning run. I jogged at a very leisurely place back home while J. went on ahead.
Then we stretched for longer than we'd even run.
I sound like I'm complaining. I'm not, really. Although I'm physically sore and completely spent of energy and therefore needing a bit more sleep than my usual 5 hours a night, I feel good. Exercising is a must for me. As lovely as the lazy summer was, I was longing for this feeling of sore satisfaction, of muscle fatigue, of exhaustion. By the end of the summer, I was starting to feel as I did when I was forced into 6 weeks of inactivity after I was hit by a car back in February 2009. Quite simply, I wasn't feeling great. Not physically, not mentally.
J. and I have been discussing this week how much of working out is the impact it has on our mental health. No, I don't look any different now than I did a week ago. It'll take more than a week for the muscles that have softened and atrophied to firm up and strengthen again. But do I feel different? Definitely. I feel better about myself both when I look in the mirror and when I have my moments of soul searching introspection, which happen almost daily.
When I'm not physically active, I get restless. I get anxious. It's as though my brain picks up where my body is inert. I overthink absolutely everything. I get distracted and discouraged; complacent and competitive. I'm not a nice person to be around, and I don't want to be around people.
Forgive me if I've seemed this way of late. I won't be any longer.
Well, as soon as I'm no longer a limping hunchback.
First week workout burn.
Did I mention that it hurts?
Sunday, September 12, 2010
compatible companionship
It struck me last week how rare compatibility is, how special.
Four days at J.'s cottage. No phone. No internet. No television.
Just the two of us, in a small cottage, watching the rain fall steadily. Hours a day, days on end. It was a true test of compatibility.
It hit me on Tuesday evening.
We needed to pick up some dishwashing detergent, and decided to walk the kilometre or two to the small convenience store located on a somewhat main road. Hand in hand, dressed warmly in our sweatshirts, decked out in our running shoes (which, unless we're working out, you will never find either J. or I wearing otherwise), we walked. We walked, and talked, and talked some more. We were giddy with the headiness of being the only two people around. Literally. No one else was silly enough to be cottaging in September, in the freezing cold. We arrived back at the cottage at dusk, went for a frigid dip and a warm shower. Then, lights dim, candles blazing, we began our evening: cooking together, wine in hand, the mellow music of Coldplay on in the background.
It hit me on Wednesday afternoon.
The rain intermittently drizzled and poured throughout the afternoon. J. was sitting on the couch, playing a game on his computer. I was curled up in the armchair across from him with a blanket and a book. We sat in silence for hours; no music, no talking. Every once in a while, one or the other of us would catch the other gazing across the room, and we'd share a smile. We didn't even need words.
It hit me again on Thursday night.
We'd driven all afternoon, and were headed to the Stratford Festival to see a show: Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris. As a child, spending summers at his cottage, J.'s grandfather had played records of many different musicals, and Jacques Brel was J.'s favourite. Having studied musical theatre, I know several of the songs from the musical myself; and, as fate would have it, it was one of the shows being performed in Stratford this year. Sitting hand in hand, clearly the youngest people voluntarily in attendance on that given day, J. and I both equally enjoyed the show. His eyes lit up at certain songs. He applauded vigorously. He understood my criticisms and offered a few of his own. Best of all, he agreed with me that we should do it more often.
Sometimes, I marvel at how easy it is. I feel, sometimes, like it can't possibly be this easy. It can't possibly involve so little drama. It can't possibly stay so wonderful. Here's the thing, though: it is because we work at it. For the first time in my life, really, I feel completely unselfish with him, and he with me. Both introspective by nature, both contemplative and over-analyzing and hyper-sensitive, J. and I can tell in the nuance of a certain tone that something is wrong. And both of us, equally, work to make things better. We work to maintain that balance, not looking for conflict or seeking control. We work to keep the peace.
There is a difference between companionship, and compatible companionship.
compatible
(adjective)
1 : capable of existing together in harmony :
compatible theories; compatible people
2 : capable of cross-fertilizing freely or uniting vegetatively
3 : capable of forming a homogeneous mixture that neither separates nor is altered by chemical interaction
My parents have always gone for walks together. As children, we used to roll our eyes as they donned their running shoes and set off every night at dusk, walking leisurely down Lake Drive at our cottage. More recently, they've been known to set off on long journeys through High Park, thermoses of coffee in hand. But now, I understand it. It's the shared, easy companionship of a couple who want nothing more than to spend a few quality moments together, walking, talking. Privately inhabiting a world where the main priority is togetherness, and cherishing whatever intimate alone time they can share together.
Everyone desires companionship, the fellowship of another person or a group of people. It's a gift, though, when companionship isn't just company, whatever that may mean. Instead, the gift of compatibility is found in existing together with another person in harmony; it is in the free uniting of two people; it is in the creation of a homogeneous mixture of personalities that does not separate; it is in the transfusion, the grafting of lives together; it is in the design that allows two individual systems, two individual people, to work together without major modification.
J. and I have such companionship.
And I cannot say it enough.
Four days at J.'s cottage. No phone. No internet. No television.
Just the two of us, in a small cottage, watching the rain fall steadily. Hours a day, days on end. It was a true test of compatibility.
It could have been a disaster.
It could have resulted in extreme moodiness. It could have led to hours spent arguing, no real refuge to be found from hurtful words or frustrated tears. It certainly could have induced a claustrophobic sense of being cooped-up and stir-crazy and bored to tears. It definitely could have resulted in isolation.It was heaven.
It hit me on Tuesday evening.
We needed to pick up some dishwashing detergent, and decided to walk the kilometre or two to the small convenience store located on a somewhat main road. Hand in hand, dressed warmly in our sweatshirts, decked out in our running shoes (which, unless we're working out, you will never find either J. or I wearing otherwise), we walked. We walked, and talked, and talked some more. We were giddy with the headiness of being the only two people around. Literally. No one else was silly enough to be cottaging in September, in the freezing cold. We arrived back at the cottage at dusk, went for a frigid dip and a warm shower. Then, lights dim, candles blazing, we began our evening: cooking together, wine in hand, the mellow music of Coldplay on in the background.
It hit me on Wednesday afternoon.
The rain intermittently drizzled and poured throughout the afternoon. J. was sitting on the couch, playing a game on his computer. I was curled up in the armchair across from him with a blanket and a book. We sat in silence for hours; no music, no talking. Every once in a while, one or the other of us would catch the other gazing across the room, and we'd share a smile. We didn't even need words.
It hit me again on Thursday night.
We'd driven all afternoon, and were headed to the Stratford Festival to see a show: Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris. As a child, spending summers at his cottage, J.'s grandfather had played records of many different musicals, and Jacques Brel was J.'s favourite. Having studied musical theatre, I know several of the songs from the musical myself; and, as fate would have it, it was one of the shows being performed in Stratford this year. Sitting hand in hand, clearly the youngest people voluntarily in attendance on that given day, J. and I both equally enjoyed the show. His eyes lit up at certain songs. He applauded vigorously. He understood my criticisms and offered a few of his own. Best of all, he agreed with me that we should do it more often.
Sometimes, I marvel at how easy it is. I feel, sometimes, like it can't possibly be this easy. It can't possibly involve so little drama. It can't possibly stay so wonderful. Here's the thing, though: it is because we work at it. For the first time in my life, really, I feel completely unselfish with him, and he with me. Both introspective by nature, both contemplative and over-analyzing and hyper-sensitive, J. and I can tell in the nuance of a certain tone that something is wrong. And both of us, equally, work to make things better. We work to maintain that balance, not looking for conflict or seeking control. We work to keep the peace.
There is a difference between companionship, and compatible companionship.
compatible
(adjective)
1 : capable of existing together in harmony :
compatible theories; compatible people
2 : capable of cross-fertilizing freely or uniting vegetatively
3 : capable of forming a homogeneous mixture that neither separates nor is altered by chemical interaction
4 : capable of being used in transfusion or grafting without immunological reaction (as agglutination or tissue rejection)
5 : designed to work with another device or system without modification; especially : being a computer designed to operate in the same manner and use the same software as another computer
(from Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary)
(from Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary)
My parents have always gone for walks together. As children, we used to roll our eyes as they donned their running shoes and set off every night at dusk, walking leisurely down Lake Drive at our cottage. More recently, they've been known to set off on long journeys through High Park, thermoses of coffee in hand. But now, I understand it. It's the shared, easy companionship of a couple who want nothing more than to spend a few quality moments together, walking, talking. Privately inhabiting a world where the main priority is togetherness, and cherishing whatever intimate alone time they can share together.
Everyone desires companionship, the fellowship of another person or a group of people. It's a gift, though, when companionship isn't just company, whatever that may mean. Instead, the gift of compatibility is found in existing together with another person in harmony; it is in the free uniting of two people; it is in the creation of a homogeneous mixture of personalities that does not separate; it is in the transfusion, the grafting of lives together; it is in the design that allows two individual systems, two individual people, to work together without major modification.
J. and I have such companionship.
And I cannot say it enough.
I am grateful.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
here it is again
All of a sudden, the season has changed. There is a new spark in the air, a new energy, a sense of anticipation, of remembrance, of loss, of hope. Over the years, this time of year has represented so many things for me. Here it is again.
The temperature has dropped about 10 degrees overnight.
The much-awaited week at J.'s cottage has flown by in a blur of comfy sweats, tender cuddles, heartfelt conversation, midnight movie-watching, frigid swims, delicious food, and long walks to town for yummy fudge.
The workout itch has seriously begun, the last of the summer laziness has worked its way out of my system. Just in time for Eva Redpath and her Body Conditioning By Dancers class to kick my butt twice a week, on Tuesday and Friday evenings, throughout the fall. It starts in three days. Yikes. This woman is hardcore.
Check it out.
www.evaredpath.com
Goodbye, summer.
Hello, autumn.
I can't wait for what the rest of this year will bring.
September has arrived.
The temperature has dropped about 10 degrees overnight.
The much-awaited week at J.'s cottage has flown by in a blur of comfy sweats, tender cuddles, heartfelt conversation, midnight movie-watching, frigid swims, delicious food, and long walks to town for yummy fudge.
The workout itch has seriously begun, the last of the summer laziness has worked its way out of my system. Just in time for Eva Redpath and her Body Conditioning By Dancers class to kick my butt twice a week, on Tuesday and Friday evenings, throughout the fall. It starts in three days. Yikes. This woman is hardcore.
Check it out.
www.evaredpath.com
Goodbye, summer.
Hello, autumn.
I can't wait for what the rest of this year will bring.
Saturday, August 28, 2010
committed
I just finished reading a book. Literally just finished.
Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage.
It's the follow-up to the best-selling book Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert, now a major motion picture starring Julia Roberts.
First of all, let me say: this is going to be a very long post.
Consider yourself warned.
Let me also add that if I could choose to emulate one modern-day writer, it would be this woman. With unabashed sarcasm, wry wit, and obvious intelligence, she takes the reader on a journey through her emotional highs and lows while still very persuasively conveying her educated thoughts and opinions on a whole array of subjects, particularly the topic of marriage.
Two summers ago, in the middle of one of the most lost, frustrating and painful times I hope ever to live through, I picked up Eat, Pray, Love, which had come highly recommended by several very trusted friends. I had just returned home from a trip to Cuba with my dear friend L., a much-needed getaway for both of us as we recovered from devastating break ups, and I was instantly hooked. Here was a woman who spoke my language. Here was a woman who, living through the cataclysmic effects of a divorce, struggling through severe depression in the aftermath, decided to take a year-long trip to several different countries in order to truly discover who she was and how to make peace with her life.
In Italy, she ate; in India, she prayed; in Indonesia, she loved.
I didn't take a trip around the world. I had no such desire to gorge on Italian decadence, meditate in yogic silence in an Indian ashram, or delve into Southeast Asian culture in an Indonesian hut. Hardly. I did, however, impulsively book a trip to London, England. All alone, sleeping on the couch of a virtual stranger I'd met in Cuba (who did, let me just say, became a good friend), I set off to spend fifteen days in the city I'd always wanted most to visit.
I walked twelve hours a day, buying a day pass for the tube and getting off wherever I felt like it to explore; journal in my bag at all times, I stopped several times a day for a tea, a scone and a quiet moment to explore my thoughts and note my surroundings. It was wonderful, it was healing, it was necessary; in the end, it gave me the courage to come home and, just days later, make the phone call that would set the final stages of my divorce in motion.
When I heard, several months ago, that a follow-up book had been published, I was curious. I was even more curious to learn that the book was about the author's views on marriage. She had made it very clear in the first book that she was finished with marriage; she was adamant about her desire never to get married again, even though she had, on her travels, met and fallen in love with a Brazilian man.
Similarly, just getting out of my marriage, I was fairly adamant myself that I didn't think I ever wanted to go down that road again. Then, of course, unexpectedly, J. happened. On my travels as well, ironically enough: we met on vacation in the Dominican Republic, and just happened to live in the same city. Suddenly, I was caught up in a vortex of new emotions, terrified and exhilarated and wondering every second what I was doing, knowing what I knew about the end of love. As J. will tell you, I spent most of the first year of our relationship waiting for the other shoe to drop, so to speak; waiting for the land mine to explode under me and once again blow apart my heart.
But here we are now, very serious and very much in love, and I've stopped expecting the worst. I've stopped looking for disaster to strike. It was only natural, then, that I would get around to reading this book; that, beginning to put my own fears aside in once again contemplating a lifetime of marriage to a man that I love, I would be prepared to understand this woman's journey to embracing her own marriage.
Understand it I have.
Challenged I will continue to be.
Hopeful I am, as a result.
I want to quote several different passages from this book, and then expound upon them. Will you stick with me if I do? I know it's long. It's just that there's so much I feel she explains so well, so perfectly; so many things I can relate to and empathize with, said in words that I quite frankly wish I'd written myself.
Here goes, then.
...correct in one respect (we will all be fine eventually), but dead wrong in another respect (we will never entirely move past it, either). In this sense, we divorced folk are something like twentieth-century Japan: We had a culture which was prewar and we have a culture which is postwar, and right between those two histories lies a giant smoking hole.
I will do virtually anything to avoid going through that apocalypse again. But I recognize there's always the possibility of another divorce...because love-based unions make for strangely fragile tethers. I'm not giving up on love, mind you. I still believe in it. But maybe that's the problem. Maybe divorce is the tax we collectively pay as a culture for daring to believe in love - or at least, for daring to link love to such a vital social contract as matrimony. Maybe it is not love and marriage that go together like a horse and carriage after all. Maybe it is love and divorce that go together...like a carriage and a horse.
It's been famously said that second marriage is the triumph of hope over experience, but I'm not entirely sure that's true. It seems to me that first marriages are more hope-drenched affairs, awash in vast expectations and easy optimism. Second marriages are cloaked, I think, in something else: a respect for forces that are bigger than us, maybe. A respect that perhaps even approaches awe.
Committed, page 83-85
How insanely, brilliantly true. If the only thing that holds together a marriage is love, then it is a fickle marriage at best. If there is no commitment, if there is no understanding that the shifting nature of personal happiness is not the be-all and end-all of life, if there is no mutual agreement to work things out at all costs, then why marry at all? Love is a choice. Modern-day society has no need of marriage for economic or political reasons, leaving the decision to marry solely in the hands of the emotionally impassioned.
Dangerous? Certainly.
Disastrous? All too often.
So, yes, my love affair...had a wonderful element of romance to it, which I will always cherish. But it was not an infatuation, and here's how I can tell: because I did not demand that he become my Great Emancipator or my Source of All Life, nor did I immediately vanish into that man's chest cavity like a twisted, unrecognizable, parasitical homunculus. During our long period of courtship, I remained intact within my own personality, and I allowed myself to meet...for who he was. In each other's eyes, we may very well have seemed beautiful and perfect and heroic beyond measure, but I never lost sight of our actual realities.
We were two nice enough people, bearing the wounds of some very massive personal disappointments, and we were looking for something that might simply be possible in each other - a certain kindness, a certain attentiveness, a certain shared yearning to trust and be trusted.
To this day, I refuse to burden him with the tremendous responsibility of somehow completing me. By this point in in my life I have figured out that he cannot complete me, even if he wanted to. I've faced enough of my own incompletions to recognize that they belong solely to me. Having learned this essential truth, I can actually tell now where I end and where somebody else begins...as nicely defined by C.S. Lewis, when he wrote of his wife,
'We both knew this: I had my miseries, not hers; she had hers, not mine.'
One plus one, in other words, is sometimes supposed to equal two.
Commitment, page 105-106
I don't believe that I realized just how much I depended on my first marriage to somehow fulfill me, to complete me, to bring me unending bliss. Don't get me wrong; I loved him with everything I had. It's just, perhaps, that I didn't really know how to love him and love myself at the same time, and I dove in with unrealistic expectations. I didn't realize how my need to have him complete me was basically a demonstration to him that I would dissolve into the entity of our marriage as though I had nothing that he couldn't absorb. But I did, and I do, as does every human being, and when this became clear to me, it was too late. In fact, I think he expected me to dissolve regardless, as he said many times in many different ways. I didn't realize just how difficult that was going to be. It proved to be impossible; as a result, the marriage proved to be untenable for him, and looking back with perspective, ultimately it would have eventually become unbearable for me as well.
With J., on the other hand, I know my weaknesses. I know my fears, I know my failings, I know my needs, and I know that he's never going to fill all the gaps, try as he might. And I, too, will never fill all of his. Still, we love each other fiercely, protectively, with a selflessness I could never have imagined I was capable of demonstrating. Perhaps this is because we are both all too keenly aware of our shortcomings, and are both unfailingly honest and up front about them.
Whatever the reason may be, I feel more with every passing day that this time, the equation will not be faulty: one real, flawed person plus another real, flawed person does equal two. And two real, flawed, vulnerable, open, honest people who love each other is far better than two scared, unrealistic, closed off, angry, resentful people. Any day. Even if they really do love each other.
When I tried to sort out my resistance to a public wedding ceremony, I had to admit that part of the issue was simple embarrassment. How very awkward to stand in front of one's family and friends (many of whom had been guests at one's first wedding) and swear solemn vows for life all over again. Hadn't they all seen this film already? One's credibility does begin to tarnish after too much of this sort of thing...To paraphrase Oscar Wilde: one divorce may be regarded as a misfortune, but two begins to smack of carelessness.
...how those two little indicting words - this time - make me cringe. Yet it was true. The recollections of last time felt all too recent for me, too painful. Also, I didn't like the idea that guests at a bride's second wedding are just as likely to be thinking about her first spouse as they are to be thinking about her new spouse - and that the bride, too, will probably be remembering her ex-husband on that day. First spouses, I have learned, don't ever really go away - even if you aren't speaking to them any more. They are phantoms who dwell in the corners of our new love stories, never entirely vanishing from sight, materializing in our minds whenever they please, offering up unwelcome comments or bits of painfully accurate criticism.
Committed, page 241-242
Ah. There it is, one of my biggest fears about getting married again: the actual ceremony itself. Sure, I'll pick out an exquisite dress, choose beautiful flowers, and walk down a candlelit aisle to my love; but why do other people need to be there? Isn't it really just about the two of us? And, even if family and friends are present to celebrate with the bride and groom, why must it become a spectacle for those phantoms of the first time to witness as well? Why are those ghosts allowed the opportunity to play brutal games of comparison inside my head, to make me agonizingly question myself over and over?
Still, it will be a first for J. And, because of that, I will banish my fears to the darkest recesses of my mind, silence the ghosts, and pray that the day, when it comes, will be new, different, and more incredible than anything I could have imagined. Because it will, ultimately, be about us, and that "us" is more incredible than anything I could have imagined.
It's fitting that the title of this book represents how I now feel about marriage. It's not just about infatuation or love. It's not just about who my parents would have chosen, or what my siblings think, or how well he gets along with my friends.
(Lest you worry, there's not a single person who's seen J. and I together who has ever expressed a negative opinion. Not so with my first marriage, let me say).
Remember the horse and carriage...or the carriage and the horse?
Marriage is, ultimately, about commitment. Through the good times and the bad, whether deliriously happy or desperately sad, I want to know that at the end of the day, my commitment to the man I marry will last a lifetime. For in the end, it's not about love. It's about the commitment that joins two hearts and lives together.
Come what may.
Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage.
It's the follow-up to the best-selling book Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert, now a major motion picture starring Julia Roberts.
First of all, let me say: this is going to be a very long post.
Consider yourself warned.
Let me also add that if I could choose to emulate one modern-day writer, it would be this woman. With unabashed sarcasm, wry wit, and obvious intelligence, she takes the reader on a journey through her emotional highs and lows while still very persuasively conveying her educated thoughts and opinions on a whole array of subjects, particularly the topic of marriage.
Two summers ago, in the middle of one of the most lost, frustrating and painful times I hope ever to live through, I picked up Eat, Pray, Love, which had come highly recommended by several very trusted friends. I had just returned home from a trip to Cuba with my dear friend L., a much-needed getaway for both of us as we recovered from devastating break ups, and I was instantly hooked. Here was a woman who spoke my language. Here was a woman who, living through the cataclysmic effects of a divorce, struggling through severe depression in the aftermath, decided to take a year-long trip to several different countries in order to truly discover who she was and how to make peace with her life.
In Italy, she ate; in India, she prayed; in Indonesia, she loved.
I didn't take a trip around the world. I had no such desire to gorge on Italian decadence, meditate in yogic silence in an Indian ashram, or delve into Southeast Asian culture in an Indonesian hut. Hardly. I did, however, impulsively book a trip to London, England. All alone, sleeping on the couch of a virtual stranger I'd met in Cuba (who did, let me just say, became a good friend), I set off to spend fifteen days in the city I'd always wanted most to visit.
I walked twelve hours a day, buying a day pass for the tube and getting off wherever I felt like it to explore; journal in my bag at all times, I stopped several times a day for a tea, a scone and a quiet moment to explore my thoughts and note my surroundings. It was wonderful, it was healing, it was necessary; in the end, it gave me the courage to come home and, just days later, make the phone call that would set the final stages of my divorce in motion.
When I heard, several months ago, that a follow-up book had been published, I was curious. I was even more curious to learn that the book was about the author's views on marriage. She had made it very clear in the first book that she was finished with marriage; she was adamant about her desire never to get married again, even though she had, on her travels, met and fallen in love with a Brazilian man.
Similarly, just getting out of my marriage, I was fairly adamant myself that I didn't think I ever wanted to go down that road again. Then, of course, unexpectedly, J. happened. On my travels as well, ironically enough: we met on vacation in the Dominican Republic, and just happened to live in the same city. Suddenly, I was caught up in a vortex of new emotions, terrified and exhilarated and wondering every second what I was doing, knowing what I knew about the end of love. As J. will tell you, I spent most of the first year of our relationship waiting for the other shoe to drop, so to speak; waiting for the land mine to explode under me and once again blow apart my heart.
But here we are now, very serious and very much in love, and I've stopped expecting the worst. I've stopped looking for disaster to strike. It was only natural, then, that I would get around to reading this book; that, beginning to put my own fears aside in once again contemplating a lifetime of marriage to a man that I love, I would be prepared to understand this woman's journey to embracing her own marriage.
Understand it I have.
Challenged I will continue to be.
Hopeful I am, as a result.
I want to quote several different passages from this book, and then expound upon them. Will you stick with me if I do? I know it's long. It's just that there's so much I feel she explains so well, so perfectly; so many things I can relate to and empathize with, said in words that I quite frankly wish I'd written myself.
Here goes, then.
...correct in one respect (we will all be fine eventually), but dead wrong in another respect (we will never entirely move past it, either). In this sense, we divorced folk are something like twentieth-century Japan: We had a culture which was prewar and we have a culture which is postwar, and right between those two histories lies a giant smoking hole.
I will do virtually anything to avoid going through that apocalypse again. But I recognize there's always the possibility of another divorce...because love-based unions make for strangely fragile tethers. I'm not giving up on love, mind you. I still believe in it. But maybe that's the problem. Maybe divorce is the tax we collectively pay as a culture for daring to believe in love - or at least, for daring to link love to such a vital social contract as matrimony. Maybe it is not love and marriage that go together like a horse and carriage after all. Maybe it is love and divorce that go together...like a carriage and a horse.
It's been famously said that second marriage is the triumph of hope over experience, but I'm not entirely sure that's true. It seems to me that first marriages are more hope-drenched affairs, awash in vast expectations and easy optimism. Second marriages are cloaked, I think, in something else: a respect for forces that are bigger than us, maybe. A respect that perhaps even approaches awe.
Committed, page 83-85
How insanely, brilliantly true. If the only thing that holds together a marriage is love, then it is a fickle marriage at best. If there is no commitment, if there is no understanding that the shifting nature of personal happiness is not the be-all and end-all of life, if there is no mutual agreement to work things out at all costs, then why marry at all? Love is a choice. Modern-day society has no need of marriage for economic or political reasons, leaving the decision to marry solely in the hands of the emotionally impassioned.
Dangerous? Certainly.
Disastrous? All too often.
So, yes, my love affair...had a wonderful element of romance to it, which I will always cherish. But it was not an infatuation, and here's how I can tell: because I did not demand that he become my Great Emancipator or my Source of All Life, nor did I immediately vanish into that man's chest cavity like a twisted, unrecognizable, parasitical homunculus. During our long period of courtship, I remained intact within my own personality, and I allowed myself to meet...for who he was. In each other's eyes, we may very well have seemed beautiful and perfect and heroic beyond measure, but I never lost sight of our actual realities.
We were two nice enough people, bearing the wounds of some very massive personal disappointments, and we were looking for something that might simply be possible in each other - a certain kindness, a certain attentiveness, a certain shared yearning to trust and be trusted.
To this day, I refuse to burden him with the tremendous responsibility of somehow completing me. By this point in in my life I have figured out that he cannot complete me, even if he wanted to. I've faced enough of my own incompletions to recognize that they belong solely to me. Having learned this essential truth, I can actually tell now where I end and where somebody else begins...as nicely defined by C.S. Lewis, when he wrote of his wife,
'We both knew this: I had my miseries, not hers; she had hers, not mine.'
One plus one, in other words, is sometimes supposed to equal two.
Commitment, page 105-106
I don't believe that I realized just how much I depended on my first marriage to somehow fulfill me, to complete me, to bring me unending bliss. Don't get me wrong; I loved him with everything I had. It's just, perhaps, that I didn't really know how to love him and love myself at the same time, and I dove in with unrealistic expectations. I didn't realize how my need to have him complete me was basically a demonstration to him that I would dissolve into the entity of our marriage as though I had nothing that he couldn't absorb. But I did, and I do, as does every human being, and when this became clear to me, it was too late. In fact, I think he expected me to dissolve regardless, as he said many times in many different ways. I didn't realize just how difficult that was going to be. It proved to be impossible; as a result, the marriage proved to be untenable for him, and looking back with perspective, ultimately it would have eventually become unbearable for me as well.
With J., on the other hand, I know my weaknesses. I know my fears, I know my failings, I know my needs, and I know that he's never going to fill all the gaps, try as he might. And I, too, will never fill all of his. Still, we love each other fiercely, protectively, with a selflessness I could never have imagined I was capable of demonstrating. Perhaps this is because we are both all too keenly aware of our shortcomings, and are both unfailingly honest and up front about them.
Whatever the reason may be, I feel more with every passing day that this time, the equation will not be faulty: one real, flawed person plus another real, flawed person does equal two. And two real, flawed, vulnerable, open, honest people who love each other is far better than two scared, unrealistic, closed off, angry, resentful people. Any day. Even if they really do love each other.
When I tried to sort out my resistance to a public wedding ceremony, I had to admit that part of the issue was simple embarrassment. How very awkward to stand in front of one's family and friends (many of whom had been guests at one's first wedding) and swear solemn vows for life all over again. Hadn't they all seen this film already? One's credibility does begin to tarnish after too much of this sort of thing...To paraphrase Oscar Wilde: one divorce may be regarded as a misfortune, but two begins to smack of carelessness.
...how those two little indicting words - this time - make me cringe. Yet it was true. The recollections of last time felt all too recent for me, too painful. Also, I didn't like the idea that guests at a bride's second wedding are just as likely to be thinking about her first spouse as they are to be thinking about her new spouse - and that the bride, too, will probably be remembering her ex-husband on that day. First spouses, I have learned, don't ever really go away - even if you aren't speaking to them any more. They are phantoms who dwell in the corners of our new love stories, never entirely vanishing from sight, materializing in our minds whenever they please, offering up unwelcome comments or bits of painfully accurate criticism.
Committed, page 241-242
Ah. There it is, one of my biggest fears about getting married again: the actual ceremony itself. Sure, I'll pick out an exquisite dress, choose beautiful flowers, and walk down a candlelit aisle to my love; but why do other people need to be there? Isn't it really just about the two of us? And, even if family and friends are present to celebrate with the bride and groom, why must it become a spectacle for those phantoms of the first time to witness as well? Why are those ghosts allowed the opportunity to play brutal games of comparison inside my head, to make me agonizingly question myself over and over?
Still, it will be a first for J. And, because of that, I will banish my fears to the darkest recesses of my mind, silence the ghosts, and pray that the day, when it comes, will be new, different, and more incredible than anything I could have imagined. Because it will, ultimately, be about us, and that "us" is more incredible than anything I could have imagined.
It's fitting that the title of this book represents how I now feel about marriage. It's not just about infatuation or love. It's not just about who my parents would have chosen, or what my siblings think, or how well he gets along with my friends.
(Lest you worry, there's not a single person who's seen J. and I together who has ever expressed a negative opinion. Not so with my first marriage, let me say).
Remember the horse and carriage...or the carriage and the horse?
Marriage is, ultimately, about commitment. Through the good times and the bad, whether deliriously happy or desperately sad, I want to know that at the end of the day, my commitment to the man I marry will last a lifetime. For in the end, it's not about love. It's about the commitment that joins two hearts and lives together.
Come what may.
Friday, August 27, 2010
trucking through the muck
In any project, there comes the point at which you find yourself on your hands and knees, staggering, shuffling, crawling. The finish line is in sight, the majority of the journey complete; but still, the final stretch looms before you, the footholds of the last crest perilously fragile.
Exhausted, frustrated, sick and tired of the whole thing, you want to give up: instead, you press forward, press upward, press on, hoping you have enough left to give it your all, right to the end.
I'm right about there right now. This current project of mine, the recording of an album of twelve original songs, is in the final stages of production. Three more weeks of engineering, followed by several weeks of mixing, and then several more weeks of mastering, and finally off to press it shall go in mid-November.
Does that ever seem far away.
It's been a very long year of seeing this come to fruition, for a variety of factors, but the end truly is in sight. I've referenced often this past year the need to elaborate on this whole process, I know, but have yet to do so. Call me crazy, perhaps; superstitious, even; but I've decided that I don't want to discuss it in great detail until it's all finished. Until, album in hand, website up and running, iTunes account activated, songs purchased, there is something legitimate to show for it.
I will go into detail about the incredible, unexpected sponsorship I received last October, which has paid for all of the studio time and engineering of this project. I will go into detail about the brilliance of my producer and friend, and the joy it is to work with him. I will go into detail about the daunting process of finding a photographer, shooting creative portraits; then choosing artwork, critically selecting representative imagery to effectively immortalize a look and a sound.
I will go into detail, I promise. For now, though, end in sight, I truck through the muck of small necessities that threaten to overwhelm, that make me feel as though I am wading through quicksand, arms and legs pumping, not getting anywhere.
I need to get rid of the remnants of laryngitis left from my airconditioning cold so that I can record the last few vocal tracks. I need to get technologically current with a functional, aesthetically pleasing website. I need to decide on the style of CD format (digipak? wallet-style? jewel case? 4-panel? 6-panel? centred? spined? booklet? matte? hi-gloss?) and the company I want to trust with such a significant task as reproducing 1,000 copies of this album. All of this in time for Christmas.
Several years ago, my mother gave me a book entitled The Dream Giver, a parable written by Christian author and motivational speaker Bruce Wilkinson. In it, a man named Ordinary leaves his Comfort Zone, the land of the Familiar, in order to pursue his Big Dream. Along the way, he meets Bullies in the Borderland, or those who stand in the way of the initial process. He then walks through the Wasteland, a season of barrenness, before finding Sanctuary. Then, in this fictional story, Ordinary enters the Valley of Giants. These giants are obstacles that threaten his faith and bar the way to the Promised Land.
I am in the Valley of Giants. I can see the Promised Land, the fulfillment of this album, my Big Dream, just ahead. It's overcoming the obstacles along the way in these final few faith-testing, confidence-eroding, character-building weeks ahead that will ultimately make the completion of this project so rewarding, so fulfilling, so satisfying when it's all said and done.
Every Dreamer soon learns that the road to the future you really want is clogged with Dream-threatening obstacles. That's why so many turn back. But what many don't realize...is that each obstacle is also an important opportunity. The obstacles come in a predictable sequence, and each for a very promising reason.
So let me ask: Did you have a dream as a child that you lost along the way? Do you have a dream right now that seems impossible to pursue? Do you feel like God forgot to even give you a Big Dream? Or are you pursuing your Big Dream, but experiencing setback after setback?
If your answer to any of these questions is yes, then this book is for you.
May your heart sing as you embrace what you were created to be and do.
from The Dream Giver,
Bruce Wilkinson
Exhausted, frustrated, sick and tired of the whole thing, you want to give up: instead, you press forward, press upward, press on, hoping you have enough left to give it your all, right to the end.
I'm right about there right now. This current project of mine, the recording of an album of twelve original songs, is in the final stages of production. Three more weeks of engineering, followed by several weeks of mixing, and then several more weeks of mastering, and finally off to press it shall go in mid-November.
Does that ever seem far away.
It's been a very long year of seeing this come to fruition, for a variety of factors, but the end truly is in sight. I've referenced often this past year the need to elaborate on this whole process, I know, but have yet to do so. Call me crazy, perhaps; superstitious, even; but I've decided that I don't want to discuss it in great detail until it's all finished. Until, album in hand, website up and running, iTunes account activated, songs purchased, there is something legitimate to show for it.
I will go into detail about the incredible, unexpected sponsorship I received last October, which has paid for all of the studio time and engineering of this project. I will go into detail about the brilliance of my producer and friend, and the joy it is to work with him. I will go into detail about the daunting process of finding a photographer, shooting creative portraits; then choosing artwork, critically selecting representative imagery to effectively immortalize a look and a sound.
I will go into detail, I promise. For now, though, end in sight, I truck through the muck of small necessities that threaten to overwhelm, that make me feel as though I am wading through quicksand, arms and legs pumping, not getting anywhere.
I need to get rid of the remnants of laryngitis left from my airconditioning cold so that I can record the last few vocal tracks. I need to get technologically current with a functional, aesthetically pleasing website. I need to decide on the style of CD format (digipak? wallet-style? jewel case? 4-panel? 6-panel? centred? spined? booklet? matte? hi-gloss?) and the company I want to trust with such a significant task as reproducing 1,000 copies of this album. All of this in time for Christmas.
Several years ago, my mother gave me a book entitled The Dream Giver, a parable written by Christian author and motivational speaker Bruce Wilkinson. In it, a man named Ordinary leaves his Comfort Zone, the land of the Familiar, in order to pursue his Big Dream. Along the way, he meets Bullies in the Borderland, or those who stand in the way of the initial process. He then walks through the Wasteland, a season of barrenness, before finding Sanctuary. Then, in this fictional story, Ordinary enters the Valley of Giants. These giants are obstacles that threaten his faith and bar the way to the Promised Land.
I am in the Valley of Giants. I can see the Promised Land, the fulfillment of this album, my Big Dream, just ahead. It's overcoming the obstacles along the way in these final few faith-testing, confidence-eroding, character-building weeks ahead that will ultimately make the completion of this project so rewarding, so fulfilling, so satisfying when it's all said and done.
Every Dreamer soon learns that the road to the future you really want is clogged with Dream-threatening obstacles. That's why so many turn back. But what many don't realize...is that each obstacle is also an important opportunity. The obstacles come in a predictable sequence, and each for a very promising reason.
So let me ask: Did you have a dream as a child that you lost along the way? Do you have a dream right now that seems impossible to pursue? Do you feel like God forgot to even give you a Big Dream? Or are you pursuing your Big Dream, but experiencing setback after setback?
If your answer to any of these questions is yes, then this book is for you.
May your heart sing as you embrace what you were created to be and do.
from The Dream Giver,
Bruce Wilkinson
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