My friend once said, “The towel rack fell off the wall one day. That’s when I knew it was over.” Often, it’s the little things that tip the scales. When my “towel rack” fell, I hadn’t known it was coming. My trust and my heart shattered, more than seems physically possible. This story isn’t about divorce, but rather about love. Allow me to set the stage, the one that determined my next decades.
The end of my young marriage wasn’t unique, except to me. Divorce had not been in my realm of thinking. I knew our relationship was not as I’d hoped, but I adjusted and thought he had, too. Just like that, with no warning that the end was near, with no stated reason nor problem to be addressed, no chance to recover…the marriage died, but the love was a slow torturing fade. My world literally cracked. There is nothing I did not question. When my heart finally recovered, I still had no idea how to begin rebuilding my trust. I’m a connector, a problem solver, a long-range-vision idealist and strategist who passionately believes. These strengths also make me perpetually naive and hopeful, and all that comes along with that.
I focused front and center on parenting and on raising a toddler boy into an amazing, responsible, respected, and loving man. This mission became my living, breathing, everyday life. It paid off.
Then came the question, “Now what?” The answer was, “Recovering me, that’s what!”
A wise friend helped me to see that forgiving all that had shattered me–every last bit of it– was my way forward. I listened to him. I made an extraordinarily long list of infractions, and one by one I let go of them…even the unforgivable, and, it healed me. Soon, I began dating again.
Facebook was new on my scene, and it opened my world. I reconnected and connected in a new way with friends and acquaintances. This venue gave birth to my writing. I discovered and ventured into new and old friendships. I also learned about me. I had become a bit cynical about men.
Here I re-met KH (yes, that’s what I still call him). He fascinated me before I ever spoke to him, not in the physical way, in the soul way. I barely remembered him from school, but I know we never spoke nor even had the occasion to. Needless to say, I didn’t know him. On Facebook, he was political and Howard Sternish, and I literally hated that. Every time I started to block him from littering my newsfeed, he would show his big ‘ole amazing heart which stood in complete contrast to his own cynicism. I had never experienced a man that was so openly soulful. He captured my attention as he pulled me and pushed me with his words, and kneaded my cynicism right out of my core.
KH had his own reasons for becoming a cynic (don’t we all). Like two inch worms, we crept toward each other on social media in some sort of polar opposite magnetic field. Ironically the distrust in my own “picker outer” is the exact thing that made me give this conundrum of a man a chance. He was so different than anyone that had caught my attention in the past. In some ways he was as rough as a cob in my eyes, but inside…well, from the beginning I saw the glimmer from the jewel that is this man. We had the occasion to come upon each other at a street dance. I was captivated by the music that night, and unbeknownst to me, I captured him that evening as he watched my joy. We began to heal each other’s deepest life wounds, through simple affirming words and by dwelling in gentle silences around the campfire. Through the simplicity of touch and the steadfastness of acceptance, we blossomed and grew into “us.”
When he whispered the three BIG words, I was frozen, and then melted by his follow up “And, I’m not going anywhere, ever. Just so you know.” I quaked at the continuing push and pull of my heart as I glimpsed the possibility of my future. In that moment, he took my hand, pulled me close, and there in the narrow passageway of my garage we swayed in a rhythm only our hearts could hear. “You,” he said, “You are the only woman who has compelled my heart to dance.” And I knew it was true, all of it… his words, his heart, his commitment, his journey out of his comfort zone. I didn’t run, as I had always envisioned. I lingered, and slowly opened. For four years we danced…in the kitchen, on the patio, in the bathroom, in the hallway, on the sidewalk, in the parking lot, in the yard…wherever and whenever our spontaneous heart song would play in our minds. And then, we danced at our wedding.
Today our dance is a comfortable glider that moves along our journey with us. Now, two and a half years married and six years since that moment in the garage, we have seven grands to adore, long work hours, new project launches, painful kidney stones, the demands of a home purchase and all of the external bungee cords of building a life together. Last night, KH snuck up behind me in the kitchen, as he often does, and said, “You know I love you, more than I ever thought possible.” I smiled in quiet confidence. This time it was me that clasped his hand in the oh, so familiar and healing rhythm of our heart dance. As he pulled me in and swayed, I looked into his eyes and saw it, the glimmer of the diamond that is us. I had never realized what it would take to open again and rebuild my trust. Nor did I realize the dance…our dance, would become the golden carriage that calmed my fears and settled my doubting mind.