This morning's coffee has come and gone in a flurry of unforeseen activity.
It is Thursday. We returned home yesterday from spending the previous night in Atlanta babysitting three of our grandchildren while their parents went to a Mumford and Sons concert. Racing home, my husband packed up to go hunting and I got ready for my bridge group (I am only in the loosest sense of the word a member of this group) to play at my house for a change. Later, after the break-up of the bridge game, I totally collapsed. Luckily dinner was leftover eggplant parmigiana, better for being leftover, and my husband contributed bounty from his afternoon hunt for an appetizer. The remainder of the evening was a blur.
After a hard night's sleep I was looking forward this morning to my leisurely coffee. Al was off to work and my intention was to head to my studio to sew. But in life plans often go askew. Expect the unexpected has become my recent mantra. "What are you doing tomorrow?" queries my husband as he dresses for work. "Nothing specific. What did you have in mind?" I reply, imagining an outdoor cafe and lunch for just the two of us.
"Well, I thought we might head over to Birmingham to visit my cousin Calvin and his wife Shirley." he responds casually while tying his tie. "Could you call Calvin and work that out? I wish I had more time but I gotta run to this mediation, And maybe you could check and see if we can get tickets to Carole's new play for tomorrow night." Carole is another cousin's wife, and well worth whatever effort it takes to watch her in a performance. But this truly ends my leisurely morning.
My husband is a retired judge who still sits on the bench from time to time and also has a solo mediation practice. With the same secretary for over thirty years, one who did everything for him in the way of secretaries of the past, Al is very spoiled. When he retired eight years ago he lost his secretary and with our marriage coming a year later he quietly began trying to shoehorn me into that vacant seat. I chafe at playing that role; sometimes quite violently. But today is not one of those days.
In the way of our rather nomadic life we are going to Montgomery this weekend to visit my son and his family, and admire the latest addition, four week old Andrew. Originally we had planned on spending two nights but knowing how exhausting a new baby can be, not to mention the three other children who make up the family, I had changed the plans to just one night. Changed the house sitter. Opened my mind to another day and night at home, in my own bed.
It seems like lately we sleep in a lot of hotels. With four children in four different cities and ten fairly new grandchildren we stay on the road. And who ever sleeps well in hotels? Strange sounds, smells, and lights all interrupt sleep patterns. And then there are the beds. Too soft, too hard, too scratchy, too, too. For the last four years there have been the additional transitions between our Augusta house and our mountain house. The change between the two totally different sleep experiences always causes at least one bad night, if not more. It seems I am always catching up on my sleep. I sigh in response to my husband's request, suggestion, inquiry. But today it is an inward sigh.
One of the many things that attracted me to my husband is his love of family. Being raised in the military, always in transit, never close to family, it is something I sorely missed growing up; even though I didn't identify that longing until I met people who had those close connections. And it was something I wanted for my children. My first marriage was to another army brat who never really felt the emptiness that seemed to define my life. Al is my second husband and his love of place and people has helped me to understand that deep void in myself and how to begin to fill it. So how could I say no.
Several of the relations that define Al are cousins; a handful of cousins who live, or have lived until recently, in Birmingham. Initially, with my son living in Montgomery, we delighted in the convenience and thought we would spend a lot of time visiting them; that was before the nomadic lifestyle set in. Even though Birmingham is only ninety miles from Montgomery it still requires another day to spend any quality time visiting there. Another day in a different bed.
This past week we got news that one of Al's cousins lost his son-in-law to cancer. It was unexpected. The memorial service is planned for the end of September, a time when we are going to Virginia and Washington DC, with two other cousins, on a history tour. The son-in-law is not someone to whom my husband was close, a cousin's child's husband stretches even his familial bonds, but there is a need in him to attend the memorial service, to share in their sorrow. Hence the solution of this visit. And also the loosening of my restraints in tending to my husband's seemingly ever constant requests.
As I sit here writing I am not sure quite what I want to say. It is necessary to have boundaries. Mine are formed in reaction to childhood experiences, as are most peoples I think, and they got stronger as I got older. But it is also important to know when to let down those walls and fences that keep us from joining others in their experience. My husband's attempts to mold me into the void left by his secretary are annoying. At times I cannot separate what a secretary would do from what a wife and partner can and should do. I am getting better but it is still a struggle. But I do love this marriage for providing me with the opportunity to grow beyond my boundaries, to open myself to the wide open spaces of a partnership where boundaries are not necessary. Even if only for an instant.
Now I need to text the house sitter; like many people of his generation he does not answer his phone.
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