I enjoy the opportunity these days of chatting with my second wife every now and then. Previously, we had not spoken at all for some years. Too many wounds, both real and imaged, I guess. But hey, old things are passed away, behold, all things have become new.
We were married thirteen years, and in fact had known one another since our grade school days. Therefore, we have many shared memories, which are now mostly good. We don't talk about the others except in broad general terms.
Yet though we share many memories, we do not necessarily share them in a mutual way, by which I mean that we will remember the time and place and basic character of a certain experience but will disagree on the specifics. We spoke the other day, for instance, of a troubled time when we were walking in the park. On that day, she said, seemingly out of the blue, "I don't think I'm 'in love' with you anymore."
I remember even now how much that hurt. It broke my heart. And yet at the time I buried my pain and chose to approach the matter philosophically.
"Love changes over time," I said. "It deepens and matures. Sure, it is no longer the electric, butterflies-in-the-stomach passion of romance, of newness. But it has become deeper than that, more permanent, more secure."
"Hah! I said that!" she now insists. "I could see you were hurt and I wanted to explain what I really meant in the first place!"
Strange. I am quite sure that I said these things to her. She is quite sure it was she who had said them to me.
Funny.
There is another incident that we do agree upon, though we saw it quite differently at the time. I had asked her to accompany me on a walk around the neighborhood, my idea being to have a leisurely time together, a breather, just the two of us, from our busy schedules, for we were both in our prime, working full time, raising four children. I was longing for quality quiet time. It was a nice, sunny spring day (rare enough for Oregon), and it seemed a perfect opportunity.
Often, I had accused my wife of having to make an adventure of everything, for being seemingly unable to be at rest, to 'just chill'. I missed her, I guess. With all the necessities and interruptions of our busy lives, I missed just talking to her.
Well, sure enough, she turned our quiet walk into a needless, and rather irritating slog through a forested area of the neighborhood. The forest floor consisted of countless little lakes separated occasionally by a bit of dry land. The trees were dripping from the recent rains, the bushes were dripping, and the sucking mud was determined to capture one or the other of my shoes--which, by the way, were dress shoes, not tennis shoes or hiking boots.
At some point in this adventure, I stepped off a log into a particular deep puddle--or not a puddle, a pond--and I finally lost my temper.
"Dammit!, I complained, "why does everything have to be a damn adventure with you!"
She laughed uproariously then, and laughs even more uproariously now. To see me get angry was a rare thing, and an apparently hilarious thing. Boy did she love it when I showed some emotion!
"I guess I never thought of it before that time," she says now. "I guess you just wanted to take a peaceful walk."
Ya think?
And even now my response is the same upon being reminded of this story.
"Well, why? Why did you have to make such a damn adventure of everything?"
In all fairness, though, I will admit now that adventure is not such a bad idea, and that making such adventures is not such a bad character trait. At the proper place and at the proper time, of course. But then that very idea of propriety would transgress against another of her character traits, that being the conviction that spontaneity is the very spice in life.
I am remembering one August when we drove down to Gold Beach, just north of the border between Oregon and California. I had done this in the past with my son and we had just kind of lazed around, sightseeing and such-like. But on this occasion, my wife had other ideas.
First off, we went to see a local rodeo. I had never had any interest in rodeos or cowboys or people interacting with horses and cows and calves and bulls. 'How long will we be there?' I asked. Surprisingly, however, I found the whole event rather entertaining, and I appreciated the skill displayed by all these cowpokes, young and old, male and female.
Next, she signed us up for a tour trip on a fast boat up the Rogue River. 'How long will we have to sit in the boat?' I asked. As it turned out, a famous figure was also taking the tour that day. This was Loni Anderson, best known for her marriage to Burt Reynolds, her various roles in movies, her role in the popular sitcom WKRP in Cincinnati, and her large breasts.
"Now don't make a big deal over her," my wife warned. "Don't even let on that you know who she is. I'm sure she just wants to have a relaxing time out of the spotlight." And then straightaway she contrived a way to secure a seat next to Ms. Anderson as well as a way to engage in an accidental, quite spontaneous personal conversation.
Other than that--or, perhaps, in addition to that--the boat trip was fabulous. The Rogue River wilderness is one of the most beautiful areas in Oregon and is populated by all sorts of wildlife. We saw bears, deer, elks, eagles, blue herons, and a lot of delightful people, including Loni.
All-in-all, the Gold Beach excursion of that summer was one of the most enjoyable vacations in my memory. Thanks to her.
My second wife was a nut case. She still is a nut case. But it occurs to me, just now, that I loved her very much. And that I love her still. What happened to us ultimately? Who can say? Perhaps the problem was that I was simply not "in love" with her anymore.
We were married thirteen years, and in fact had known one another since our grade school days. Therefore, we have many shared memories, which are now mostly good. We don't talk about the others except in broad general terms.
Yet though we share many memories, we do not necessarily share them in a mutual way, by which I mean that we will remember the time and place and basic character of a certain experience but will disagree on the specifics. We spoke the other day, for instance, of a troubled time when we were walking in the park. On that day, she said, seemingly out of the blue, "I don't think I'm 'in love' with you anymore."
I remember even now how much that hurt. It broke my heart. And yet at the time I buried my pain and chose to approach the matter philosophically.
"Love changes over time," I said. "It deepens and matures. Sure, it is no longer the electric, butterflies-in-the-stomach passion of romance, of newness. But it has become deeper than that, more permanent, more secure."
"Hah! I said that!" she now insists. "I could see you were hurt and I wanted to explain what I really meant in the first place!"
Strange. I am quite sure that I said these things to her. She is quite sure it was she who had said them to me.
Funny.
There is another incident that we do agree upon, though we saw it quite differently at the time. I had asked her to accompany me on a walk around the neighborhood, my idea being to have a leisurely time together, a breather, just the two of us, from our busy schedules, for we were both in our prime, working full time, raising four children. I was longing for quality quiet time. It was a nice, sunny spring day (rare enough for Oregon), and it seemed a perfect opportunity.
Often, I had accused my wife of having to make an adventure of everything, for being seemingly unable to be at rest, to 'just chill'. I missed her, I guess. With all the necessities and interruptions of our busy lives, I missed just talking to her.
Well, sure enough, she turned our quiet walk into a needless, and rather irritating slog through a forested area of the neighborhood. The forest floor consisted of countless little lakes separated occasionally by a bit of dry land. The trees were dripping from the recent rains, the bushes were dripping, and the sucking mud was determined to capture one or the other of my shoes--which, by the way, were dress shoes, not tennis shoes or hiking boots.
At some point in this adventure, I stepped off a log into a particular deep puddle--or not a puddle, a pond--and I finally lost my temper.
"Dammit!, I complained, "why does everything have to be a damn adventure with you!"
She laughed uproariously then, and laughs even more uproariously now. To see me get angry was a rare thing, and an apparently hilarious thing. Boy did she love it when I showed some emotion!
"I guess I never thought of it before that time," she says now. "I guess you just wanted to take a peaceful walk."
Ya think?
And even now my response is the same upon being reminded of this story.
"Well, why? Why did you have to make such a damn adventure of everything?"
In all fairness, though, I will admit now that adventure is not such a bad idea, and that making such adventures is not such a bad character trait. At the proper place and at the proper time, of course. But then that very idea of propriety would transgress against another of her character traits, that being the conviction that spontaneity is the very spice in life.
I am remembering one August when we drove down to Gold Beach, just north of the border between Oregon and California. I had done this in the past with my son and we had just kind of lazed around, sightseeing and such-like. But on this occasion, my wife had other ideas.
First off, we went to see a local rodeo. I had never had any interest in rodeos or cowboys or people interacting with horses and cows and calves and bulls. 'How long will we be there?' I asked. Surprisingly, however, I found the whole event rather entertaining, and I appreciated the skill displayed by all these cowpokes, young and old, male and female.
Next, she signed us up for a tour trip on a fast boat up the Rogue River. 'How long will we have to sit in the boat?' I asked. As it turned out, a famous figure was also taking the tour that day. This was Loni Anderson, best known for her marriage to Burt Reynolds, her various roles in movies, her role in the popular sitcom WKRP in Cincinnati, and her large breasts.
"Now don't make a big deal over her," my wife warned. "Don't even let on that you know who she is. I'm sure she just wants to have a relaxing time out of the spotlight." And then straightaway she contrived a way to secure a seat next to Ms. Anderson as well as a way to engage in an accidental, quite spontaneous personal conversation.
Other than that--or, perhaps, in addition to that--the boat trip was fabulous. The Rogue River wilderness is one of the most beautiful areas in Oregon and is populated by all sorts of wildlife. We saw bears, deer, elks, eagles, blue herons, and a lot of delightful people, including Loni.
All-in-all, the Gold Beach excursion of that summer was one of the most enjoyable vacations in my memory. Thanks to her.
My second wife was a nut case. She still is a nut case. But it occurs to me, just now, that I loved her very much. And that I love her still. What happened to us ultimately? Who can say? Perhaps the problem was that I was simply not "in love" with her anymore.
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