relationships

Speak Too Soon. Invite the Jinx.


I spoke of giving up blogging in my last post because I wonder what good it is doing me any more and what I could possibly have left to say that might interest anyone. It’s not as though I, or my life, is all that interesting. But just when I thought I didn’t need the cathartic outlet that is my blog at its essence, my sister-in-law shows up at our home – four days later than she originally planned and with intentions of staying for a week. Did I mention she dragged – literally – her seventeen and thirteen year old children with her? No? Well, she did.

I like Shannon. I do. She can carry on quite the conversation and is very polite (aka Canadian), but she is in her seventh year of widowhood and stuck beyond even the most generous standards of grieving. Many of our conversations have centered around grief even when they started out about something else. Being problem solvers, both Rob and I have countered her at every turn with solutions to her fixed position – which she claims to not be happy with by the way – but for every solution, she remains attached to the problem like velcro. It’s exhausting in a way that reminds me of my time on the widow board.

Today, I escaped to the gym and then after lunch (did I mention they sleep til lunch?) I absconded with Katy to the library and to shop for groceries. In my absence, she decided to drag the teens to the mega-mall that is about a 45 minute drive from here. Upon my return with my raccoon-eyed child (teens make noise that intrigues and keeps five year olds up way past bedtime), Rob assures me that we will never have company over the holidays ever again and while I am being mollified, his sister calls to let him know her car has died. The night she arrived, she told us that the vehicle had been leaking anti-freeze for some time but she just took care of this by constantly refilling it. So, the anti-freeze was gone and the car wouldn’t start. Rob bundled up and went to fetch them and tow the car back. It was 8:30 by the time we had supper. Katy was beyond tired and nephew and niece were still wearing the stunned looks that I imagine overtook them when they realized that coercing their mom to take them home before the weekend wasn’t in the cards anymore.

My sister-in-law has taken to her bed. Our guest bed. I haven’t seen her at all. Rob says she does this.

It was easy to deal with widows who refused to help themselves when they were on the other side of the ethernet. I hit the ignore button. Now I have one in my basement. God help me.

Serendipity


Rob and I watched the John Cusak movie, Serendity, the other night. It was notable for several reasons. First, it’s the first time we have been able to watch a dvd in the living room for well over a month. Second, it re-introduced me to the term serendipity. And finally it reminded me of being cubed about this time last winter.

Of late our movie watching has been confined to Rob’s computer screen as we lay cuddled up for the night in our bed – a very nice way to view a flick by the way that I highly recommend to those pressed for time and behind on their list of must-sees. We always check out the previews after a movie is over, and it is here that we have found a treasure trove of films that have proved interesting to very enjoyable views. Serendipity came to us off The Shipping News ( a good film but by warned – it’s about a widower). Rob and I are both Cusack fans, and this film looked entertaining, and death-free, and seemed vaguely familiar with it’s destiny theme of love/soul mates (though I don’t technically believe in soul mates as defined in the Holy Writ of the Widowed). It was wonderful to back back on our uber-uncomfortable sofa in a living room now free of Christmas now that the rapidly denuding pine was cozy in the snow of our front, and our decorations were packed away for our Christmas’s yet to come. I usually drape my legs over Rob’s lap, and he will absently rub my feet and calves. I love our time together regardless, but time in the dark that is intimate and yet not has such a glow.

Serendipity is a word coined from a Persian folk-tale about three princes who made fortunate discoveries that they were wise enough to recognize as such while they were questing for things entirely different. The word appears first in a letter from Horace Ordpole the 4th Earl of Orford to his friend, Horace Mann (not the American educator). In his use of his term, the Earl put heavy emphasis on the idea of being wise. In some ways it reminds me of the cliche – God helps those who help themselves. In the film, the characters discuss receiving signs from the universe that are meant to guide a person to their destiny or soul mate. The characters, like many people I know, take black and white positions on the idea of fate and destiny. Either our lives are completely scripted or we are free will all the way and the masters/authors of our own fates. No one, not surprisingly, takes the middle ground or contemplates the idea that perhaps our lives our a mixture, though the sales clerk, played by Eugene Levy, wades in with “What if it’s a random, godless universe where nothing makes sense at all?” Despite that, I am one who buys completely into the theory because much of the calmer and contented aspects/times of my life coincide with me following the roadmap of signs that the universe sprinkles on/near/around me constantly and of which I am usually only half-aware even when I am paying attention.

Rob and I are a serendipitous pairing. I am not sure if it is because our losses that we are more in tune with occurrences that a great many simply shrug off as random, or don’t notice at all, or if our new insight is part of our destinies too. I know that people who have experienced tragedy buck violently at the notion that all things happen for a reason, but nowhere is it written that the events that will make up our lives will be happy ones or ones that we would agree with if given a vote on it now. That some people experience more “bad” than “good” is a purely subjective, even if it doesn’t feel like it. I have this feeling that nothing happens in our lives without our permission, or tacit agreement, somewhere in the past. I really do think that I knew what was coming long before it did for reasons that I won’t go into fully now (except to say that more than once in my early life I seemed to know I would be a young widow – for example my Barbies were all war widows with children despite the fact I had G.I. Joes to mate them with). I am not certain why I agreed to the life I have lived so far, but I am pretty certain I did and perhaps in the next life I will remember why.

This particular dvd featured out takes and we always watch the special features because we can check out other movies or the soundtrack this way. Many of the movies we end up requesting from the library (we rarely go to the video store) come from the trailers on dvd’s , and we often check out soundtracks this way as well. All of the out takes were deleted scenes from the film. One of the scenes has the two love interests getting to know each other while the girl is “cubing” the young man. Cubing is one of those psychological personality tests which works as follows:

You are in a desert and you see a cube.
1) How big is the cube? 
    What is its color? What do you think about that color? 
    How far away is it from you? 
    Is it transparent?  Can you see what is inside? 
    How big is the cube compared to the desert?  What is the ratio?
2) There is a ladder. 
    Is the ladder leaning on the cube? 
    What is the color of the ladder?  What is it made of? 
    What impression does it give you? 
    What is the distance between the cube and the ladder?
3) There is a horse. 
    What is the distance between the cube and the horse? 
    What is the color of the house? 
     

I took a cube test similar to this one just over a year ago. Basically my cube was the size of a suitcase lying flat on the ground and was made of crystal or glass and it was transparent. The ladder was one of those aluminum extension ones and it was lying flat on the ground too and away from me. The horse was a stallion, black with a white mane and it was wandering in the distance. So, the cube represents me. I was flattened, fragile and my emotional state was obvious. The ladder was the people in my life. Aluminum isn’t the strongest of metals, it is light-weight and the fact that it was lying flat and away from me represented the fact that I wasn’t being well-supported in my life. The horse represented my lover. Black is an obvious one. He was dead. And not nearby. Cubing is one of those things you can only do once without prejudicing the outcome.

At the end of the film, the characters have followed all of fates clues back to each other and are celebrating the serendipitous moment at Bloomingdales where they met years ago. I remarked to Rob that it would be difficult for us to go back to the place where we met – the YWBB – because it is an Internet message board. He reminded me that he had saved the entire thread before he unregistered and had his posting history there erased. I had gone him one better when I left there and you would be hard pressed to find any evidence I was ever there at all. I suggested that we could return to Idaho Falls and he suggested we stroll along the frozen banks of the river that runs through a park in the town. Ironically, though we have pictures of some much of our time together, we haven’t a single picture from that weekend. Too much serendipity that weekend and I don’t think it can be captured on film anyway.

The Best


Here in Alberta licensing is out-sourced. The provincial governments allow private businesses, like insurance companies, to set up outlets in towns and cities and they handle the paperwork and fees. These businesses handle all types of licensing from marriage to driver’s to hunting/fishing to animals. Because of this, there is often quite a lengthy wait when applying for whatever type of license you might need. Last week I was finally able to get the GDL designation taken off my driver’s license as I had recently received my proof of licensing from the state of Iowa. It took over a large chunk of my afternoon between standing in line and waiting for approval from the provincial authorities who needed to see a faxed copy of my paperwork before giving the okay for the change.

During my second stint in line, I noticed a couple at the counter who were obviously getting a marriage license. I must say I love the rituals associated with marriage in the Alberta province. If you ever have need of writing marriage vows, I urge you to check out the Alberta official ceremony. It even impressed my staunchly Catholic mother and aunt and that is significant. At one point in application process, both parties are required to raise their right hands and swear that the information they have given for their application is valid. I think it’s neat, the seriousness of the application process and the ceremony after all this is a country were people don’t have to marry. There is a common-law option. I watched the couple thinking what most people would think “Isn’t this sweet? Two people starting life together as a committed pair.”

When they were finished, they had to walk right by me to leave. The woman was young but still a bit older than Rob’s oldest daughter by my estimation and the man about thirty, give or take. She was smiling in a dreamy sort of way, and he was putting his credit card back into his wallet (a marriage license is about $77 dollars) with a disgusted look on his face and he muttered loud enough for nearly all about to hear, “Well, that was a waste of money.” I was a bit stunned and I wanted to chase the woman down a few minutes later and tell her to run, far and fast, but I chose to stay in line because you can’t really know what is going on inside a relationship from bits and snippets. Although as I told Rob recently that what you see is generally what you get in terms of how people’s public behavior is usually not far off their private persona. As my old English supervisor, Jerry Wadden, was fond of reminding us at the start of each school year, “These parents are not keeping the good children home and hiding them in closets. They are sending you the best they have.” And so it follows that it is the same with adults. They aren’t saying their best for a stand-up routine in front of the mirror each morning as they brush their teeth. They are giving the world the best they’ve got. I think though, as in the case of this young couple I observed, that sometimes people tend to settle for less than the best they deserve.