After carting my small boy around to all the family, and ex family. I got in my car, with baskets of dirty laundry to clean, and headed to my now home town. My man at the time had his own washer and dryer, and he too had carted his kids off in all their many locations that day as well. Holidays are hard work for the divorced with children. Still, we had planned to share Chinese for Thanksgiving dinner once our children were in place and we could finally enjoy some quiet time together.
I drove the 91 miles from my doorstep to his, with a box of fortune cookies, one with a handmade message asking "Will you marry me?" He said yes, in bed. And so, the two of us prepared to set our table!
This is my story of finding the right person to share my table with, and all the many people, places and experiences that make me even more grateful.
On my nineteen birthday my boyfriend at the time, gifted me a hope chest. It smelled of cedar, and filled me with excitement each time I found something I could store away for our future. Dish towels, napkin rings, glasses, silverware, a flower vase. I would lose all sence of time in the aisles of Bed Bath and Beyond. I would fill my cart with the anticipation of the life that I dreamed the two of us would share together. I had big expectations for our happily ever after. I would come home after such a shopping excursions, excited to show off my finds. Looking back now, I wasn't just looking for a happily ever after with that boy, but I was also looking forward to being grown up, successful, with a place of my own. The timing was right between two friends. We enjoyed the sweet rite of passage of leaving the comforts of our similar families to create one of our own together.
On my twenty-first birthday that same boyfriend purchased me an engagement ring. I said yes! While we were not big on making our wedding day a big affair, we were big on picking out gifts to place on our registry. My favorite request, was an indigo blue patterned, Makasa dinnerware set. They were going to make our fold up card table look beautiful in our sparse new apartment filled with yard sale furniture.
First apartment, than a wedding, a lion looking kitten we named Aslan. Next on the list, the purchase of a new home. There we were gifted a hand me down kitchen table from someone at our church. That table was the perfect place to show off the fresh flowers that occasional appeared, in the vase I had stored away in my hope chest years ago. We were setting our table, just like our parents had before us.
On my twenty-sixth birthday my first husband and I purchased an enormous oak kitchen table. It even had an extra leaf to add if we wanted to invite everyone over for Sunday dinners. We knew at the purchase of that table that soon it would need a high-chair. Our baby boy was on his way, and that made the purchase all the more sweeter! I could already envision the three of us together as a family, sharing meals, and making memories around this table. "Three is a magic number," we would sing from a Schoolhouse Rock song. "A man and a women had a little baby. Yes they did. They had three in the family, and that's the magic number."
We had a home, we had a baby on the way, my husband at the time was succeeding at his job. He demanded me to stay home with our new baby, just like our own mothers had with us. With much reluctance, I complied. We had it all, didn't we? Checked it off on the American dream list to success. However, my husband had his own check list, one that included a married women, and mother of at least three of her own.
When our son was only weeks old, and I wondered if my body would ever be right again, my husband invited his co-workers over to meet our new addition. There, at the kitchen table we exchanged pleasantries and passed our new baby boy around. The women was there, she held our baby and crooned to him. "Just friends," he had assured me. I knew deep down what was going on underneath the table. I just wasn't ready to accept the fact that the allure of her brought more to the table than I could at that time. And, soon after the birth of our son, the two of us excused ourselves from the table.
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The unexcused dad of my son, let me keep the big oaken kitchen table, along with the monthly payments it still needed, with a job I no longer had because I had agreed to stay home with our boy. When I turned twenty-seven my parents acquired that large kitchen table as well as a couple of free-loaders. They kept the table even when my son and I finally landed on our feet in a tiny one bedroom apartment. For some time the two of us were actually without table, until the purchase of a Fisher Price one, with two yellow plastic chairs. I placed it in our living room in front of our television. My boy and I would watched tv at dinner time; Thomas the Tank Engine, Elmo's World, Toy Story, Blues Clues and my favorite Bear in the Big Blue House. We blissfully sang the theme songs while we dipped our McDonald's chicken nuggets into sauces. I replaced the beautiful blue indigo dinnerware for sippy cups, and super hero plates that we purchased from Target.
My son didn't have the best table manners, but neither did some of the men who ask me out during this time. I honestly preferred my son's company over even the idea of another man for quite awhile. I know now that was okay, and time alone to heal and adjust to being a new mamma was just what I needed. Some seating arrangements take time to adjust to. And we were not alone, our families were very supportive and welcoming. There were plenty of seating arrangements available to us, but this arrangement wasn't what I had signed up for.
All my life I was lead to believe that real love was only found between a man and an women, and suddenly I was presented with this sticky handed, silly, toe headed little boy who loved me back as much as I loved him. My belief was debunked with a truth that I would carry the rest of my life! Real love comes in many forms, you only have to have your eyes open to see it.
While pushing a cart through Meijer one evening, picking up dinner, my little boy threw his arms around my neck while I pushed him along, "I love you" he said to me without prompting. No other first "I love you" from any human has ever given me all the feels as that single one in front of the check out at aisle number 3 in a Meijer on the East side of Indianapolis. Love indeed comes in many forms.
Fast forward a few years and I found myself awaiting the arrival of a man I found on the internet. We had talked for months online before finally meeting. My ex-husband and his newest wife at the time, had given me money for Christmas. I mean what do you do with money from an ex spouse as a gift? You join a dating website, and joke about how ironic it would be to find your True Companion. It was June, and I wore the absolute wrong thing. Wedged heels that made me so much taller than him. There was so much build up to this meeting. My sister called me at a scheduled time to give me an out, but I didn't need an out.
It was clear from the very beginning that the two of us wished to share a table together for the rest of our lives. We got married eleven months later, bringing with us pieces of our previous lives in an assortment of many boxes. Mismatched dinnerware, a newly gifted bar stool table set from my brother and sister-in-law, place mats, and a crystal vase for the Thursday flowers that he faithfully made sure that I got! Our first date was on a Thursday, we married on a Thursday, and for the longest time he brought me Thursday flowers to commemorate another week shared together. "Here's to the first day of forever." he said, as he proposed a toast to us and our joined families on a June day in 2004.
We set our table oblivious to the fact that nothing matched. My indigo blue plates, his plain white ones with blue trim and my son's Captain America dinner plate. We would helped my boy climb up the tall backed bar chair to join us. We would eat by our picture window with the view of our concrete patio that we lovingly referred to as our veranda. Less than 1,000 square feet we were so smitten with one another that it felt we lived in a castle instead of being surrounded by cheap wood paneling, outdated wall-paper, and questionable paranormal activity. There was much bliss and happiness. Plus the upgrade from a duplex to a home with actual appliances made my head spin. We use to joke that I married him for his appliances.
When I was thirty-two, the Thursday flower money was put towards another booster seat and vast amount of baby stuff we would need. We also had purchased OUR own set of red plates, bowls and dishes at Pier One. I still remember picking them out and how happy this little thing made us. Our table grew with the embodiment of our beautiful daughter. We outgrew that table. We outgrew that home. So we moved, and added another kitchen table, the very one that I had left at my parents nearly a decade ago. Yes, it was a part of a previous life, but accepting the past is an integral part of any journey. The dream that I would have a family gathered around a big kitchen table was finally mine! Our table was so fully blessedly that we permanently added the extra leaf! Not only had I found my person, I acquired his two grownish children as well. Our table was abundant with good food and even better great people!
For years we gathered every single evening together at that table. We would clear it of homework, laundry and bills so we could sit together and consume whatever amazing meal my husband would craft. While I was big on asking "What was your favorite part of the day?" to each child. My husband would ask "What sounds good for dinner?" long before it was even 9 am.
Some nights we would have guest, some nights we would jam out to music. Our daughter went through this crazy OCD stage where she would build a wall fort with stuff she could reach on the kitchen table around her plate. Dinner was an event. Dinners were done well. Cheers to the good life, the conversions, the laughter, the rants and vents, the celebrations, the hard work, 5 o'clock beverages poured. We shared, we grew, we thrived at that kitchen table! We watched our kids grown, and learned about them, each other and ourselves.
The table wore as the children grew. Wet glass marks stained the surface, indentations of signatures from signed school permission slips and checks, a chewed on table leg compliments of our dog, nail polish remover, opaque coverings from lottery tickets embedded into the surface, broken kitchen chair spokes from the kids who leaned back on two legs, chips in red plates and mugs, plastic forks replaced the missing real ones sent in school lunches...
Small seeming unimportant assaults over time happening in the living, and just like the table and all the things we used to set it, our marriage was taking a hit as well.
Suddenly there was an empty seat at the table. The meals were miserable. The tone was somber. The dinner conversations excruciatingly difficult because of the missing occupant. Our daughter found solace in front of the television. My son retreated to his room. Over frozen pizza and boxed mac and cheese, I didn't bother to ask my kids what their favorite part of their day was. No one was asking what sounded good for dinner, because what sounded good for dinner was for that empty seat to be occupied by the man who had helped set the table to begin with, and had contributed to it four amazing humans in one form or another.
Across town my husband sat at a different table. I stayed vigilant at our damaged table thinking and rethinking about the cards that life had dealt us, and exactly how I was going to lay them out on our table. We took our time, neither of us urgent in permanently excusing ourselves from the life we had created together. A friend at the time gave me the most sage advice when I would worry over what to do. "You don't need to decided, or know what to do today," she calmly said. "And," she continued, "even if you make a decision you can always change your mind!" We live in a world that puts more value on doing what makes us happiest, even if that triumphs what is most right for the biggest picture.
It was a strange time for everyone, that limbo between a table for one, or a table for two. We balanced finances with two tables in separate dwellings. We each entertained the idea of other tables, with other partners. I felt so trapped in our small town. Every street corner, or person held a memory of us together. Instinctively, I wanted to run away, move and start all over, however I knew the kids needed stability so leaving didn't feel like an option. Desperate and unstable, leaving my job seemed like a good place to start. I hated everyone knowing our business. They were picking sides, and watching me struggle. The simple question on job applications made my head spin; "single or married," "emergency contact," "Mrs., Ms. or Miss?" I no longer knew.
The thing is, when you say "I Do!" you don't see the miscarriages, the DUI, the diagnoses, the aging of parents and children, babies that don't stop crying, a teens outrageous phone bill, trips to say good-bye to loved ones, mental illness, broken cars, stomach bugs, what puppies can do to your furniture. And suddenly your table is cluttered! Cluttered with each of our preconceived rules, expectations, promises, offenses, and wrongs. Suddenly you are trapped in the present with this big mess of a life and all of it's complicated layers.
Paul and I attempted to live apart but the table, along with so many other important people, and their love for us still lived. All the unspoken, unseen connection that tethered us to one another in the collection of a million memories, traditions, adventures, trinkets, photographs, love notes, concert stubs, and THE meals that we had shared at the table over the years proved us to be an unbreakable entity. That terrible time when the two of us lost ourselves in the eyes of others, we never lost US. At 43 my husband of 12 years moved back home. We chose to reset our table. Things would not be as they were before, but they could actually become better.
Maybe some meals have be to devoured at other tables, just so you can appreciate how good the food really taste at your own table.
At 47 the two of us celebrated our 16th wedding anniversary. Four years later, we still have the two tables, the bar stool we were gifted by my brother and sister in law, and the one I picked out a life time ago. The seating arrangements have changed, that little boy who was in need of a highchair has left the nest, but a booster seat is always at the ready for the grand-babies that come to visit Pops and Mimi.
Life happens to the best of us, but one thing is for certain, we still have to eat. Where will you eat? Who will you share your table with? What is the recipe for a happily ever after? Just like there is comfort in mixing the exact combination of ingredients together to get the expected outcome... marriage takes that kind of learned balance, and maybe a few secret ingredients that keep you coming back for seconds!
At the marriage table, some nights you feast on lobster and prime rib, and others you pick on crumbs or ramen noodles. Some nights your too tired to cook so you order cheap pizza and eat it with an expensive bottle of wine. Some nights Judas is your dinner guest, and others you feasting with Paula Dean or Andrew Zimmern. Unfortunate nights you might find your guest puking up red velvet cake, and a bottle of sangria leaving a dismal mess that takes awhile to pick up. The marriage table is always changing as the days pass and the children age, the family grows, loved ones pass and even a pandemic shows up to leave your table pretty bare. The marriage table ebbs and flows from abundance and famine, to the mundane and exceptional. Marriage is the unique privilege in which you get to bring something to the table everyday, make sure to treasure the honor, and bring something good to feed each other's soul.
Dedicated to my True Companion,
Cheers to our good life!
(I've been writing this since 6/24/17)
