False Hope

During his first presidential campaign, Barack Obama said, "There is nothing false about hope."  I loved that quote.  Just the very idea that hope itself is a reason.  But, that was eight years ago.  When he said that, we thought the progressive political agenda was on the rise.  When he said that, I thought my marriage would last until my death.  

One night, my husband came home and said to me, "I'm not happy."  My insides turned to water, then to acid.  I put shields up just in time to keep my face from burning away.  Over the next few weeks, as he edged further from me in the bed, as his wedding ring mysteriously disappeared, as I lost the ability to make eye contact with him, hope shriveled.  It didn't die, but my little thing with feathers molted and went into hiding for a long time.  

The Ex did nothing to help it.  It hurt at the time, but now I see it for what it was -- a kindness.  He made his exit plan and followed his timeline.  Out of the condo in one month, out of the marriage in six.   I only had to nurse hope back into being one time, and when I finally did, I could focus on things that were real and possible.  Things that were not him. 

I am reminded of this painful kindness as one of my friends finds herself involved with a man who is separated from his wife.  They are not yet divorced.  The explanation is that they have to wait 2 years in Illinois to get the no-fault divorce.  And the man feels sorry for his wife who moved here with him and doesn't really have any other friends.  He still talks to her daily and hangs out with her.  He invites her to  his celebrations, all while he is plowing through his post-relationship crazy phase.  He is filming himself in bed with women, and using that footage to flirt with even more women.  

My friend is uncomfortable with the situation.  She is right to be so.  Maybe this man thinks he is doing his wife a kindness by staying around to be her friend, but what he is doing is false hope in action. I am sorry, President Obama, but everything about this hope is false.  This woman's hope is dying the death of a thousand tiny cuts.  Once this is done, there will be no pieces big enough to put it back together again. Much kinder to just leave her.  Leave her entirely alone for a while.  Maybe it will hurt more at first, but wouldn't you rather recover from one deep, clean wound than from a thousand smal slices that leave your tissues tattered and unrecognizable? 

Even in my year of heartbreak, I saw little things to be grateful for.  This is another one -- that the wound was clean, quick, surgical.  That the skin around it was intact enough to join together again.  That hope was damaged and displaced, but never false.  

Decree Day Thoughts, Part 2

I dressed for battle.  I called on the spirits of all the warlike nations of history as I selected and put on my clothes.  When I pulled my blood red sweater over my head, I swear I heard it clang shut.  All the sensory receptors of my skin felt blocked by a thin layer of leather and chain maille.  I prepared for war.  I put on light makeup, but the picture in my mind was a Maori leader's dark, swirling tattoos.  I clipped my hair away from my face, and in my mind I clicked shut the chin strap of a battle helmet. 

 I put the necessary items in my purse: keys, wallet, phone, letter from his attorney, jumble of toilet paper in lieu of tissues.  I slipped my purse over my shoulder, and it became a crossbow, cocked and loaded with one deadly shot.  All of my steps were heavy, meant to make the very earth shake before me.

I dressed for battle.  I prepared for war.  All of this, even though our parting was as civil as these things can be.  It was a polite conversation held across a chasm via smoke signals.  No shots fired, ladders lowered, trebuchets loaded with flaming cannonballs so we could burn each other to the ground.  It was not a war.  It was a surgical separation provided at a hospital with the most compassionate care.  Because I prepared for the blunt force trauma of war, and not the gentle final separation of two people who were already apart, I felt lost at the end of the hearing.  

Where do you put the battle gear when there is no war to fight? I stood tall under the weight of my armor, my weapons, my full-face tattoo.  I walked away with my heavy steps and dropped my gear, piece by piece, until I only had my hurt and anger, cradled in my heart, swaddled with relief.  I dressed for battle to go into a birth.  I prepared for war to witness a soft, gentle death.