Ex-Nihilo

I never, but never, thought about getting married. I never thought about my future husband, what he would look like, how he would treat me. Somewhere that had stopped.

I only have one memory of my future-thinking in matters of love and it is so shadowy- i could not have been more than ten years old. i think i was younger.

The memory revolves around the idea of my having a boyfriend. Not a husband. The part of my boyfriend was played by my parents' bedpost. I admit: i kissed that bedpost.

Chris entered into the role with nearly no conscious scripting.
And yet, somehow, he still seemed woefully out of place.

He didn't fit and I knew he didn't fit from forever. From the beginning, I knew he wouldn't do. But i couldn't let go. i tried to, but i willed not to. i didn't even understand it myself, then.

last night, we lay in bed and i mourned for the irregularities, the grooves that just don't come together, the time we spent apart and the woman I am not. the woman I have yet to become and cannot become by trying. She appears or she doesn't. We don't make ourselves up. I tell him that I am glad I married him, but that i was not ready to marry him. i cried to think about how much sense we fail to make in the day-in and day-out experiences that everyone else seems so adjusted to.

He holds my hand. He laments, our lives together have been. . .bizarre.

I didn't have to say it.

I thanked him, because what he said was true, only he could know how much and there he was, in our bed, holding on to me, when there has been so little positive reinforcement to do so.

I couldn't, wouldn't have made this up, and maybe that is the best part about it.