“Well, after a while there is nothing left to fight about.”
I opened the third drawer of my seven day dresser, where I keep my hair brush and the like and which I have opened a thousand times in the last ten years; but saw something different, it was as if I was looking at it for the first time. I stopped and thought: They are all here – my people are all gathered together in my third drawer.
The piece of paper first caught my eye, and I wondered why I was keeping a membership card, from a church youth group, signed in 1977, in with my hair jewelry? It was from a church in Delano, California, which my father pastored, and thus had signed. My older sister had also signed the card, as she was the president of the youth group. For a moment, I thought it should be stored someplace else, but then decided it was safe, right where it was at. I then thought about how my younger sister had given me the box – it was a lunch keeper, but I had found a better use for the compartmentalized container. The hair clips on the right for my hot rollers, which my mother had given me years ago, and which I have been using since seventh grade, when she gave me the first set. The hair jewelry was all from Kate. Tessie, Kate’s grandmother, had made her way to the box, in the form of an old concealer which I have no idea why I keep. Our dining room table, central to our life, and the Dessert Rose dishes came from Tessie, along with countless serving platters which she used to send us, when we lived in California. Mel, from whom we bought our house, was in the box. He had decided that we would be good neighbors to Phil, and Ruth and Tom, and thus sold us his house, filled with many of his treasures which became ours. Mel was responsible for the little chain, which I kept because it reminded me of my childhood – together Mel and Tessie represented our home in so many ways. How nice, they were all tucked away safely in the third drawer.
I went through the next several days thinking about how we hold on to people, often putting them in little boxes, where they are safe and sound, and where we can control our interaction. We lock our loved ones into a place and time where their lives make sense to us, and thus they make us happy. Keeping the people I love neatly stowed, led me to think of how we also let go of people we have loved. Death is of course the non-negotiable factor in letting go, we are forced to say good-by and whether or not the relationship has run its course, it stops. But what of the others that come and go throughout our life? Why do we keep some people in our lives and let go of others? Is it a conscious choice to work on some relationships and give up on others? Is forever simply a choice – do we choose to make some people forever in our life, and thus they are there year after year? Do we even have a choice in the matter? Why do some relationships last a lifetime and others only a season, I finally wondered aloud, to a group of friends, sitting around the table?
“Well, after a while there is nothing left to fight about,” Someone answered. My friend began reflecting on what a great marriage she had had, and the happy times she had shared with her husband; though they had had their share of difficulties too, of course. The group grew quiet.
“You know what I mean?” she continued. She did not wait for us to answer, but began to talk about how the mother-in-laws pass away, and there is no longer any debate about where holidays will be spent, you buy a house, and talking about a move becomes pointless, and the children grow up and there is no further worry about how you are going to pay for their education. She again looked for affirmation, “Right? Isn’t it like that for you?”
Suddenly, I was no longer feeling reflective alone; collectively we began to take stock of our relationships. People drift apart, you no longer sit in alphabetical order or are forced to eat lunch in the cafeteria, and thus there are so many new opportunities to make new friends and excuses to let go of old friends. Most of us are not now born and raised on the same street, where we marry and make a new family, and are eventually buried. Nor do we stay at the same job or many of us even the same profession, for a lifetime. Our very mobile twenty-first century existence fill us up with opportunities to find new people to love and share our lives; so what of the old people? Do we put the old people in a box until they die or there is no longer anything left to fight about?
Is that the key to forever relationships, to wait until there is nothing left to fight about? I do not know, but I have grown weary of fighting with people that I love. I continue to wonder if there might not be some viable alternative to maintain old relationships. Perhaps, what we are missing is acceptance. We do grow up and life changes us, for better and for worse. While I agree with my friend that what we fight about does change, what we celebrate also changes.
There are many wonderful things about old relationships, especially a shared history. Kate says that I still see her as she was at twenty, when I met her. She is right. I am not blinded to the scattered grey hairs, the laugh line or two, or even the extra second that it takes her to jump up out of bed, in the morning. But in my minds’ eye, Kate will always be twenty, and hopefully, I will always be twenty-five. It is lovely to share your life with someone who remembers you at your best, and loves you at your worst – and I do not mean our aging bodies, but rather our lost tempers, foolish annoyances, and wasted efforts. Lasting relationships survive both the good and bad moments of our life. We accept our friends moving far away, because they want a new adventure; we embrace our children’s spouse, because they make our children so happy, and we congratulate our partners on new positions, because the challenge brings them joy – regardless of what it does to our box.
I do not want to wait until there is nothing left to fight about with the people I love; I want to be happy right now, this very moment, because they are happy! That is all for now.
