Relationships

To be or not to be, that is the question!  Does a forty year old divorced single mom with two active kids, a career, a crazy family, baggage of the physical and emotional kind, and bad credit even venture back into the dating scene?  Yes, she does because her friends, most of her crazy family, and Valentine's Day tells her she should.  How could anyone be happy alone for possibly another forty years?  How could you afford a house on your own?  Aren't you lonely?  Don't you need a man? Are you a lesbian?  How bad did your EX screw you up?  Funny how all these little slings and arrows pierce a woman's self-confidence and make her think she needs to be in a relationship.  However, after some soul searching, I have decided I don't need a relationship, but I want one.  I really do cherish the idea that I can grow old sharing my life with someone, helping each other, and enjoying our lives together.  I want that connection mind, body, and soul with a man.  I want a feeling of being a woman and nothing in this world makes me feel more womanly that being with a man.  However, being in a relationship and defining roles within it to build a partnership is so complicated.

I think men and women want the same basic needs fulfilled by their relationships.  Acceptance, love, honesty,  appreciation, and commitment.  I know I want these things in my relationship and I want them equally between my partner and I.  Does that mean that even though I do 90% of the cleaning that our partnership is doomed?  Surprisingly no, but if I do 90% of the cleaning and feel like my partner does 100% of the mess and never even acknowledges that I do anything but complain, then yes it is headed for Splitsville faster than a bullet train.  The evolution of a relationship, good or bad, is very tricky and often makes no sense what-so-ever.   I have read countless articles on the stages of a relationships and marriages, and yet divorce rates are higher than they have ever been.  I don't need to quote anybody's statistics for that, they have groups for kids of divorced parents in school now.  The sobering reality of our disposable society is relationships usually don't last, but yet I, like so many others, still want one to last until death do us part.  How do you make a relationship last through all of life's changes?  Some people say compromise, some say don't fight, some say fight right, some say it's impossible and all people finally just settle down into a routine and give up but stay in the marriage anyway.  I honestly think that it is just luck.  If all of us want the same basic things, then why do we have such a hard time with relationships?

Feelings are to blame.  Take for example my feelings of being taken for granted in every relationship I've ever had.  I'm a very very giving person.  It makes me feel good to give.  That saying, "It's better to give than to receive," should have been stamped on my forehead.  The down side of giving too much of your time, your heart, your money, your patience, your love is that not everyone appreciates your gifts.  Quite honestly, that never bothers me unless I'm in a relationship with the person who doesn't appreciate how special I am.  Don't misunderstand, I'm far from perfect, but if I can work two jobs, cook, clean, drive the kids to a baseball game and still be in a slinky outfit with garters, hose, and high heels with makeup at 11:00 p.m. when I have to work at 6:00 a.m. and the love of my life complains that he really just needs to get some work done when he has the entire day off the next day?  Trust me I'm going to feel taken for granted.  I have listened to many of my married man friends complain that they don't get enough attention, don't have sex enough, don't feel appreciated while their wives complain that they don't help with the dishes, never take out the trash, never buy them flowers or participate in any events, but nothing changes and then one day they are divorcing because they have just had enough.  Enough of being unappreciated on both sides and they were both right in FEE:LING that way.  Feelings aren't wrong they just are.  Unfortunately, I can't control my feelings like Spock, I am more a Captain Kirk.  Most people can't control their feelings, but they can control their behavior.  The disconnect that happens when a partner voices their feelings about a certain behavior and the other partner dismisses those feelings and neglects to change their behavior is key to feeling unappreciated.  Ignoring another person's feelings toward you is like hearing a tornado siren and running onto the porch, it doesn't make a lot of sense, but most people do it anyway.  The key is to have those feelings about the behavior and not about the person.  For example, I love my partner, but I hate it when he doesn't flush the toilet.  I don't hate my partner because he didn't flush the toilet, I just hate that he didn't flush his stinking gross shit away so I wouldn't have to see it.  He acted in a selfish way which caused me to feel badly.  However, if he continues to ignore how I feel and the behavior becomes who he is, I will start to hate him.  This is the slow erosion of a relationship.  When you finally realize the truth about that person and the value they place on your feelings.  It may seem like a small thing, but add up any small thing over years and years and it accumulates into a huge pile of stinking gross shit that no amount of flushing can ever wash away.  Feelings are like fertilizer to love.  Some are nutrient rich and others are too acidic and can damage love's roots and kill off any potential for growth.

Timing is also the culprit.  If you plant a tree at the wrong time the roots will die.  If you try to build a relationship with an emotionally immature person that is selfish and can't make a commitment past Friday night, your roots will die.  If a person tries to love you when your heart is broken and you can't see a way out the thick fog of your last relationship, their roots will die.  You have to start a relationship at the right time for both partners.  Thankfully, feelings can change and so can people, but you can never change time.

So why do some relationships grow and other's end?  Luck.  I think it's hard work, but mostly luck.  My current partner tells me a lot, "You're lucky I love you."  He is right.  I am lucky, because he does appreciate how special I am right now.  I'm not perfect and I don't know if our relationship will survive the test of time and our feelings will grow.  I love that song, "Now that we found love what are we gonna do with it."  My partner and I found love, now we have to decide what to do with it.  Do we appreciate it? Do we talk about our feelings honestly and behave in ways that will nurture our love?  Are we honest about ourselves and how we feel?  Do we change our behavior based on our feelings?  Do we value the love we found over our love for others?

It's so complicated, but that's life.  My alternative is to be alone and that is just not acceptable to me.  I like to share my life way to much to spend it alone.  I have close family, many friends and co-workers, but on a Friday night when I'm sitting in front of my TV in sweats dreading going to a gallery opening or a bar all by myself, because I'd rather be sitting down to a candle light dinner with somebody  I truly love and can't, I came to the conclusion that family, friends and my kids just simply weren't enough.  I wanted the entire messy, complicated, wonderful, crazy and difficult relationship.  "Now that we found love what are we gonna do with it," I guess I'll try to love it!