Ms. Team

My friend just coined that moniker.  I was telling her that I am clear on what would be my top criteria in a potential spouse.  I am NOT currently shopping for a future spouse; this is just about an observation I had over this weekend.

I recently confided  in people that really were not going to be my advocates.  I should have known this going into the conversation, but I am so needy to have some support that I went against better judgment, and told them some of my plans and fears.  When it became clear that they would not be using this information to look out for my welfare, I felt more alone and frightened then in several weeks.

This Saturday I was reading a book another friend had lying around: Shidduch Secrets. The book is specifically about dating in the Orthodox Jewish world, but the ideas more generally are about becoming clear for yourself what you need most from a spouse, in order to have a happy fulfilling marriage, not just assuming everyone needs the same things.  I'm not trying to suggest the book is good (or bad), but it put this subject in my head.

My highest requirements would not be physical attractiveness or wealth, not even sense of humor or intelligence. What I need most is the confidence that my spouse will always cover my back, because we are a team. 
When I told this to my friend, she said "Yes, someone who cares about you." But no, that is not necessarily the same thing.  As Marian the Librarian says, I want someone "more interested in Us than in Me". 

I need someone who wants to be part of a team, who wants to depend on me, and wants for me to depend on him.  When I was young and stupid, I assumed this is what everyone wanted.  Instead, there are lots of people who want to be independent, feel that complete self-reliance is their ideal - which is fine, I guess, but it is not who I am, and not who I am looking for. I need someone who not only will be dependent on me, but wants to be dependent. and wants me to depend on him.  A man who wants to act, plan, celebrate, mourn and dream as a team.

As a funny aside, the idea of a spouse as someone to literally "cover your back", is explained by Mel Brooks, the 2000 Year Old Man. To paraphase: "Marriage also stems from fear, everything stems from fear. You can't see in back of you.  So you take some lady, you say 'Hey lady will you look behind me?' 'How long?' 'Forever!' and that's it, you walk around attached,  you're married."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIezIhi9JNc&feature=related
(Sorry I can't just attached the video, something is not working.  This link should go to the 2000 Year Old Man animated cartoon).

And the Money is Gone - a confused ramble

I started writing this post soon after the other "where the money goes..." posts, back in April 2001, when things got really, really bad and I expected to move out soon:

Well that's the end to my comfortable margin of income/outflow.  I will now have an extra $1000 - $1200 expenditures in my monthly budget, and starting next year I will most likely have a child going to school out of state, with all those associated bills.  Well, it was a fun ride for those couple months.  I don't even think I will get to use those wine glasses this year.  It has been a very hard couple of days.
I have had a chance to glance over other people's book the last few evenings.  Two that I stopped over were An Offer You Can't Refuse by Rabbi Yisochar Frand, and The Garden of Emunah by Rabbi Shalom Arush.  I lately have a hard time getting into these kind of book, but they were both wonderful, or I was just led to a wonderful part, and I really took a lot from the little bits I read.  The ideas I caught were, respectively, to be mindful of your mitzvos, that they are not done in a blase, unthinking manner; and to know that everything in your life has a reason.  Together they are a message to be aware of

...of something. The potential for making everything count?  The connection we want to create with G-d at all times?  The possibility of having innumerable meaningful moments throughout the day?  I can't remember what I wanted to write, or if I even had anything important to say. I should probably try to proceed with these positive thoughts, but can't find the inspiration. Such is life - fleeting.  That is what is says in Kohelet and Psalms anyway.

So, here I am on the other side of the separation,  and the wine glasses are sitting in a box on the storage shelf, and much of rest of the money was spent without any return. 
On the one hand it feels like being in a sit-com; no matter how good or bad your fortune in one episode, no matter how genius or moronic the plan, the characters always go back to Start for the next episode. 
On the other hand, there is actually tremendous change (like when a sit-com is lagging, so everyone in simultaneously decides to pull up strings and move to California).  The future of the money is very unclear, as I need to meet with my wasband and a mediator to graph out how any assets are to be allocated.  More irony -  this is one of the major things I demanded in order to stay with the wasband, to discuss the money with a mediator.  Maybe it is not ironic, maybe I am seeing the beginning of a life change for the family, as I had insisted was necessary.  Maybe I am stepping out of that crazy, nonsensical Kafka-like world, where everyone said "go, work, you're right, you're right", then proceeded to make sure all my attempts were speared.  Maybe. I'll try to let you know.

Opposing veiwpoints

Nothing earth-shattering, just thinking about these quite incongruent messages:

 

Finnian's Rainbow

Schoolhouse Rock

How long 'til we get there?

***Photo by Jordan Sopinsky, off the hook productions

I was so sick last night!  I rarely do well with day fasts (yesterday was the Jewish Fast of Gedalia), I suppose because I don't alter my normal routine,  and don't prepare well in advance.  My friends were having a gathering yesterday evening, and I though I would just break the fast there.  My stomach did not like that, and my head, which was already in pain, pushed it into the "let's just go back to a blank slate" mode.  I don't know if any of the advil I had taken 10 minute prior stayed with me, but I wasn't about to take more.  I waited until I felt moderately better, luckily only had about 6 blocks to drive home, and just crawled into bed.

And I woke up...better than well.  I felt that "really really well" of those formerly in acute pain.  My bed felt so comfortable, and it was wonderful to just lie there pain-free.

I'm no stranger to nausea.  I was terribly nauseated throughout all my pregnancies.  And headaches are a regular occurrence unless I am very lucky and careful.  I would think I wouldn't hate it so much, seeing as how I love the euphoric rush of "health" that usually follows.  But the problem, I believe, is the uncertainty. I think I could bare the sickness much better if I knew the duration.  Not knowing when or even if the pain will end is very scary and disabling.

I remember when I was still new to the city where I met my wasband.  We spent a lot of time on Saturdays walking, in the Southern heat and me in high heels, to places I had never been.  "How far do we have to go?"  "I don't know."  This always brought down my spirit.  "You know," I would tell him, " Rashi asks 'Why did G-d say to Abraham "Go to the land I will show you."?'  Why not tell him where he was to travel?  Because it is a bigger test if you don't tell the destination, he had no idea how far he would have to travel."  But he just didn't have the map-type sense to judge how far a trip would be, so I was always just waiting, waiting to get there.

So - obvious parallel:  How long 'til I am comfortable with life again?  I'm willing to accept this is a necessary period of discomfort, even to try to be grateful that G-d has taking my fate so strongly in his care.  But I wish I knew that it was a finite distance.  Or even to know that it was to get to a final proper destination.  Or even to know that I was on the right path.  But I've had a taste of the euphoria in (yet another) dream - if I'm on the right direction, it's worth it.

*** Photo by Jordan Sopinsky http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/off-the-hook-productions/121549817856455 .  If you love it, please ask for the photographer's permission before re-posting or for a link to more photos.