Brotherly Love

"There once was a woman who lived in a shoe, she had so many guests she didn't know what to do." 

 

This is my newest situation. Somehow while I was braving the awful Midwest heat index last weekend, my brother accidentally moved in with me. Its rather odd, I'm not going to lie. He called Saturday and asked if he could "rent the garage" for his stuff.  He apparently decided to terminate his lease so he could move to a better place, but didn't realize there was a gap in time...3 weeks or so. When I asked where he was planning on staying, he didn't know. Ah, so the real issue emerged!  Having his bed and whatnot in my garage and him homeless didn’t make any sense.  So of course, I invited him to stay.  He got the keys from my parents and I came home to his official residence being my back room for the next bit.

 

This was a lot to handle as I have not lived with my brother since I was 19 or 20. You have to understand that my brother doesn’t really call me unless there is a major life crisis.  Dad is in the hospital.  I’m thinking of breaking off my engagement.  Those kind of things, so when I got the call Saturday I had a little post traumatic response going on. However, he is my brother and I will always be there to help.  I’ve also always wanted us to be closer so I’m hoping this time together will be bonding. 

 

To make things a bit more complicated, one of my dearest friends showed up on my doorstep last night about 10:15 needing a place to crash for a couple of days. She is now on the aerobed in the third bedroom downstairs. She will be with me until tomorrow night.  However, she is not the point of this entry so I’ll move along…Even though I had been up since 3 AM MDT to catch flights and I had a rough day at work, I still couldn't sleep very well. Psychologically trying to wrap my brain around so many people in my space was difficult.

 

Although a decade had passed, some things hadn’t changed.  He still had laundry piles around the bedroom and a basket to be washed in the basement.  He had jimmy-rigged his Nintendo/Game Cube/X-Box/Evil Male Time Robbing Machine so that it could be eye level while he was in bed.  This was done by precariously stacking the TV on top of a stool on top of a few cardboard boxes.  His toothbrush was randomly placed in the shower although my toothpaste was half gone.  Instead of empty coca-cola cans, there were beer bottles.

 

Other things hadchanged.  He asked if I needed something when he went to the store.  He was so appreciative of letting him crash at my place.  He gave me privacy when I wanted to talk to my boyfriend on the phone.  In fact he was so concerned that he didn’t want to interfere with the way I did things he was always checking if I usually sleep with the A/C on or what time I usually got up in the morning. 

 

It was strange to realize he wasn’t the personification of my little brother I had in my head.  He is a grown man with real grown up problems, but someone who always knows that his big sister will be there on the playground to stick up for him no matter what.

I take thee...

Once a month I get together with nine fantastic women for a book group.  It is not like some book groups where the literature is just an excuse to get together and gossip.  We actually discuss the book.  Last night was our 7-year anniversary. 

 

The group spans about a 40-year age gap and life experience.  We have social workers, nurses, a bookkeeper, a writer, a teacher turned mom, an entrepreneur, and a couple of individuals who work at a local university.  These women have traveled the world, hiked mountains in Africa, married their soul mates, survived tragedy, saved lives, had children, some divorced and remarried, and have been the strength of their families.  I am very proud to be part of this group.

 

Last night we discussed The Mermaid's Chair by Sue Monk Kidd over a variety of hors d’oerves, wine, and a sinful dessert.  I began reading it because I loved The Secret Life of Bees.  It wasn’t such an easy read in comparison.  As one of the women remarked, it was a mix between The Thorn Birds and a pressured second-book deal for the author.  I thought it was ok, but the more we discussed it, the more I realized I had strong feelings about it. 

 

We posed questions among ourselves of things like:  What would be a deal breaker for a relationship?  What is the significance of Jessie referring to her lover by his monk name vs. his given name when she was talking to her husband?  These all seemed like benign questions the literature stirred up for us and in the process of answering them, we revealed secret parts of ourselves to the group. 

 

And then a passage was read that involved the protagonist marrying herself in some stupid ocean ritual before she went back to her husband.  What the???  Oh, the women in the group thought this was wonderful and I thought it was contrived, cheesy, and counterfeit.  Marrying yourself?  Either you’re for the home team or you aren’t.  How can you marry yourself when you don’t spend any time by yourself?  This woman went from her husband of many years to a monk lover back to her husband!!!  The only time spent by herself was at her monk’s sanctuary while she was waiting for him!!  Being in serial relationships does not allow you to court yourself, get to know you, and then commit to always being faithful to yourself and not abandoning your principles.

 

I have done the affair thing and I have done the serial relationship thing.  During that time in my life I thought I knew what I wanted and who I was.  In reality, I hadn’t a clue.  Its like Julia Roberts in “The Runaway Bride” where she likes her style of eggs the way her current fiancé likes his eggs.  She doesn’t know!!  It wasn’t until I made the conscious decision to really commit to myself and be alone for a while that I discovered I really liked myself.  I am independent, ethical, interesting, and smart.  I enjoy being by myself. 

 

People fill up their lives with people because they are afraid of being alone.  Its one thing to be lonely and another to choose to be alone.  I have felt lonely in a crowd and in a relationship.  To choose to be alone is empowering.  It is a state of being, not a feeling.

 

The more I talked, the louder I became, and the more I gestured.  Apparently I was very passionate about this.  When I finally stopped a few were laughing at me and others just had an expression of confusion/concern.  Ok, well it hit a button for me.  A big, red, flashing button that said, “push me.”  I had to stop and wonder why it got hit.

 

As I sit in limbo land of this current relationship I have to wonder what is at stake.  Am I being faithful to myself by staying and sticking out the waiting period or am I self-sacrificing?  As a friend put it, “I know there is a right decision out there, but it will only be apparent in the future.”  No wonder my button got pushed.  What’s even more ironic is that I’m waiting for the stupid ritual of declaration of dedication…not by me, but by someone else.  My button didn’t get pushed, it got hit by a ton of bricks.

 

Today I head back to the land of cornfields and tent revivals.  One of my employees asked if she should get the officepool going again.  I came home from Hawaii to find one posted about my pending engagement.  She was joking and I just shook my head.  The reality is I’m already married…to myself. 

Hello, my name is...

On Saturday I went to a baby shower for my cousin who is married to a guy from Columbia but they now live in Toyko.  (Did everyone get that?)  My aunt hosted it and I got to see relatives that only come out for big family events like showers or funerals...this was a much happier time. 

The shower was lovely.  I usually hate showers.  You typically do not know a lot of people, there is a lot of polite conversation over finger food, and you generally feel rather self-conscious about the wrapping of your gift. 

Not with this shower.  Everyone was meshing well and the conversation turned to blogs.  Does everyone know "lucy's spleen?"  Did you know that readers are sending money to "suburban bliss" to go to a bloggers conference?  What about the protest of "dooce" and her elimination of comments?

And then I had a funny experience.  One of the women in the room turned to me and said, "Wait a minute, don't you have a blog?"

I began to feel the blood drain out of my face as I quickly mentally scanned the content of my entries and felt flattered all at the same time.  This woman knew me before she knew me! 

She said it was funny that on her blog (a la inspiration of my cousin, same as my story) she had a quiz of how well people knew her.  Turns out her readers scored higher than her own family or boyfriend.  (As soon as I get her site, I will link it to mine.)

Every once in awhile I scroll down to see how many readers have checked out my entries.  It always amazes me.  I guess I just want to thank my readers.  Thanks for being interested, sending comments/emails, and coming back.  :-)

Editorials Unsolicited

This week I had my quarterly visit with my psychiatrist.  I realized I had very little to talk about in therapy as my life has been going relatively smoothly.  No lightening bolts have hit, no lotteries won; you get the picture.  Really how is it that a 15 minute time slot can really be operationalized into more than just a med check? 

I  brushed over work issues and the politics involved to which he responded, "Your job is too emotional."  I think he realized I was stonewalling so he began to ask about what my boyfriend was up to and how the relationship was going.  I simply mentioned that he was on the palliative care consulting service this month for his rotation.  His face contorted like he had sucked on a lemon.  So much for the blank page theory of Dr. Freud.  I reassured him that actually my boyfriend was finding enjoyment in his work this month and he also really enjoyed working on the hemetology/oncology service as well.  At that point in time he hit me with this social commentary:

"You guys are a match made in heaven.  Both of you are drawn to situations that are truly utterly hopeless."

I couldn't help but laugh.

Time Traveler

As one of my dear friends said, my bad luck with traveling a la boyfriends is over.  Hawaii was a success.  We had a great time snorkeling at Shark's Cove, sea kayaking with the sea turtles, hiking the rainforests, and hanging out in the quaint town of Haleiwa.  For all intents and purposes, it was amazing.

I was astounded how well we did around each other.  There never was a time where I needed alone time.  I didn't scare him off with my tantrums (and there was one when we were snorkeling and I was pushed up against the reef in low tide by the strong current.)  He reframed me as a mermaid with her siren call luring men into their deaths.  Really I was cursing him under my breath, screaming into my snorkel tube, and trying to blame him for me following him out to sea (even if it was by my own volition.)  Talk about psychotic optimism on his behalf. 

Several friends (mostly guys) predicted that it would be the trip I would get engaged.  Not so much.  There were conversations about marriage (go figure, all initiated by me) that were left in a high degree of vagueness.  

Typical Conversation:

Me:  What are we doing?

Him:  I don't know.

Me:  What are the obstacles?

Him:  I don't know.

Me:  This isn't very reassuring.

Him:  I'm sorry you feel that way. We are getting married.  I love you.  I told you I was slow.

Me:  Evolution is faster than this relationship.

He will then go into a scientific explaination of why that statement isn't true, how time is relative, and if he's really on a roll, he'll bring in quantum physics vs. Neutonian physics into the conversation.  Don't get me wrong, part of his charm that I love is his geek speak, its just kind of hard to take when I know I'm working with matters of the heart.

We looked at the pictures from our trip at a family dinner party the night before he went back to Indy.  His Mother and Grandmother both asked where the ring was, I just shrugged my shoulders thinking they were asking the wrong party.  Easy to ask because if you look at the pictures in this entry, they are very romantic.

I hate to admit I'm one of "those" girls.  Where the hell is my ring?  It becomes more apparent as now every single one of my girlfriends is married or newly engaged.  (This all occurred within the past couple of months for me to be the last one standing by the way...I lie, two are still relatively single.)  Don't get me wrong, it is not a race to the altar...the only one I'm racing is myself and the strange ticking of my biological clock. 

The more I bring up the marriage thing the more I begin to feel like the crocodile in "Peter Pan" stalking Captain Hook.  Tick tock, tick tock.  He says he's aware of my clock and has been for the past 2 years. 

Time is a funny thing.  It can work to your advantage, like building excitement before a trip.  Or it can be a disservice, like when you are late.  He is typically late because he is slow or distracted.  I am typically late because I overestimate what I can accomplish in a small amount of time.  Perhaps our relationship is "late" because of all of these reasons.  I just wonder how much more time it will take.  In nicer terms, he is on "island time" which is typical of the Hawaiian lifestyle...fitting with this entry I suppose.

Aloha.