Together forever
My husband and I have been together for 16 odd years. We have weathered times of extreme emotion and drama through to much mundane going through the motions of family life. We have both changed alot over the years but our essential personalities and character still rule the order of the day. There were a number of years where we used to threaten each other with, ‘I’ll leave you if……’ whenever things got stormy. We even had a few days apart at times.
I know that there is a part of me that has always yearned to have ‘a friend for life’, someone who didn’t take off when the going got to tough. I have always felt that I wanted that in a female friend because this is where I seem to lack that in my experience. In some deep dark hole of myself I hold to an ugliness around the light of my feminine in relationship to other women. I feel my failure. I still seek the validation of my okayness through a commitment to all the shades of me through the portal of ’her’ acceptance.
But in the bigger picture is the true blessing that is easy to miss. I have a mate who already is and will always be ‘my friend for life’. Chris and I spent our early years in threat of leaving because we were not getting what we wanted. We were not seated in the place of unconditional love. Somehow through our fears of being alone we stayed together and created a family. It has been a few years since either of us threated to leave in a fit of not getting what we wanted or even felt we needed. Something happened over time that has let us sink into a trust of each others deeper heart connection.
I already have what I always thought would make me feel secure. Does it make me feel secure?. In a way I didn’t realise. There are people in this world, and it is probably very few in each individuals life, that simply love you no matter what. They love you from the deepest place possible and nothing can break that bond regardless of the show on the surface. They will be there in your hours of deepest need. They will also walk away if love is served most deeply by that. But they are closer for the leaving.
I have been watching a true unconditional love story here on National Television. It has spanned 13 years since a young man was charged with the murder of his whole immediate family. He had spent all this time in jail and there has been a man who lives at the other end of the country, who has fought for his innocence all this time. This man has spent all his life savings and his high profile reputation (which he has lost to many) on holding to the innocence of Bain. And at last Bain has been released after appeal to the Privy Council in London and discovery of an unfair trial. Bain is now living with this man who never failed him. I feel that is incredible love, extreme and unbelievable holding for all this time.
It just goes to show that love doesn’t neccessarily show up in the packages we think it will. Our true family can be a desparate bunch. It can look like unconditional love from one side and unfair dismissal from the other. When I look around I can’t doubt in sacred contracts. I find some sense of faith in them that lets me breathe more easily. I feel the outreach of Gods hand that holds underneath them. Even when it feels like you are falling through the gap between the out stretched fingers you are simply falling into the enfolding palm that never closes or lets go. Part of opening our clench on life is finding and breathing into this place of trust in the already written stories of our lives and loves with each other.