No, not it IS time to say goodbye. There WAS time to say goodbye. Sometimes people write and say they didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to their loved one before they died. Sometimes they write and say even though it was difficult to watch their loved one go through an extended illness, they are grateful for the time they had for saying all the things they wanted to say. I get that…and both sides of that coin suck.
I’ve given this lots of thought in the nearly three years since Mr. Virgo died. Even though I was in no way ready for what happened…I mean, how COULD you be?…and even though he was ripped away from me in a matter of three or four hours, I never felt like I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye. That’s because we told each other every single day, multiple times a day, just exactly how important we were to each other. We said “I love you!”…a LOT! We hugged and kissed and held hands. We couldn’t be in the same room without touching each other. We sat on the couch and snuggled while we watched TV. We held hands while we drove. He opened doors for me. He placed his hand in the small of my back as he led me to a table in a restaurant before pulling out my chair. He helped me on and off with my coat. He wouldn’t think of doing something until he checked with me first to see if I might want to go along. I know, I know…I am one of the most blessed women on the planet. I totally get that not everyone gets that kind of treatment. I know there are a lot of people out there who never get to experience that kind of love in their whole lifetime. But, I’d like to think we can all improve our connection with our partner. I’d love to think we can deepen our level of intimacy and achieve better communication with our loved ones. I’m also not so naïve as to think it’s easy or even possible for everyone.
Love is a two way street. I went through a horribly painful divorce that I can’t help but feel might have been avoided had we gone for counseling a long time before it fell apart. And if it couldn’t have saved the relationship, it could have at least eased us through the dissolution of it. I think it would be extremely helpful if everyone met with some sort of marital counsellor, be it clergy or secular, every five years of a relationship. Just to touch base. Kind of like the 30,000 mile tuneup you give your car. A time to reconnect, re-evaluate, renew…recommit.
We don’t like to ask the difficult questions in a relationship because we fear what the answer will be. But if we don’t, we can end up living life in an unfulfilling relationship. As painful as a divorce is to go through, I would much rather have known how unhappy Hubby #2 was five years before it actually fell apart. That was five years we couldn’t get back. Five unproductive, frustrating, angry, sad years that we could have spent healing and moving on instead of putting a doily on the elephant in the room and calling it a table.
These are the lessons we learn in life. The “hindsight is 20/20” moments. These are the things I wish someone would have talked to me about in the early years of my marriage. I didn’t really have a mentor to show me how to be a good partner in a relationship. How to be a good wife. How to be a good mother. I, like so many, muddled through the best I could till I finally figured it out. Maybe that’s the way it’s supposed to be. Every single thing I went through in my life made me exactly who I am today. And God has had my life planned out long before I was even a blip in the universe. And, while many of the things I’ve gone through were decidedly unpleasant, there are just as many that I wouldn’t have traded for anything in the world. It’s been a beautiful balance…a lovely journey….a delightful dance that has written the story of my life. One for which I am hugely grateful.
❤️
“My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry,”
James 1:19 NIV