Quiet desperation

As my sixth wedding anniversary approaches, I'm inspired to reflect on a couple of model and not-so-model marriages in my life.  And I am truly humbled and thankful for the man whom I married.  He is the best husband I never imagined for myself.  Intelligent, patient, disciplined, understanding, compassionate, and most of all full of integrity.     


They say 50 percent of marriages end in divorce -- most likely, an urban legend. What of the other actual 66 percent (or at least those that don't end in divorce)? As my mind's eye takes a random sample of family and friends, I suspect some of the women (and men too) live marriages of quiet desperation.


Silent hopelessness. It's feeling despair, but going on with your life, never letting on that you're feeling it. Living a life of "quiet desperation" means the feeling people get from simply going with the flow and doing what is expected of them in order to fit in and pay the bills, without ever exploring what it is they truly want out of life.  They know there's something wrong, but they're too polite to complain and too busy to think about it much.  Or perhaps they understand that they've made a commitment to another person, children, to their family. And after so many years, whatever affection they don't experience in their five-, fiftteen-, or thirty-year marriage, they are left to happen upon elsewhere . . . else someone.  That a woman -- a wife and mother -- would live in quiet desperation as her husband berates her through the decades overwhelms me. While there may be no physical abuse, day after day, week after week, month after month or year after year of spousal rebuke . . . can leave someone emotionally drained (I can only imagine).  No doubt there may be husbands or partners who have experienced similar journeys.

For those who have lived lives of quiet desperation and have found freedom in new loves . . . with discerning respect . . . 

by artist Lorna Robertson

heart's desire at twenty-something

loses its way in the clouds

no sunlight

bound by commitment to culture, to partner, to family

no way out of the overcast

heart's desire at fifty-something

loses its way into someone else's heavens

the slightest silver lining

breaks through muted melancholy

shrouded Sibylline lingers lovingly

in promising pentecost

Calling the moon

"Calling the moon
'Cause I know what it's worth

To tug at the seas and illumine the earth

Oh, I am calling the moon

Oh, I am calling the moon"

~ Dar Williams, Singer-Songwriter 

A dear friend of mine, C., shared an interesting article about the effect of eclipses on our day-to-day experiences -- bringing seeming challenges or possible opportunities. Admittedly, eclipses -- lunar or solar -- would explain so much that has happened along life's journey the past six years.  I realized at least one major life-changing event has happened since A. & I have been together:

• 2005 . . . A. & I married
• 2006 . . . Dad began hormone therapy; I resigned from a longtime career at NYU and began my work in cancer support; A. underwent open heart surgery
• 2007 . . . Dad started chemo
• 2008 . . . Dad died; I was laid off
• 2009 . . . Unemployed for eight months, I finally started my work in government relations/advocacy; we started our adoption process
• 2010 . . . ICAB approved our adoption dossier; A. was laid off
• 2011 . . . Unemployed for almost one year, A. started his new position with IEEE just a couple of weeks ago!
• 2012 . . . ???

I suppose that even with challenges, opportunities have presented themselves, especially the time to reflect, nurture our Spirits, and be well.    


June 4 - Yesterday was my Dad's birthday.  He would've been 72.  Almost three years since his death, I am still overwhelmed by the memories of our last summer together, and my Mom & I work to grow an adult relationship as mother & daughter, not without its potholes along the way.  In my Mom, I am discovering the woman I, as her daughter, did not know, and I am taking to heart the courageous strength she mustered to stay the course of a dutiful wife & mother in a culture wrought with old school Filipino machismo and sometimes not-so-subtle derogatory behavior towards women and girls.  It's either a Pilipino teleserye or a Nicholas Sparks novel (I'm hoping, without the usual tragic ending). This is not to dishonor my Dad's memory or disrespect my parents or their marriage. No doubt Dad mellowed with age and illness.  It's true what some say, The only people who know what goes on in a marriage are the two individuals in that relationship. Strange how we really can never know what Life has in store, and we just have to accept the invitation to . . .


. . . move through the eclipse.  

Into memory

on the pier out in the sun
waiting for regulation fluke
summer's bay breeze whispers,
don't forget the clam strips!


As A. has begun his new position with IEEE, we continue to discuss our future as we work on requesting an extension to our immigration application for our waiting child.  To flee from the  East Coast or not?  For some reason, we are drawn to Seattle.  With A. working close to home, the mindshift without the commute into the city is incredible.  Definitely not as stressful.  And Jersey certainly does have its gems -- like the Keyport Fishery.  As with most weekends, we enjoyed hanging leisurely on the pier, where A. is known to fishermen locals as "The Fluke Guy."  While most are trying to figure out how to catch fluke, A. is throwing them back in because they're not regulation size!


A. doesn't express much his longing for our waiting child (though he assures me that it doesn't mean he's not excited! just cautiously more reserved than I) while I am constantly banking in mind memories to be made with our child at our Jersey gems.  The pier, the fishery, paths to be hiked, ocean waves to be jumped, bbqs to be grilled with our closest friends and family . . .


Summer's here.


We celebrated our dearest friend E.'s birthday this past Sunday and are most thankful for her loving presence in our lives!  To our deepening friendship & laughterful memories.  Also, heartful blessings to the R. family -- Tito F., one of my Dad's buddies, died three years ago on Memorial Day weekend (and Dad the following Labor Day weekend).