Sheltering in Place, Part 2

All that does seem rather dark and foreboding, doesn’t it?  How could two people who had become so distant over so many years, happily—or even bearably—cohabit under such draconian restrictions?  It’s understandable that we would be miserable…scratching at the walls, driving each other crazy, staging spectacular verbal battles, playing tug-of-war over household responsibilities; in general, just hating life.

I had geared up for a fight, back in March, when I told him if he went to Portland, he should stay there for the duration.  For 26 years, the job has been his #1 priority.  It ALWAYS took first place, over me, over our marriage, over our home; over “joint” endeavors upon which we embarked with his full consent and commitment (or so I thought.) Birthdays, anniversaries, holidays—any day or time that could be construed as being personally important—were only celebrated to the extent that the job would allow him to do so.  When we lived apart, he’d let it be known the job was his priority and would always get the lion’s share of his time and energy, even when time or energy might be better invested into his home and marriage.  When it came to “our” business ventures, his interest/involvement would wax and wane erratically, depending on whether he was engaged and happy at the job, or frustrated and bored with it.

The job was the constant during all those years, all those ups and downs, all those attempts to break out and make a life together. It was at once his refuge and his purgatory.  It gave him something to cling to, and with both hands engaged in holding on to it, he couldn’t reach for anything newer, or better, or more rewarding, or even different.

As the years went by, I learned that if I wanted a life, I had to get my own.  In our younger days, we’d loved camping.  We’d taken weekends in vacation rentals in little tourist spots all over Oregon.  We’d invested countless hours and dollars remodeling every house we had ever lived in. Then we bought the restaurant, and everything changed.  Everything stopped.  Eventually, the restaurant chewed us up and spit us out.  But we couldn’t get our old life back. 

He withdrew from me and anything I had ever had anything to do with.  He hated camping.  A succession of travel trailers that I thought I couldn’t live without sat moldering in the driveway.  Getting him to take time off so we could go on a long weekend was nearly impossible.  He stopped caring about the house and the yard.  He’d come home from work, have dinner, and then sit in front of the television until he went to bed.  And all day Saturday and at least half of Sunday, he spent on the couch in front of the tv.  And I…well, I tried to get a life.  I invested time in what was now MY small business—which eventually led me to spending many hours in Eugene at the building I had bought to house it.  I drove hundreds of miles with my dog and my camera.  I took the trailers out for solitary vacations. I walked and kept house and decorated for holidays and escaped to Eugene by myself as often as I could.  To say we grew apart would be like calling the Grand Canyon a trickle through a ravine.      

So, yes.  I expected a struggle when I told him not to come back if he drove up to Portland on March 17 of this year.  After all we’d been through for a quarter of a century—more than half our married life—over which his work had always taken priority, I did not believe for one minute that even COVID-19 would able to loose the chains that bound him to that job.  There was little doubt in my mind that he would go anyway, and I would be left, as had become our habit, to get my own life.  Only this time, THIS time, he might not come back.  It would be up to me to conquer the debilitating anxiety, hold down the fort, maintain the house and the pets and the yard, alone.  I could do it.  I would do it.  I didn’t intend to beg, or cry, or threaten.  If he made up his mind, he would just be…gone.  It’s not like we weren’t mostly apart anyway.

But, to my utter astonishment, he didn’t go. With hardly a peep of argument.  It was hard for me to be properly dumbfounded, lost as I was in my personal hell of runaway anxiety.  I didn’t even consider how being together 24/7 was going to play out.  All I really knew was there was one less thing to be crazy worried about—he was not going to go out in the world and bring the disease back to our home.

For the first two weeks of our shared “social distancing,” I wouldn’t have been able to say how things were working out between us if you asked.  I had fallen so far inside my own head that all my waking energy was spent trying to keep myself from being completely swallowed up by that black hole.  

But as time went on, I noticed that I wasn’t fighting quite so hard.  This was partly because we’d been home long enough to have outlasted the incubation period if we had been infected.  But, more than that, it was because I wasn’t battling alone.  Life no longer consisted only of me straining to create a satisfying solitary existence while waging a lonely war against my anxiety, as it had been for most of the last twenty years.  Just having someone in the house to shoulder some of the burden of everyday life—mowing the lawn, taking out the trash, caring for the animals, planning grocery deliveries, working on household projects—was a godsend.  And having another person consistently within shouting distance, someone with needs and fears and challenges of his own, served as a life ring.  It dragged me out of my own head and pulled my attention to someone who was not me.

At some point, I noticed this, and sat and thought about it for a bit.  And what I realized was that I was hunkered down, socially distancing and sheltering in place with…my best friend.  After all the years of see-sawing commitment; of almost getting close enough then pushing each other away; of frustration and anger and hurt; we still liked each other.  I suppose if that basic fact were not true—if we were not on some level best friends through everything—we would not still be together at all. 

I told someone a couple of weeks ago that this “difficult” time we’re living through has actually given me the opportunity to tend my relationship with my husband, with whom I have “really needed to reconnect.”  During the days, he “works” from home, on what is left of his work, and I fuss around with house and/or yard projects.  In the afternoons, we work on projects together, or go for drives, do online shopping, or do our little one-mile “walk-at-home” workouts together.  In the evenings, we settle in and binge-watch several episodes of our favorite reruns on tv.  One night a week, we declare “no tv night,” and after dinner, we play cribbage or Racko until bed time. At the end of every evening, I fill up the kitchen sink and we do the day’s dishes together (our “new” house came without a dishwasher.  But who needs one?)

We’re so comfortable in our isolation, that I almost feel guilty to be so blessed, when so many others are suffering so much pain and loss during this dark time.

In the mornings, when I go outside to feed the outside animal life and drink my coffee, I salute the four compass points and honor the Spirits of East, South, West and North from whom I have sought guidance for years.  And I make it a point to express to each Spirit that I am grateful, SO grateful for the blessings and the guidance that have been so freely given to me and my household during these hard times. 

I’m pretty sure there are still difficult times in store for us, financially, at least.  His job will be over by the end of July, and our small business is in a state of limbo, without festivals, fairs and markets at which to sell our wares.  Income and health care are looming worries.  But the Universe has continued to show such care and love for our little household that I can’t help but rest in it, confident that, as always, we will be provided for, one way or another.