My ex-husband has a girlfriend. Months ago, we decided it was time for us to meet. The three of us arranged to have breakfast at a local restaurant. I arrived first, sat on a bench, played with my phone, and waited. Eventually I saw the two of them approaching, and I stood up. She smiled and when we hugged, her hair smelled like a flower I couldn’t identify.
We asked for a table by the water. She and Craig sat down on one side; I sat on the other and placed my purse on the seat next to me. When the waiter came, I ordered hot tea. He delivered it to the table in a little white teapot. I didn’t know what else to talk about, so I talked about the little white teapot.
I said, “Look at this! How cute is this? My own teapot.”
The next week, I opened a box in the mail. Inside there were two little white teapots—from her to me.
When my daughters go to their father’s house, she is there with them, and she braids my daughters’ hair skillfully. I have never known how to braid my daughters’ hair. I’ve tried, but it ends up looking lumpy and pathetic, so we stick to ponytails. Whenever I see a little girl wearing complicated braids, I think: She looks well loved. She looks well mothered. She looks like a little girl whose mother knows what she’s doing. Who once was a teenage girl who knew what she was doing, who had lots of friends in high school, who all sat around and braided each other’s hair and giggled. Who was Golden.
When Craig and his girlfriend drop the kids off at our house, we stand in the foyer together in a little circle and we are kind and awkward. I tell too many jokes and laugh too often and too loudly. We each do the best we can. Sometimes, while we’re standing there, she pulls my girls over, wraps her arms around them, and plays with their hair. When this happens, Abby grabs my hand and squeezes. When Craig and his girlfriend leave, I pull my girls close again. They look well mothered, and they smell like a flower I can’t identify.
The kids, Abby, and I got up early this past Thanksgiving morning, piled into the car, and drove to the Turkey Trot race downtown. On the way, Chase read us a meme that said, “My greatest fear is marrying into a family that runs Turkey Trots on Thanksgiving morning.”
Craig and his girlfriend met us there. As we approached the starting line, Craig and Chase went to the front of the pack; their goal to win. Craig’s girlfriend, my daughters, and I found a place in the back; our goal to finish, maybe. Abby placed herself in the middle, surveying; her goal to make sure everyone achieved their goal.
The race began. We stuck together for a while, then drifted apart. Halfway through the race, I saw Craig’s girlfriend jogging ahead of me. I’ve always thought of “picking up the pace” as something one does metaphorically, but suddenly I felt my feet literally picking up their pace. I began to run instead of jog. I began to run strenuously. I began to run so strenuously that I felt myself sweating and panting. I began sprinting. As I approached Craig’s girlfriend, I weaved to the far left so she wouldn’t see me pass her. Farther along, I saw Tish running alone, but I didn’t slow down; I left her in my dust. My knee started to hurt, but I didn’t slow down for my knee either. I crossed the finish line having beat Craig’s girlfriend. By a long stretch.
Still trying to catch my breath, I grabbed a water and walked back to the finish line to wait for my girls. I scanned the sea of runners finishing and saw Abby, Tish, Amma, and Craig’s girlfriend cross the finish line together. Abby had finished early and gone back, rounded up the troops, made sure they all crossed together. They were giggling, happy, Abby on one side, Craig’s girlfriend on the other, Amma and Tish in the middle. Nobody seemed to notice my absence or my victory.
A few days later, I stood in my driveway and called Craig.
I said, “She tells Tish that she loves her. Don’t you think that’s a little much? She is your girlfriend, not their mother. We all need some boundaries. You need to help her set them. What if she leaves and hurts our kids?”
I am much more afraid that she will stay and love our kids.
We all ate Christmas dinner together this year. I asked Craig to bring the traditional apple pie. He and his girlfriend brought a strawberry dish instead. When Tish asked where the apple pie was, I shrugged and shushed her. After dinner, we took a family picture: all of us and the dog. After we took it, Craig’s girlfriend said, “Okay, now let’s do a crazy one!” Why all the suggestions? We don’t do crazy ones. All three kids agreed that the crazy picture was the best picture. Then we sat down and ate the strawberry dish. All three kids said it was the best Christmas dessert we’d ever had.
The next day, Craig’s girlfriend posted our crazy picture online. She wrote, “Grateful to have found a love that is inviting and kind, witty and nonjudgmental, a no boundaries type of love.”
Someday I’ll ask her how to braid my daughters’ hair.
Someday I’ll learn how to mother with her, with Abby, like a braid.
Sometimes, when heated conflict arises between Abby and me, we stop talking, take a breath and say to each other, “Okay, let’s not first-marriage this. Let’s second-marriage this.” What we mean is: Let’s not go on autopilot here. Let’s use what we’ve learned and apply it. Let’s be careful and wise and put our egos aside and remember that we are on the same team. Now that we know better, let’s do better.
I would have described myself as the spiritual director of my first marriage. I had the vision for our plot, and Craig fucked it up. I now understand that this is because each person has their own plot. No one can be a supporting actor in someone else’s storyline. They can pretend to, but they will always have subplots brewing inside and unfolding outside.
I am very controlling. I want to control things. This is because I am afraid. Things feel so precarious. When I was young, I made myself feel safer by controlling my food and body. I still do that. But as I got older and became a wife and a mother, I found another thing to try to control to create safety: my people. Since life is scary and precarious, controlling people I love felt like the responsible thing to do.
In addition to the fear factor, there is something else that leads me to want to control things, and that is my belief that I am very smart and creative. I really do believe I have very good ideas and that people would do best if they got on board. This kind of control is called leadership.
For a long while, I have controlled and led my people and called that love. I “loved” my people to a bloody pulp. My role in the lives of the people I love has been as follows: I exist to make all your hopes and dreams come true. So let’s sit down and take a look at this comprehensive list of hopes and dreams I’ve created for you. I have been paying very close attention and trust me, I SEE you and know you better than you know yourself. You can do anything I put your mind to! Let us begin!
But we cannot feel and know and imagine for other people. This is what I am trying to understand. The person who is teaching me this is my wife. My wife is uncontrollable.
I love my wife more wildly than I have ever loved a grown human in my life. Before I met her, I wasn’t even all that afraid of dying. Now the thought of death panics me daily, not because of death itself but because of the idea of not being with her. Death, to me, is just the ultimate FOMA: Fear of Missing Abby. Since I love Abby the most, it follows that I have to control her the most. I want to make all of my dreams for her come true. I just really want my best for her. To that end, I have relentless good ideas to share with her about what she should do and wear and eat and how she should work and sleep and read and listen. But every time I try to share my good ideas—overtly or covertly—she somehow knows what I’m doing, calls me out on it, and categorically rejects my efforts. She does this gently. She says things like “I see what you’re doing there, babe. I love you for the effort, but no, thank you, I’m good.”