My son thinks nothing grows in the winter but, he’s
wrong. I do.
In all fairness, he hasn’t been made privy to the story
of how his father and I came to know one another. He doesn’t know how we
fell into a raw and complicated mess that broke both of our hearts. He doesn’t
know that his father was brave enough to forgive me and he doesn’t know how
transformative it was for his mother to lower her fists, or that I almost
didn’t.
I met my husband in the fall of my 25th year. Every
Sunday night, after a restorative yoga class, I went produce shopping with
two of my dear friends who were coupled at the time. He worked there and I
noticed him. I thought he was cute, quite, actually, and found the manner
in which he carried himself enticing. I was only mildly interested whether
he had anything to offer beyond that. Mostly, I liked to watch him work
and I liked that he watched me back.
It’s no secret that secrets are hard to keep in small
towns and, as it were, news travelled fast. We were quickly set up by mutual
acquaintances, and we did not have much choice in the matter. Truth be
known, I didn’t much resist: it seemed like something to go for. After
all, winter in Tofino was fast approaching and it would be dark very, very
soon.
We met up, hung out, and then, with my closed heart and
big mouth, I spent a few months participating in the sport of pushing him
away. I was finally successful, only then to realise in the depth of
winter, at christmastime, with him now long gone from my days, that despite my
pretentiousness, protectiveness, and preconceived ideas about
partnership, I had, despite all efforts, fallen in love with him.
At that stage in my life I had a habit of being stubborn
to the point of self sabotage and I was, specifically, overly proud around
matters of the heart.
I had to be. I was recovering from a significant
car accident that had devastated me a year prior and though my bones were
mostly healed, shadows still rattled me in secret. I was a different girl.
I felt vulnerable in multiple ways and I wasn’t too inclined to make
myself more so. I was wounded in other, less specific ways, too. I
hate to admit it but the ghosts of a breakup past followed me around.
Despite my voodoo efforts to shake him, his memory and the lessons I needed to
learn haunted me, finding me at inopportune times, mostly when in the company
of boys. As it turned out, one minute I’d be laughing, glass of wine in
hand, and the next, when my eyes met theirs, there he’d be, infiltrating my
consciousness, without consent.
Ultimately, this burden resulted in me keeping myself
emotionally distant from most individuals of the male persuasion. It can take a
while to shake someone out of your system, as I happened to learn twice
that winter.
My husband surprised me, the first of many
surprises about what kind of man he is and what kind of woman he makes
me. I was the bold, loud, assertive, and dynamic one and I thought I
was in charge- untouchable, even. He presented, to my judgemental eyes,
anyhow, as passive, uninterestin, unexperienced, and limited.
I did what I did. I drew lines in the sand
before him just like I had for others. He didn’t listen. He didn’t fight me
with force but he did stand steady: solid and open, and persistent in his
gentle and unassuming way. I kept it frivolous, as I was in the habit
of doing. He was not afraid to let it be known that this was not an
insignificant union for him. I made sure he knew he was nothing to me, and
never would be. He took it away with him but he always came back. I
engaged with him exclusively on my terms and disregarded what might have been
his. He was patient with my arrogance, and my neurosis.
After a while it got complicated. Our dance became an
unhealthy culmination of bad decisions, consequences, shared horror and, a
dangerous codependency. So, like any decent woman would do, I took him out
at the knees: chose to proceed, alone from him, and I forced goodbye.
It wasn’t the end, however.
Weeks later I could no longer deny that this
foreign creature had gotten into my bones- deep where a constant ache was
already the new normal. And, like my pain, I couldn’t shake him. The winter has
a way of forcing me to look at myself and that winter was no exception. I
realized, then, that for all the reasons I had determined he was
unsuitable for me, not of my kind, I had been wrong.
It was his differences from me that were most striking,
most honourable, and most respectable. Some distance had let me see that. Some
space had given room for me to appreciate what kind of person he was, and what
kind of man he had been to me.
I remember calling him for the first time with my
guard down. It was Christmas day, actually, and I called a good friend who
knew our story first. “Cheryl”, I whispered, “I think I’m in love with
him”, I confessed. She, like any good friend who knows when you need to be
moved from places of stuck, laughed and pressed me onwards.
I was shaking when I dialed. I knew what it
meant. If I opened to him, at all, he would be in my life-in a long-term
way. I knew, that for him, that there was more to our story. I tried to trust.
Afterall, he had made clear who he was, and he was a good, good man.
I won’t soon forget how he sounded when he answered the
phone, or how my whole being lept at the sound of his voice, previously
unappreciated. I won’t ever forget how gracious he was to me, me who had been
so selfish and so cold with him. He, in line with past behaviour that I
had dismissed, received me with grace, curiosity, and warmth. We spoke for a
long time, longer then we had before, and, of most importance- I finally
listened.
When I returned from the Christmas that I had
spent at my parents home, where I had landed, as I often do when I am in a bad
way, he greeted me. He brought gifts, of person, of course, and those he had
carefully chosen for me, before I had even called. My new life began. The
next morning, a friend saw me walking the beach with him. She told me later
that she didn’t recognize me. I didn’t either.
The following Christmas he proposed to me. I said
yes. The next year, we were wed just as winter was giving up its fight. Like
much of our relationship, I oscillated between blissful abandon and
crippling anxiety throughout our engagement and, felt both, even, as I
walked towards him. There was a giving up in me too, you see, not of who I
am, for he has always accepted, honoured, and encouraged me, but of my fear.
Letting go of what held me back, even as I was moving forward with him,
was met with hesitancy- my ego was a hard match for anyone, even my better
self.
Late the next winter we conceived our first son. The
next, he was born. If I thought I had grown to be unselfish in my
relationship with my man, I was wrong. The birthing and raising of my first son
was a time of my most paramount personal growth. We conceived our second son in
the winter, as well, and we welcomed him in the late days of fall. This past
winter, I grew again: the kind of growth that can only come from
sacrifice, surrender, and patience- like my husband teaches me, over and over,
if I slow down enough to watch him live.
This day, all days, all these years later, the anxiety
is gone. I knew I was on the edge of a life the day I called him, and
as many would say growth occurs just outside of your comfort zone.
Fortunately, I arrived, and am now deep in the home of us.
Last week, we took our family on vacation to celebrate 5
years of our marriage. While we were away, I looked over from the
bed I was sharing with our baby and silently waved at my spouse, who was
in his bed with our eldest son, both of our children deep asleep. He and I
were laid diagonal, bodies curled inwards towards our children, and to each
other, I suppose, punctuating our family like human parentheses.
I was filled with joy, and pride. There we were, as per
theme: seeds planted in the fall, soul work every winter, and in spring, our
beauty comes evident.
With spring here, my inner effort has been exposed
again, the big reveal, and all that has been growing with difficulty but
without witness, is blossoming everywhere. A subtle, yet vivid intimacy
infiltrates our life and the sun, making me smile, starts to tell the tale.
My son, bless him, is a preschool version of my
intensity, and will, naturally, need to be taught and reminded, as I do,
that becoming who we are meant to be is a process. Nothing is born complete,
though it may seem so, for we are often only shown the bloom.
Heather Hansen is a married mother of two and an allied
health professional living in the greater Vancouver area. She is the author
of www.motheryourbusiness.com where
she writes about the business of being born a mother. She is also the
co-author of www.rerunmom.com where
she publishes her love letters to running.
