Sitting at crowded Gate C12 before boarding my flight to LaGuardia this week, the mild-mannered looking woman next to me gave Koko a pat and then sighed. “I used to have a Cavalier,” she said, longingly. Then her phone rang, she sat up, put the phone to her right ear and sidled into a conversation with her (I assume) husband. Here is the one-side of the poignant conversation that I (and everyone else around me) overheard.
“Hi honey, I am sitting here next to about 70 people outside my gate at PBI."
[short pause while she listened]
"Yes, honey, there was something I wanted to talk to you about."
[very brief pause while she listened]
"It’s this. While we were separated I returned to, or picked up, a few things to occupy my time. To get me through the loneliness and the hurt and just, well, all the endless hours. My needlepoint, my gardening, my book club, just reading more fiction, seeing my girlfriends more often. I started doing all of these things that I really hadn’t done, or hadn’t done much, for the 30 years we were married. Then you came back, and we decided to figure out whether we could enjoy each other again.”
[she took a deep breath]
"I miss those things now that we’re together again. When you left me I was bereft. You wanted to explore. I needed to cope. That’s how I coped.”
[lengthy pause while she listened to him, shaking her head]
"Yes, yes, I know. We’ve gone through it. Honey, you don’t have to keep apologizing for the rest of our lives, but what I need to tell you is that I changed. While you were exploring, I did what I guess was my own version of that and I don’t want to give up the things I did to cope after you left me. I want them in my life now in an intentional way. I don’t want to go back to exactly what it was like before you left. In fact, I can’t. I realized that I didn’t have enough of my own life, my own interests before. I didn’t nourish friendships. I nourished you, and then you and our kids, and then just you again. I got short bits of time for myself but it was like filler — I realize now that I treated my friendships like filler. Like they were there to fill in when you didn’t need me or require my attention. That’s not fair to my girlfriends, or to me. And I just like myself so much more now that I have more in my life. I am more interesting, for one thing. I have a bigger heart and more people fit into it.“
[lengthy pause while she listened]
"Well, honey, the truth is you require quite a bit of attention and care-taking. You are exhausting. Things have always revolved around you. And I enjoy taking care of you. I do! But I had to adapt when you left and now, what I have to tell you is that you will have to adapt. You have to get used to me having more in my life. You have to share me. I’m sorry, I know that will be hard for you.”
[lengthy pause while she listened]
"No, that’s it. That’s what I needed to tell you. Oh, and I’m going to go to Paris for a few days in May with my girlfriends."
[short pause]
"No (chuckling), we won’t be bringing our needlepoint! I mean maybe on the plane, but then we’ll be in Paris.“
[short pause]
“What I know is that you’ve been saying that you wanted to go to Paris with me. You said it for many, many years. But whenever I wanted to make the actual plan to go you couldn’t fit it in. So now I’m going with my girlfriends. Please try to understand.”
[short pause]
“Okay, okay. Thank you for listening. That’s what I needed to say. It will be fine. We’ll work through it together. I love you.”
The Crush Letter
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