DB's friend M was visiting us last evening. He has an adult son and is recently divorced. From decades of being married, having a home and responsibilities that go with being in a family, he is suddenly alone - free and with more options in life than he ever had before. While he is enjoying his new found freedom, he misses the comfort of familiar things. Being a musician and an artist, he is able to channel his time and energy into passions neglected for years in favor of chores and responsibilities. We were talking about our experiences going through divorce and being single for years after that - the challenges of trying marriage for the second time. M was making jokes about his Facebook relationship status being muddied by his ex-wife wanting to be friends.
They are still in the early stages of emotional separation where it is hard to let go even if everything is sour, bitter and filled with anger. You want to hang on to rage and the object to vent it against. The door has been legally closed but not so in the mind - at least not as yet. As the evening wore on, we had a few drinks, chatted about things not related to relationship and marriage, M brightened up quite a bit. He was talking about the places he and his band performed, the experiences - he shared photographs he had taken and music he had played. Suddenly, he had gone from M - the lost half of a formerly whole entity to M the person that has recently started to get reacquainted with himself. Strange are the uses of freedom, even if it comes at a great cost.
Sometimes coming out of an old or bad marriage is like the spin cycle of a dryer stopping. The haze clears, the colors and fabrics stand out individually - and then there is dead silence. A person is able to take pause and understand their surroundings ; their relationship (if any) with it. M is in that state right now - in his head the world is still spinning furiously and he along with it. In time the inertia of motion will give way to tranquility.
They are still in the early stages of emotional separation where it is hard to let go even if everything is sour, bitter and filled with anger. You want to hang on to rage and the object to vent it against. The door has been legally closed but not so in the mind - at least not as yet. As the evening wore on, we had a few drinks, chatted about things not related to relationship and marriage, M brightened up quite a bit. He was talking about the places he and his band performed, the experiences - he shared photographs he had taken and music he had played. Suddenly, he had gone from M - the lost half of a formerly whole entity to M the person that has recently started to get reacquainted with himself. Strange are the uses of freedom, even if it comes at a great cost.
Sometimes coming out of an old or bad marriage is like the spin cycle of a dryer stopping. The haze clears, the colors and fabrics stand out individually - and then there is dead silence. A person is able to take pause and understand their surroundings ; their relationship (if any) with it. M is in that state right now - in his head the world is still spinning furiously and he along with it. In time the inertia of motion will give way to tranquility.
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