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| Getting our marriage licence the day before we got married. The looks on our faces say it all. "We're doing what..??" |
"Cold feet" is a good way to sum up my feelings about my wedding day.
I was anxious and doubtful. Of course, I was always anxious and doubtful, not just when it came to marrying Roman. I suppose that is why I ignored the voice in my head that screamed at me to consider what a potentially huge mistake I was making. That stupid voice was always chattering on about something though, so I had gotten pretty good at tuning it out when I felt that another person's logic was better suited to the situation. I did not trust myself.
Roman was so smart and rational; he was very easy to trust when it came to reason. Although, in retrospect, when looking at this picture of Roman and I taking an oath when applying for our marriage licence, I think it's safe to say that I was not the only one with doubts.
But we both had our roles in the relationship. I was the worry wart. Roman was the problem solver.
If he expressed his doubts to me about getting married, well then, he would have been stepping out of his designated space. Who knows how I would have reacted. He probably knew that, so he carried on with the plan and maintained his duty as the steady one in the relationship. I too carried on with the plan, choosing to ignore my own uncertain inklings, which I simply chalked up as irrational.
In retrospect now, I see that was not being neurotic. My fears were valid.
Roman and I had some serious communication issues that I couldn't put my finger on in the beginning. It wasn't until a couple years into the marriage that I really saw our disconnect clearly. But by then, I was invested...It was too late to walk away. Counseling was an option we had discussed, but never pursued. We had become complacent and I had gotten masterful at ignoring my better judgement. Which brings me to the point of this post.
They say that how a person copes with change depends greatly on what they were like before the event took place. I think about that a lot as I wonder about how I handled news of Roman's affair. While I have always been a reserved, shy, outwardly stoic person, I have never had trouble expressing my pointed anger to anybody who crossed me.
Two instances come to mind offhand. One was in high school when I confronted my neighbor for spreading rumors about me around campus. He lied and told people that he could hear me having sex with my boyfriend in my room, which was adjacent to his bedroom by just a few feet. After enough friends at school told me what he was saying, I went next door to tell him to stop. Only, when he was face to face with me, he wouldn't admit to his actions, so I slapped him in a fury right across his lying face. I slapped him so hard that my hand stung. He started to cry as he ran into his house. He also never said a word again about me at school.
Another instance that comes to mind is my pointed way of breaking up with a long-term boyfriend whom I'd dated before I met Roman. Without going into tremendous detail, we went out for about two years on and off. I never felt that I had his full attention, so during one phone conversation when I'd had enough of feeling ignored by him, I snapped angrily "Fuck you!" as I slammed down the phone. With that, the relationship was officially done. We didn't speak again until six years later, after Roman died, when I called him to apologize for my lack of tact in ending things with him.
At the time though, a reaction like that was not unusual for me. Reacting with force to people who upset me was how I ensured that my reserve would not be mistaken for weakness. It was not a tactic I used often, but when I did, my words and ensuing actions were definitely felt by my target. I was like that up until the day Roman died.
So for me to decide quickly that I wanted to part ways with Roman amicably, even after knowing that he was unfaithful, and knowing in my gut that he was still lying, it came as a surprise even to me. My tongue could be sharp and my precisely chosen words could cut. Yet, even on the night that he dropped the bomb about his indiscretion, I was angry and I let him know, but I didn't lash out at him like I would have in the past.
For some reason, I held back.
And what's even more vexing is why I turned the other cheek so quickly after I finished expressing my hurt. The ego can be a monster that could have easily allowed me to become an angry, bitter, betrayed ex-wife at that time. But that was not how I was nudged to respond. In fact, quite the opposite was my inclination. The last time that I saw Roman, I told him I loved him. I told him I was going to be okay. I wished him well. I wanted to hug him but didn't out of fear of looking weak. Perhaps I had simply matured and recognized my ability to react with kindness as a strength.
But why then?
Why that day?
For me, that is where the larger plan comes into focus and that little voice that was in my head, which I long ignored as irrational and neurotic, suddenly found it's place in my daily being.
