captkevman

I mentioned in my “H” post that my marriage had just endured its first major trial since we got married nearly fifteen years ago. Again, I won’t go into details about what happened, but I will discuss what I have taken away from it.

Our marriage had fallen into the trap where we never had time to see each other without the stress of the house and the kids (at least one of our kids is very challenging to deal with daily), and since we’re on opposite work schedules, very little got done in the house as far as cleaning/maintaining it. We each expected the other to pull more than their fair share of duties in both housework and parenting, and eventually, we started regarding each other with a bit of contempt. We had lost the joy of being together. We had lost Kevin and Angela to being dad and mom, the stresses and schedules of our respective jobs, and all the other trivial but necessary minutiae of life. We weren’t living, we were coping.

So it got to the point where this Trial emerged and threatened the very foundation of our family. This trial came to a crescendo last night, and it wasn’t until late last night/early this morning that we learned how we had fared, so it was a long and excruciating night for both of us.

Early on in this trial (which lasted about a week — the longest week of my life, ended by the longest night of my life), something deep within me had surfaced — something that illuminated to me my shortcomings both as a husband and a father — that compelled me to work harder at being better at both of those roles. It carried me through the week.

Thankfully, we passed this trial better than I had expected or had even dared to hope. After tearfully celebrating in each other’s embrace, we both got some much-needed sleep for most of the morning, and we set off with the kids to go to the playground, which ended up being too crowded for us to even park the car. So we drove around, not really having a destination.

We found ourselves driving near the park where we got married, and we had not visited there in years — certainly not while the kids were old enough to remember. So that became our destination. We parked the car and walked to the deck and gazebo overlooking the water where we exchanged our wedding vows. It was like time had brought us back, and we looked in each others’ eyes and watched the years fall away.

I was falling in love with her all over again.

We shared this special place, this special day, with our kids. We told them this is the place where our family began, so it was a sacred and special place. Angela and I held each other overlooking the water mere inches from where we wed. Our daughter explored a few trails through the wooded area near the gazebo and found a stick she fancied. I told her that stick had fallen from a tree that was most likely growing the day her mother and I exchanged vows. She kept it as a souvenir of her visit, and asked if we could come back again.

We left the gazebo and made our way out of the trail and stopped at the playground so the kids could play before we got back in the van to leave. Angela and I sat there, enchanted by the others’ gaze, smiling and giggling at each other like grade school kids in puppy love.

We came back home, had a bit of a nap while the kids played and watched TV, and we ended the evening dancing in the kitchen while the kids looked on in mock horror (or maybe it was real horror - they’re not used to seeing their parents acting this way, fawning all over each other, giggling and smiling and laughing with each other).

All I know is that in the past 24 hours, I’ve experienced the lowest of lows and the highest of highs and I feel like a renewed man with a new lease on my life, my marriage, and my family.

And right now, I’m so full of joy I can barely contain it.

I first met her on the phone, and even then, I could hear her smile. She had a quiet energy and youthful zeal in her voice that lifted me during a dark period in my life.

We spoke for hours a day on the phone for an entire week before we first laid eyes on each other. During our conversations, my low self esteem painted the image of a monster in her mind’s eye, and yet she wanted to see me anyway.

We arranged for a meeting at a local mall, and when I first saw her, I thought I was in a dream — or perhaps about to become the victim of a cruel prank. How could this stunningly beautiful young woman possibly want to be with someone like me?

She greeted me with a heart-melting smile and a huge hug, and I reciprocated in kind, still stunned that such a perfect creature would want to embrace me. I presented her three roses I had concealed inside my jacket. We walked around the mall, starting with the video game arcade, and spent a couple of hours getting to know one another in person. We had a quick bite to eat at Chick-Fil-A, and I walked her out to where her father was waiting to pick her up (we were both car-less at the time, I had been dropped off by a friend and caught a bus home).

We smiled and hugged and agreed that we would see each other again. We filled the time between with marathon phone calls every night.

—-

Five years later, we were in the hospital. The pain started early in the morning, and we arrived just before dawn. After all day being tended to by nurses and anesthesiologists, she gave birth to our first child, our daughter. It was exactly five years, almost to the exact minute, from the moment we first saw each other.

Another eleven-plus years have passed since then, and our family is still going strong. Sure, we have our challenges, like everyone, and yes, we could probably do things a bit better and work a bit harder. But for all our imperfections and foibles, we have each other. She fills in my weak spots and I fill in hers. She makes me a better man, and I make her a better woman.

Epilogue

This entry (and all after it) were delayed by the first real trial our marriage has faced in its nearly 15-year existence, which took place over the course of the past week. I will not be more specific than that, but suffice it to say that we have both emerged from it with renewed energy and conviction we haven’t felt since we first met.

More than ever, her smile moves and inspires me to be a better husband, better father, and a better man.

I recently found myself on the needing end of a confidant, and quite to my surprise and chagrin, after going through my inventory of current relationships, I found no one that fit the bill. It’s not that I don’t have any friends, it’s just that I no longer have any friends close enough that I could approach with my burden.

I suppose that’s just something that comes along with age. In high school and college, I was fortunate enough to count several people on my “Best Friends” list. Back then, I was a good friend, and I had good friends. I don’t know if the years have made me more self-absorbed, less generous with my time, or a combination of the two, or something else entirely. I don’t find myself getting close to people as easily as I did when I was younger.

Even though I have a marriage and a family and a business that all take precedence in my life, I still make time to do “me” things: I organize a cartooning group, I goof around online / on my computers and iThings, and I’ve been trying to reconnect to my creative side a bit. Maybe I am just getting selfish in my older age. Is that normal? I still enjoy doing things for others and helping when I can, but I don’t do so nearly as much as I did in my youth. Back then, I put everyone else’s needs before my own.

Maybe life has teetered to the other side of the seesaw before finding the balance somewhere in the middle.

Then again, just reviewing this post, there sure are a lot of “I”s and “me”s in here.

Back in December, it was decided that my services at my employer were no longer required. This, despite the fact that I excelled at what I did and was a valuable resource to my team. Someone decided that for whatever reason, I wasn’t a good fit there anymore. I tried to fight it for several months prior, but when it became obvious to me that I had the choice of either spending my time defending my job or actually doing my job, I chose the latter, and made arrangements to “mutually agree” to end my employment.

I figured I couldn’t fight it (at least, not without compromising my professional principles), so I may as well just make the best of it. Since I was pretty good at my job, I decided to start my own consulting business and keep doing it, even if they wouldn’t let me do so at the company I so adored.

And it really wasn’t a big deal. I’ve been building a business and learning a lot. But today, the fallout started affecting a lot more than just me in a very obvious, very ugly way.

My daughter is almost ten years old, and is struggling in fourth grade. For the past six years, we have been working with specialists — both medical and academic — to manage her ADHD issues to ensure her success in school. Since first grade, part of that has been trying a variety of different medication combinations that will allow her to concentrate in class with minimal impact other aspects of her life. We finally found the right “mix” about a year ago, and while not perfect, it’s helped her tremendously.

Losing my job meant changing insurance plans, to the one my wife’s employer currently uses. When we went to refill our daughter’s prescription last week, the new insurance company refused to cover it, and demanded that we use an alternative medication instead. I went to pick it up this morning, and the cost of the medication is over $100.

Nevermind the fact that we have no idea how this new medication will affect our daughter (it’s one of the few she hasn’t yet been on).

Nevermind the fact that we’ve spent years finding the right balance of medications for her.

Whatever is best for the insurance company’s bottom line, damn the consequences.

Before today, I was just looking at my dismissal as an inconvenience, and an opportunity to do my own thing, with a “que sera, sera” attitude toward the whole thing.

But now that it’s f*cking with my family, I’m pissed. Maybe it’s my fault for not fully understanding the consequences. But whatever the reason, I’m now faced with the fact that I’m starting over playing roulette not only with my family’s financial/medical well-being, but also with my daughter’s academic success and emotional health.

I don’t know who to be more angry with: myself - for not fighting harder for my job, Big Insurance - for getting in the way of my daughter’s/my family’s well-being, or those responsible for dismissing me from my previous job without justifiable cause.

All I know is that we’re looking pretty much screwed. And it’s because of me.

Dammit.