I’ve lived alone almost a month now. The Preacher flew to Hamilton, where the football team wears yellow and black and the fans shout “Oskee Wee Wee…” He was raised there and most of his family members live there.
In the almost thirty-nine years of our marriage, the Preacher and I have had short periods of time apart from each other for work or family visits. Most often it’s me who leaves home, but in the last few years he’s made several trips out East.
Living singly is easier than living with someone, I thought a few days after he left. No one else to work around. A schedule truly my own and a bathroom too. (We only have one.) I could manage living alone.
For the first week, I worked non-stop after returning home from the office, battering at my list of “things to do when Rick is gone,” including digging a surprise patio out back. Even the grandbeans helped – each of the four eldest hauled several shovel-loads of gravel before the “can-do” man from across the road arrived with his Bobcat.
But my steam didn’t last, and after it fizzled out, I realized once again that the convenience of living alone pales in comparison to having my large and loving husband to share the living with.
It should come as no surprise (but it does every time) that our long marriage has fused us together. A decade ago, during a nearby lakeside vacation, Rick had to return home for a day. He had a wedding to do soon. He needed to make some preparations. After he left, I wrote this in my journal :
“When he pulled away, I felt what I always do the first few minutes when we separate from each other for a day, a week, a month, or more. Empty. Rootless. Funny, but even though we haven’t done a lot of talking on this quiet vacation, just being together is often enough. When he’s in the bedroom resting, and I’m out here typing or reading (or vice versa), it’s stabilizing just to know the other is near. Now, as much as I imagine him in the other room sleeping, it’s not the same. He’s gone, and I can’t reach him, and it hollows me out. I mentioned this curiosity to him the other day. He laughed, and said he feels the same.”
My widowed and divorced friends keep themselves very busy. Some have returned to the work-force. Others stay occupied with grandchildren, church or volunteer activities. I recall the comment of a neighbor whose wife had died in the previous year. “Every morning I wake up to the walls. They can’t talk back to me. The house is just an empty shell.” I never understand that better than when my husband and I are apart.
“Two are better than one,” it says in Ecclesiastes 4:9. Not everyone chooses marriage, and not every marriage succeeds. But by God’s design, marriage interlocks us, and I’m grateful.
