Crossroads

“It seems like you guys don’t argue as much as you used to.”

My friend of nearly thirty years. For almost three decades, we’ve emailed each other every weekday.

I wrote when I found out I was pregnant for the first time. I wrote when I lost it in a sterile hospital room ten weeks later.

I wrote when I felt overwhelmed by new motherhood, but I felt guilty for feeling overwhelmed by something I wanted so badly.

And when autism first entered our lives, I wrote about the tricky disorder that followed my little boy – proverbial ants at a picnic.

Then, when my husband Joe and I couldn’t find our way, I typed my worries onto a screen.

It is her I turned to when the dishes smashed to the floor.

When passionate make-ups breached the gap, however briefly.

When the gauzy veil of date nights and marriage counseling weren’t enough.

Now, in the dimly lit restaurant, the server refills our water. Small children giggle at the table next to us.

Our talk turns to other familiar topics. Books we’ve read. Updates on family, kids. A trip down memory lane to the first time we met.

Coincidence brought us together.

In a dusty classroom we sat around a large table, comparing notes about finance. Or was it statistics? Time has eroded that detail, yet I vividly remember she wore a blue sweater. I can still see the sun setting through the windows and the golden bars of light on the carpet.

From that point on we were study buddies, confidantes, friends.

Our lives were set to follow a similar trajectory.

We married our college sweethearts two weeks apart.

Dressed in white, we bravely stood on our mutual dance floors and clapped our hands.

Now, over Caesar salad, I consider her question.

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Do Joe and I argue as much as we used to?

Or, after twenty-six years and five kids, have the sharper edges of our marriage softened?

In other words, can people change?

Again and again, she reminded me he was a good man.

Flawed, impulsive, angry. But good.

She pointed out that five kids and a son with autism would crack even the strongest marital foundation.

A bride sees her future in angles and planes. The sharp cut of a tuxedo against the smooth satin gown.

But really, we are emotion, and history, and baggage.

Now, at fifty, I find myself at a crossroads. Hopelessly proud of the burgeoning young adults my children are becoming, as I miss the small people they once were.

Who knew?

Who knew, after all this time, I would still hear their little voices.

I want to squeeze their hands.

I want to fill sippy cups with juice and smooth wayward bangs.

I miss young us.

Them.

Him.

And me.

Not the yelling or the dishes, but the newness of family.

All is not lost.

Yet.

Something raw and real feels gone.

Can people change?

Maybe.

Maybe not.

Maybe our angles become smoother. Flat planes flood with color and light.

Our histories intertwine until they are a shared story that is at once original, and timeworn.

I look back at my pretty friend. My memory, my legacy. I smile.

He is a good man.

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