Ordinary Blessings

for Annie,

on the 8th Anniversary of our first meeting

We arrive at the sink

                at the same moment

you

        from the workshop

I

       from the garden

scrubbing the grit from our fingertips

                smiling in each other’s eyes.                          

We agree on sudden changes

                in our plan for the yard

arriving at the same conclusion

                at the same moment

                         with almost no discussion.

We agree on changes

      in our plan for the yard

arriving at the same conclusion

after fierce disagreement

                and finally                          

                              laughter.

We sip coffee and tea on the deck

                feeling the cool morning breeze

                                together.

We sip wine on the deck

                feeling the cool evening breeze

                                together.

We laugh at the machinations of the many

                quail families

                                chittering

                as their babies peck at the dirt

                beneath mom and dad’s guardian eyes.

We mourn over a crow’s destruction

                of a wren nest in the pergola.

We begin and end the day with kisses

still lavish them

              alone in elevators

                         or on the street

                             or in a restaurant.

We get out the door together

                 on time

                      or early

                                every

                                      single

                                            time.

We savor food, books, our bodies,

                    yes our bodies

              their capacity for pleasure

              their capacity as instruments of spiritual fire-making

              their capacity to affirm

                              with a mere touch

                                that we are something

                                          real in a world that often isn’t.     

We savor imaginings, memories, wonderings

       …would we have met if this had happened, or that…

and celebrate

                that they didn’t

                                 and we did.

We rub each other’s shoulders and feet

                   hold hands everywhere

admire and cherish

                   each other’s spirit

                                 and intelligence,

engage in outrageous silliness

                     which if revealed to the public

would tank our reputations as serious people.

We actually listen to hear

           and speak to be heard

                   most of the time.

We manage to hold each other

                                tenderly

                                   knowingly

                     at some point

                            every single day

in spite of, and sometimes because of,

                     long-lived childhood despairs.                      

In the movie theater’s darkness

      we clutch each other’s hands

                               and weep

over lost loved ones

                               war

                          inexplicable acts of courage

                                  unrecognized genius

               the all too human

                               inhumanity of man.

When we get a splinter

bang an elbow

           stub a toe

                     bump a head

when we feel the ache of muscles,

            the wearing of joints

               --pain in the hands

                               feet

                              lumbar

                         elbows

                           shoulders

                   ankles,

when we contemplate together

           the long look back

                 and the ever-shortening

                      forward,

when we witness demon diseases

         drawing down the shades

                                in the cells

                              of family and friends

…then we know

               the usual search for miracles

                                 is misguided

because each moment

  no matter how

                         ordinary

                 mundane

                             routine

                       predictable            

               freighted with feelings

                     falling far short of joy

is miraculous

          is life

                 living itself

           standing strong and bending before its own wind

                 illuminated and blinded by its own light

                       instructed and frightened by its own darkness

                            mesmerized by its own music                           

                                --the sound of tears joining rain

                                 laughter

                                        thunder--

every nuanced moment

               --even the uncounted

                      unnoticed

                              certainly uncelebrated ones

               --and every ordinary breath

                                 a blessing.

C Bob Kamm 2015

July 16.

Winning and Losing in Love Relationships

By the time we reach adulthood, most of us have participated in some form of team--athletic, social, religious or work.  We have been exposed to people who place their own ego's above
the success of the team.  Probably the easiest example to consider comes from a sports team.
Think of an athlete, man or woman, who has great stats game after game.  Now imagine that in spite of their performance (or more likely, because of it!) the team loses game after game.
Would any of us, with the perspective of adulthood, call that person a success?  Unlikely.  We might marvel at his or her persistence and talent.  We might also think of him/her as "a ball hog"
or selfish.  Does any of us believe that Kobe Bryant or Mia Hamm would consider themselves successful if they hadn't won championships?  A no-brainer, right?  But here's the thing.  A love relationship is a team of two.  It calls for an even greater commitment to collaboration than other teams because our hearts are so fully engaged.  We are more vulnerable on the "love team" and our childhood hurts are so much more likely to be triggered.  But the core question is the same as on a sports team:  are you a team player or a ball hog?  Do you push for your own victories over your partner as if they were actually the other team...or are you capable of letting go of the need to win in order to serve the greater good of the relationship?  

We know what the answer is for most of us much of the time.  We have a hard time letting go
of having our way or being right. Why?  Because being wrong has such powerful resonance during our early years.  When we are little, we need to be attached to our parents.  It is not a desire.  It is a biologically written need whose goal is to serve our survival and optimal development.  Far too often, when parents correct children they come down hard.  They forget they're dealing with a small fragile being whose brain is nowhere near fully developed.  As children, we immediately fear the loss of love, which is potentially catastrophic for such a genuinely dependent being.  Since our parents tend to react to us in fairly consistent ways, we develop a pattern of adaptations to those moments.  We try hard to be right, to be on their good side.  Some of us fight for it, meaning we cry, flail, object, blame someone or try to talk our way out of a situation.  Some of us flee, meaning we hide within ourselves and physically withdraw from our parents.  Some of us freeze in the moment, become paralyzed and speechless.  Some of us discover it is safer to just submit.  In all these cases, we are feeling a great deal of discomfort because the withdrawal of parental love, even for seconds at a time, is so potentially devastating.  

Fast forward to adulthood and you find yourself and your partner having a difficult time allowing the other to be right.  On an unconscious psychological level, the dynamic is, "If you are right, I am wrong.  If I am right, you are wrong.  Whoever is wrong is going to feel bad.  Someone is coming out as the parent and someone the child."  It's a zero-sum game that parallels the childhood pattern when parents had all the power and we needed them with all our hearts.  So here we are in our twenties, thirties, forties and on, being ball hogs in our relationship so we can avoid feeling that feeling.  Of course, we don't live with a coach in our home to help us run better plays.  We don't have crowds cheering us when we serve the team. But we can gradually learn to get in touch with the deeper feeling that drives this reaction, grieve it and be liberated from the impulse that drives us to create win-lose.  We can do some of this work when we are single, but the deepest work comes when we are in a relationship for there are wounds that are only triggered and therefore available to work on when we actively seek to be in loving connection with another.

We are strange creatures, aren't we?  We long for love.  Then, when we find it (after the 
romantic phase is over) we treat our partner as if he/she is the competition, not a teammate!  We have to defeat the very person who might love us...for fear of feeling unloved.  Once again we see how early patterns can hijack the present and deprive us of the thing we cherish most.