In The Next Room

At the beginning of the school year, my son met a guy at school named Joe.  Conrad and Joe got along great and, as they were both starting out at Bishop Miege without a huge bunch of kids they had gone to elementary/jr. high with, it seemed this was a great match.

Even more importantly, Joe's mom and I got along pretty well.  That is a pretty big deal since I'm not great at meeting new people and I am really not great at thinking about spending the next four years avoiding my son's friends -- or impeding his social growth -- because I'm not comfortable with the mom.

So, Conrad and Joe do okay.  They are not really close friends, but they hang out occasionally.  The bad news is that I like Joe's mom a lot.  I can kind of see myself hanging out with her more.  Is that awkward for the boys?  And do I care, really?

I haven't made any real effort to make any real friends for a long time.  I've done lots of volunteering at schools and have room-mothered my way into everyone's peripheral, but I wouldn't say I've really taken a run at fostering a friendship just for me in over a decade.

In that same decade, when I look at it, I've also let other things that are (were) uniquely important to me slide.  In an effort to be "that" mom -- and "his" wife -- I've lost me.  I've tried ignoring that situation.  I've tried drowning it.  Now I'm facing it, head on.

I'm taking a writing class.  I'm pitching a cooking class.  I tried to take a painting class, but not enough people signed up.  And I'm seeing a life coach.  She's 80.  I'm thinking about starting yoga next week.

All in all, I'm making a real run at being disciplined.  And positive.  And confident.

And it's hard.

Tonight I went to see a play with Mary (Joe's mom).  It's called In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play).  It was excellent.  It was nice to have a lovely dinner and a glass of wine with Mary.  It was great to do something that I really wanted to do.  And the play itself was great.  In big, broad brush strokes, it was a bit of a tongue-in-cheek story of the man who invented an electrical stimulation instrument for the relief of hysteria in women, circa 1880.  The subtext was hilarious.  The crowd of septegenarian couples -- and groups of women -- some poking each other in the ribs and guffawing while others caughed and snickered discreetly was interesting, too, but the play itself was just wonderful.

Mrs. Givings (misgivings?) was a tragically sad and lonely wife and mother.  Although her doorbell rang constantly with her husband's clients, she was unreachable and pathetically alone.  She listened at the door as her husband pleasured other women (all very clinically and in the name of scientific research).  She handed her newborn over to a wetnurse and watched uncomfortably as she saw a relationship build between her own child and a stranger.  Throughout the play, she was jovial and pleasant to everyone, but so heart-wrenchingly sad inside.

Gradually, she faced her sadness and her loneliness and (and this is the part I really liked) she confronted both.  She recognized that she was incomplete and unsatisfied.  She recognized that she was missing love.  And (drum roll, please), SHE DID SOMETHING ABOUT IT!

She went to her husband and bared her soul.  She told him she felt empty and sad and she asked him to love her.  As his job.  All day, every day.  Just LOVE HER.  Just her.  For her.

And it was empowering.

I felt so encouraged seeing this woman who is every woman -- well, a lot of women -- grow sick and tired of pouring herself into everyone else -- and putting on a cheery happy face all the while and actually take the first step toward changing that.  She knew that she had to change and she did.

And if she can, so can I.

It's as simple as identifying what is missing and having the confidence to ask for it.

And it's that terrifying.

But it's just little steps in the right direction all the time that will get me there.

On the way home, I felt confident enough to say some pretty private things to Mary; and she to me.  And it was nice.  And a little terrifying.  But nice.  To say what I feel, without tears, is something I have lost in my effort to be the right wife and mother.  I've lost my ability to be the right me.  And once I regain that ability, everything will be all right.