Building got the better of me this past week; no time to write, with a huge push to get the roof built.
Seems like all work and no play… yet tomorrow we’re taking off… something special to celebrate…the roof is built (metal comes this next week) and our anniversary is today.
For now, I’m just sharing this, because this is what matters most: LOVE. For those who have stuck it out together through hard knocks and tough times, and found yourself belonging in the shared place and space of long term love – something I never thought I’d be lucky enough to experience – I hope you’ll relate to this:
funny that all it takes
is opening eyes
to see
that you are there
beside me
right where we belong
Twenty-two years ago today, we married. We committed to become the family we chose. And in those years, we learned what unconditional love, duty and devotion, kindness and forgiveness feels like. In those years, we learned and grew, we flourished and failed, we longed and lusted and feared and found footing to stand strong, and we moved and built more than I’d like to admit.
It’s been a wild ride. The only stability was our love. Of each other. Our son. And the high wild lands where we choose to live. No matter how hard things got, how lost we felt, how tired we became, at the end of each day (or sometimes it took until the morning after) we knew we were no longer alone. And we knew someone else was counting on us, relying on us, needing us. So you pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and get back to work beside one another right where you belong.
Now we are here. In person and place and time.
Slowly we have settled in, learning the lay of the land, the feel of dried grass beneath bare feet or mud caked on our boots. Listening to the wind, tasting the water, letting the first sun of morning fall across our rawhide faces, allowing our fingers to find their place in the others hand when we walk. Finding our place, here. Finding the balance of lust and longing, energy and exhaustion, dirt and discomfort, strain and stress as we kept on keeping on building the dream – our family home and mountain homestead. Something we both wanted, together.
So it went, and so it still goes. Building together. A safe place to bring dreams to life.
Sitting at a different kitchen table, gazing out at a different view, things are different here. The mountain, the river, the elevation and air. Even the bears and birds and colors of the season as it begins to fade and summer browns and sky grays and we start to look up at distant peaks to see if snow has fallen yet.
Our relationship is different now. A little less spark but more warmth from the coals and that is what cooks the stew. And like the stew that has been simmering and been stirred and added to with care and taste and time, together we are each richer within than either of us imagined had we not chosen one another.
Maybe I am different, too. Not in spite of what we went through. But because of it. I am more. I am fuller. I am deeper and wiser. In part because of you. In part because of time. Aging is beautiful thing. At least, most days I think it is.
The wisdom of aging is perhaps best found in the skill of knowing what baggage to leave behind.
You cannot outrun the past. The past is the path that led you to where you are today.
In moving, you leave where you were behind. In a way, you leave who you were behind as well. You become the blank slate. The clay upon the potters’ wheel. You are both the clay and the hands that shape it.
In remaining, however, you face the challenge of your past lingering all around you like last years leaves that still need to be raked, and overgrown underbrush that catches and tangles as you try to walk through the woods. But you know your way through and sometimes there is comfort in knowing what to expect, what it will feel like, how bad it can be.
And how good.
Together we have done both.
Now is the time for re-writing. Not based upon where you are, but who you are.
The answers are not found out there. They are found in here. Within.
Perhaps where I should have looked all along.
But even inside, the landscape has changed. I wasn’t then who I am now.
It takes making the journey to understand the path.
It takes travelling the path to become the traveler.
Marriage is like that. At least it can be.
A mysterious path beckoning you to come hither.
A safe place in which you both can soften.
A healthy place in which you both can continue to be nourished, nurtured and thrive.
As the simmering stew, or the garden bed, deeper and richer and fuller with time.
Covered in sawdust and gear grease and dressed in baggy shorts not long enough to hide skinny white legs sticking out below, scraped up knees and all. Skin like rawhide and at times, admittedly, a personality to match.
This is no hot date.
These are two videos I took yesterday of us at the mill for anyone curious what our hot times look – and sound – like. In this case, loud. Yes, we wear ear protection. Bob is already hearing impaired. I can’t afford to be too.
My cinematography sucks, but that’s not what it’s about. It’s just an attempt to show you how it works.
There’s a sign I found a few years back that I just had to have and hung at the entrance to our ranch.
“Beware of the wife,” it reads, and if you know, you know it’s no joke. Depending on what mood I’m in, how tired I am, how late it is, and how late you are.
Still, I’ve been told more than once,”She cleans up well.” I think that was a compliment. I think?
In any case, this week found us dirtier than usual, arguing out of short tempters and frustration, not with one another but from working with rotten wood, in the heat and wondering why we’re doing this – and how the hell are we going to make it work. And of course, taking it out on each other. That’s the downside of partnership, of working with the one you love. They get the brunt of it, whatever “it” may be. We both are guilty of this. And working alongside one another as we’ve done for over twenty years, when the going gets rough, you can’t just walk away.
I wouldn’t want to if I could.
The comfort in commitment. The joy in being able to make each other smirk and smile, laugh and long, even during a downright dirty day. That’s good stuff.
Comfort in commitment… above and beyond love, and that’s the absolute essence. There’s commitment to habit and routine as well.
This is mine.
Early morning.
The alarm rouses me before the roosters. Right now that’s just past five. Slowly outside shapes emerge in shades of gray. Colors are slow to awaken. It’s a while still before sun graces the top of the farthest hill I can see from this little land tucked in as womb along the untamed river.
Now is the quiet time after frogs have settled and before robins wake. Even the dogs still sleep. The only sound is the river, humming as a steady wind. It is a time of tranquility, as if life on hold, the pause between the inhale and the exhale. It is a time to get in yoga and meditation practice, sharing the mat with two dogs and two cats. It is a time to softly putter about the cabin, often lit only by the setting moon or a single flickering flame. Time to get the wood stove going and the kettle on, coffee ready before Bob wakes, then time to write (often by candle light) before heading out to care for chickens and horses and walk the dogs.
Comfort comes in the familiar, in sounds like rain on the metal roof when I’m still in bed and the ticking of the cast iron woodstove contracting, a signal for me to put another log on the fire.
I like routine. It’s a safe place. In a world filled with chaos and conflict and unknowns, this is my solid ground, my foundation, a cradle that gives me some sense of stillness and calm. A time to be and breathe before the dirt and grease, sawdust and sweat, grit and grind.
The quiet before the noise.
(If you saw that video of the mill, you know what I’m talking about.)
Late afternoon.
Taking a break, laying back on lush grass, together with a couple of dogs.
Long golden shadows. Big cumulus clouds like plumes of smoke growing and gathering. The air is perfumed with blossoms of wild madrone and apple. Oak leaves suddenly full and waving in the wind as abundant undergrowth comes to life. The first of the turtles and gopher snakes cross the dirt road. Wild geese have come to rest among chickens and horses on pasture of the greenest grass I’ve ever seen. The puppy plays with the big old dog (funny because the big old one was the young one just a few years ago), and mama hen pecks in the grass with her five little chicks around her.
Sawdust and the sound of the mill feel far away. This feels like a dream. A dream I didn’t know was in me.
Get real. It’s unreal.
Who’s to say what’s real?
Living in a place which most days feel pretty dreamy, we’re often told this isn’t real.
Okay then, what is?
“It’s not the real world,” they may say of this kind of life, this place, how folks like us chose to live.
I get it. Growing up in the suburbs just outside “the” city, I didn’t know a life like this was possible, didn’t know this world existed.
“Grow up and get a real job,” you’re taught.
“Wake up and get real,” people tell you.
“C’mon… get over it… join the real world,” is what you hear.
Took growing up for me to figure out what “real” really was.
Am I living a dream? I dunno. Pinch me. I’m awake. Seems pretty real to me. And at the same time, sure enough, this is a dream come true.
Guess you gotta start by having dreams. Boy, did (and do) I.
I dream. Then get to work. Hard work. Willing to live with dirt and bugs, blood and bruises, and regular cold and wind; live in cars and tents, mud shacks and mobile homes in someone else’s back yard; live without indoor plumbing, central heating and heaven forbid, luxuries like hair dryers, coffee makers and cell phone service. “Live like no one else now so you can live like no one else later,” we once read. I am willing to try.
That’s what dreaming has meant for me. That was the price I paid. And I wouldn’t change a thing.
Everyone’s got their own price, their own path, their own definition of what “living a dream” might be. I don’t know what that means for you. I just hope you’re living it too.
If not, there’s still time.
Who says you’re too old (or young or poor or whatever the excuse)?
I don’t ever want to stop growing up. And I don’t ever want to be stuck being grown up, either.
Growing up doesn’t mean to me now what it meant when I was young. Maybe because now I’m easily as old as what I thought grown ups were supposed to be, but I sure don’t feel like them. Then I thought grown up meant boring and stuffy and sensible shoes, clean jeans and finger nails and well groomed hair, sitting at a desk all day and raking leaves on weekends; cocktails promptly at five o’clock and nothing much gets done after that. No thanks. That’s not for me.
As a kid, too, I remember thinking that being grown up was some required state of feeling like you know it all, losing that sense of curiosity, wonder, and awe. I haven’t felt that, and hope I never do because the moment we feel we know it all, have all the answers and/or have the right to speak our truth as if it were “the” truth, we start closing. We stop seeing. Stop hearing. We lose our sense of wonder and we turn into old farts. Not the most eloquent choice of words, but you get the point.
What makes life living more than curiosity, wonder and awe?
And of course, love.
That’s the magic of life. The hot and spicy. The zip and zesty. The fascination and enchantment that makes life worth living.
That childlike sense of openness.
The beginners mind.
Finding magic every day.
Making magic, too.
The ability to laugh at dumb jokes. And laugh at yourself.
The reminder to smile warmly at strangers, and enjoy watching kids and puppies play.
The nudging to just let it go when you’re cut off at the end of a passing lane or that parking spot you were vying for is taken before you can back in.
It’s taking time to smell the roses, watching baby geese take their maiden voyage, laying back in the grass or against the front steps with your eyes closed and listening to crickets on a still summer eve.
It’s listening to the same old stories from an old man or same old jokes from your partner, and still chuckling every time.
It’s having your breath taken away as a pair of red tail hawk do their courtship dance overhead or watching thunderheads build for the first time this year gracing us with an unexpected blast of thunder so sudden the puppy barks.
It’s accepting that you’ll never know it all, control it all, or do it all, but having fun trying, maybe failing, and trying again.
If missing out on any of that is what growing up means, I’m glad it didn’t happen to me.
Growing up is a work of art, fluid and ever changing, like an endless emerging of butterfly wings.
It’s not a place we get to – you know, as in “being there.” Rather, it’s an evolution that lasts as long as we are blessed to live our one wild life.
Now it’s the end of the week. We’ve kissed and made up. And washed up. Even got a little rain to keep down the dust and water the garden without moving a hose.
Now we’re back out there, getting ready to stack the next load of boards and beams for Bob to take to Colorado. All the bells and whistle and gears and grease are doing what they’re supposed to do. The broken rototiller remains broken but we borrowed the neighbor’s working one. (Thank you, George.) The garden shines and grows, somehow joyously. And looks like we finally figured out a floor plan we can build in one season with the material we’ve been working to amass.
Keep on keeping on.
It’s what we do. Would I want it any other way?
I choose to keep living the life we live and love doing what we’re doing, with wonder and awe, feeling fulfilled and full of joy by doing what we do, together.
All of it. The ups and downs and ins and outs and round and rounds and all.
At the bottom of the hill the truck pulls over, a seemingly automated response, and we step out without a word, each on our own side, headlamps over wool caps shining the way, bending over under the wheel well to unhook the chains from around the back tires. We’re getting this down to record time. Then shake off the snow, slush and mud like a wet dog in from play and return to the haven of the truck, pressing our cold wet fingers up against the heating vents to revive them before continuing on down the road.
Exhale, deep and full and rich, our breath steams the windows, adding to the fog we drive through as we descend this little mountain. All this oxygen. We have adjusted. It is easy. Natural. The body and lungs quickly forget the struggle from ten years of high altitude.
The pale blue glow of the dash on my husband’s face as he focuses on the road ahead, a narrow path of vision, white tracks on a white road with white branches bending over. We see only as far at the headlights allow, a narrow tunnel, all white ending abruptly in black. The unknown void beyond. Nothing too interesting. We’ve seen it all during the day. No surprises lurking (like the sudden sheer drop off fifty feet down into the vast expanse of the Rio Grande Reservoir found on our drive home in Colorado) except the regular crossing of the deer, calm and oblivious to our big truck with its potentially daunting grill. I swear they have a sixth sense of the speed which we drive.
We drive slow. With each bend in the road, we descend, the snow thins, pale old grasses emerging, and deer become more plentiful, bounding before the narrow view of the headlights. Houses twinkle like stars on the snowy hillsides. They sky is hazed over with probability. Chances are there will be more snow tomorrow.
Our last night of commuting. The back and forth ritual of separating work from rest, day from night, business from pleasure. It has been years for both of us. Years since we had to separate the two. There is comfort in the overlap. A solid sense of place, of belonging, allowing the two extremes, work and play, to intertwine. Becoming our life. Life without boundaries. All consuming. Defining us, each day, all around the same sense of place. And harder to walk away. Work follows you home at night when you live with it.
Redefining of self. I am not this place. I am not my job. Who am I then? Odd the sense of comfort we take from these simple knowns and givens. And the unease we find without.
A new world we have walked into. On our own four feet. Bob’s two. My two. A solid couple. Not me as a part of his life. Finding a way to fit in, to make the most, to enhance and enrich, an accessory, finishing the outfit just so. We survived and thrived. Survived living in a construction zone. In potential poverty. In limbo. In the midst of stories lingering heavy like fog carried from the past to the present where they carried no weight but undoubtedly obscured ones view. In the middle of the in-law’s battlefield. In harsh elements and extreme conditions. Now what? What next?
I can’t tell you much about it yet. Like a new parent preaching about how to raise a child. It feels so wonderful we become euphoric and want to share. But in reality, we must await the solid test of time.
I’ve never been one to hold back.
We start with simple tasks like chaining up the truck tires. Do actions define us?
My mind has got ahead of me again. Forget it for minute. And just concentrate on the task at hand. Driving down the road, dodging deer, on the snowpacked road.
Before we arrive at our temporary home, the last night in a new place that quickly got old, snow begins to fall. Big fat chunky flakes glowing like a million moths in the headlights. Mesmerizing. Dazzling. A confusion of elements and light. Somehow calming and comforting. We have seen this before.
Gin Getz 