It feels weird. It shouldn’t but it does.

Hello Possums. Tonight I have been invited out by my dancing buddy V to partake in tapas with a group of mutual friends before kicking on to a nightclub for some African music. I invited the hub. And he said Yes. Normally he wouldn’t come. He would use the excuse of looking after the kids - especially on a Friday night. Usually he prefers to sit in front of the telly with a bottomless glass of red. After a busy week, he needs to unwind. This is his normal line. And during footy season, television on  Friday night is a sacred ritual. This is why Friday nights are often girls nights for me. If I need to catch a movie or a play or go dancing with girlfriends, this is the night. It should not feel weird that my husband is coming to watch African drummers with me. But it does. It really does. I am not unhappy about it, just weirded out. I think its great that he’s making an effort. How he fits in could be quite an interesting social experiment.  Yesterday I had a conversation with a friend and colleague about mid life crises. I told her mine was over and she laughed and laughed. Yes, it is, I confirmed. Now the marriage difficulties on the other hand, these are not solved. Its just that the crisis aspect is over. I met an older man who I thought was wonderful and this has made me less panicky. I now feel that I am able to put time into the marriage, and even after five years if it still fails then there will be no resentment. There will always be hope and someone out there for me. There is no hurry. Before I thought I had to make a decision quickly, otherwise it would be too late. She thought about what I had said. Hmm, she deliberated, why is this the case that so many marriages are going through difficulties? Mine too! Why is it that our husbands no longer interest us? Take my husband, he is beautiful, a lovely person. He would be a great partner, but for someone else! But I’m not interested any more.  He bores me. Maybe it is a stage, I said. And she agreed. A stage in a long term relationship. Like stages our children go through, that are obvious to us in hindsight. Maybe this is a stage for women in their forties?  

The Rose

Hello Possums. I have been working hard today. I ate lunch late. I was just about to get back into it when I noticed this rose:

This rose is a sensual delight. The perfume is magnificent. The petals are crimson silk. It is intricate and perfect.

The rose is from our garden. The hub brought it in and gave it to me two days ago.

Thank you, its beautiful. Shall I put it in the vase you gave me last Valentines Day?

Good idea.

Today, I look at the rose and I feel a complicated mixture of emotions. The rose is symbolic. Bette Midler’s song is one of my favorites. It always makes me cry.

Because the seed

in the springtime

with the sun’s love

becomes the rose.

Could I dare hope the rose can symbolize my love? Do I have strength enough to nurture love until it shows?

It needs to be real. I might have to change and I might have to try really hard. I might have to let go of hurt and let some expectations fade away to insignificance.

Do I dare hope it could be beautiful again?

Just when you think you have to let go

 

You gotta live

You gotta love

You gotta feel something

You gotta worry

But its so hard

Its really hard

Sometimes I feel like going down.

 

Hello Possums. I love this Beatles song. I tried to find a clip of it on Youtube for you, but without success. The thing that makes the song is John Lennon’s emotion through his voice. What an artist!

The truth is I have been worrying a bit lately. Relationship with the hub was heading for the skids. That was before the night before yesterday, and the morning after that. [It's actually the morning of Saturday 22nd here in Melbourne, and I am waiting for Meg to pick me up for our rogaine].

The hub and I, we both have our faults. We had identified areas for improvement, but for one stubborn reason or another things hadn’t changed. I was beginning to despair that they never would. And that was not a happy place to be in. The night before yesterday it all blew up. I suggested we make an appointment with our lawyer. I was imagining moving into our inner city apartment when our tenant’s lease was up or house hunting.

But the morning after that everything went arse about in a good way. Can an old dog learn new tricks? Something clicked in his head. He spoke to me in ways that he has never done before. He went cold turkey on the alcohol last night and instead of drowning his stress in oblivion he sat and thought for hours. When he came to bed he spoke to me again in the most open way he has been able to manage for years.

And the morning after the night before yesterday, he made love to me like heaven.

Old dogs can learn new tricks it seems.

 

 

Gone to the dogs

Hello Possums, have you read the classic ‘Great Expectations’ by Charles Dickens? Do you remember the character Miss Haversham? Let me assure you that the character Miss Haversham was most certainly based on a real person. There are Miss-Haversham-types out there! I kid you not.

When I first met my husband, there was no mention of Aunty Veronica. It wasn’t until we were married that my mother-in-law sat me down and explained my duties with respect to the hubby’s elderly Aunt. She had in her hand a pre-addressed lettergram with the postage pre-paid. She placed the lettergram in my hand as she related the following story.

Aunty Veronica had no children of her own. She was the eldest sister of my father-in-law who immigrated to Australia in his thirties from the UK. Both of his sisters still resided in the UK. One in Aldershot and the other in Chichester (or Chi as she referred to it, I later found out). The two sisters were ten years apart in age and had not spoken to each other for thirty years. Consequently, eventhough her younger sister in Chi had three children, Auntly Veronica found herself lonely in her twilight years.

Aunty Veronica’s home in Aldershot was large and built on a considerable size of land. She had also accumulated additional wealth in the form of shares. Many years ago, long before I came on the scene, she expressed her deepest wishes to my mother-in-law concerning her assets:

Since I do not have children of my own, she began, I would like you to know that when I go I intend to leave my entire wealth to be split between your two lovely boys.

Just to put you in the picture, Possums, she was referring to my hubby and his brother. They were pretty young at the time this pledge was made. My mother-in-law, however, was obliged from this moment on to keep in contact with her husband’s oldest sister in the UK – what else could she do?

My mother-in-law expected me to uphold the Family Obligation to Aunty Veronica, set in motion by The Pledge. I was expected to write to her! For those of you who have not visited my blog before and who don’t know that I am an Australian and that I have rarely traveled out of Australia, I need to point out that I had never met this old woman before and she was thousands of miles away somewhere in the UK.

What would you do, Possums? I was bound by The Pledge, just as my mother-in-law and my husband felt they were. So I wrote to her. My husband regularly phoned her. This went on for thirteen years.

Sadly she passed away five years ago. She left all of her money to The Lost Dogs Home. The explanation she gave for this decision in her final will was that no one gave her enough attention – except for her adoring Labrador, Adam.

I didn’t care. But I realised that my hubby was upset about her final decision.

I don’t want the money! He said. It’s just that I feel betrayed. Why did she bother to make the promise to mum, if she wasn’t going to follow through in the end?

I can’t explain it either.

I don’t think we’re supposed to understand the Miss-Haversham-types!

The hubby gets a reputation

Hello Possums. The story about my surprise birthday present has been well known around our community for a couple of months now. My husband is getting a reputation amongst the women because of it.

The crossing lady at the front of the kids primary school is always on for a chat. We have broached interesting topics such as correct and incorrect ways for drivers to approach the crossing and the virtues of parking only in designated spaces. She also loves to report erratic driving behavior, or to provide reports on goings-on in the community. Last year around schoolies week she was able to report on random acts of vandalism in the form of tacks deliberately left on roadsides in prominent parking areas. Upon that occasion she took to issuing the warning, Watch where you park! with the seriousness of a sage.

Anyway now days she has taken to giving me a count down to her birthday, and has expressed a keen interest to be added to my husbands birthday list. She hasn’t started to relate her preferred car colours or makes yet, but that’s next on her agenda for sure!

Similarly conversations with the women in the primary school uniform shop (where I volunteer my time once a fortnight, or weekly in busy periods such as changes of season) have indicated that there are a few women who look differently at the hubby now that word has spread around. I have personalised number plates, so people have been easily able to recognize the change of vehicle.

Oh, Bindi, I noticed you were driving a new car this morning! Nice, very nice.

Yep. Surprise birthday present. And then if we have time, which we usually do, I relate the whole story.

Oh, what a nice man!

Yeah. I think I’ll keep him.

Well, if you change your mind, send him my way.

On this particular occasion, one of the other women chipped in with, Yeah, but after a divorce, he probably wouldn’t be able to afford new cars for birthdays!

Hmm, yeah true. Oh well, it was still a nice thing for him to do. You could send him over anyway!

No worries!

I am a brat

Hello Possums. I wasn’t going to tell you this story because it incriminates me as a brat. But this morning as was I was driving to Pump, noticing how chilly the mornings were becoming, I looked down at these little buttons that I hadn’t yet used in my new car and decided to give them a whirl. These little buttons heat the seats! I turned mine on and instantly the chill left me. I drove in comfort, silently thanking my lovely hubby for my car, which he gave to me as a surprise for my birthday in Feb.

He didn’t tell me! He pretended that he needed me to drive him to Brighton to pick up his race car after a service. All the way there I sulked.

I can’t understand why you picked today of all days, My Birthday, to make me drive you out to Brighton to pick up your bloody car! We should have been going out for lunch or something instead!

Well, we could still go out for lunch afterwards. He replied, most reasonably.

No, we can’t now! Because I’m too upset. You should have thought about it before!

So we drove there in silence. He is very clever, and he knows not to step into the arena with me when I’m behaving like this. We arrived at the car yard and he said,

Why don’t you come in and have a latte? They have a nice cafe in the car sales area these days.

There is no way I’m spending My Birthday sitting in a car yard drinking lattes. I’d rather wait in the car and sulk! I kid you not, Possums, these were my exact words.

My husband then went into the sales area and, unknown to me at the time, had a brief conversation with the young sales manager that went something like this:

I need your wife to come in here to sign the documents.

I can’t get her to come in. What should we do?

The next thing I notice is a young man emerging from a car that had been parked directly in front of where I was sitting and sulking. He looked squarely at me with a lovely grin on his face. I returned the smile, but had no idea why he was looking at me. It is not that unusual in my life at the moment to be approached by young men, so I really didn’t think much of it, until he reached into the window of my car, dangled some keys in front of me and said,

Hello, here are the keys to your new car!

Well, I was completely surprised – bowled over in fact – and feeling very, very humble.

Thankyou. I said to my husband sheepishly. I feel awful… how dare you make me feel so small and humble on My Birthday! Don’t you ever do it again.

My husband thought it was a great joke. He confessed that on the drive over, the more brattish I became the more fun he had anticipating my surprise/ humiliation.