Non-Fighting

(Originally 1/29/07)

I actually have some current, socially relevent information to impart by the way of an MSN Money article. To me, it's odd that the article is about "non-divorces" but located in the Money section of the MSN homepage. I see that their interest in the piece is because of the financial aspects of the state of being called "non-divorce", but of course what interests me is the interpersonal aspect of "non-divorce"

Namely this;

"Neither of us makes that much money, and if we had to separate, it would be a hardship for us," says Goldfarb, of Westchester County, N.Y., who works in customer service while her husband teaches high school math.

The couple come from different socio-economic backgrounds and fought "like cats and dogs" when their daughter and son -- now 22 and 18, respectively -- were in high school, she says. Goldfarb grew up middle class and wanted the children to take college-prep courses and attend top-ranked private universities. Her husband, from a lower-income background, didn't see the need and insisted they take classes at the less-prestigious City University of New York.

Goldfarb decided divorce wasn't a good idea (emphasis mine) because split households would further the problem. "I didn't want him to influence the children," she says. "I felt if we were to stay married, I'd have more control. I could monitor what he was saying."

Though the outcome was a compromise -- their daughter attended a city college but their son is enrolled in a private school outside Boston -- the battle wounds remain. Divorce, however, isn't in the picture.

"We do love each other -- it's just not as deep of a love that we had before," Goldfarb says. "We are really, really good friends. And we trust each other. We're probably both scared to find new partners. (emphasis mine)"

At this point, the pair, both in their 50s, "are sticking together," she says. "It's not that severe of a case where we need to change our lives."

From what I've heard, this is not a state of "non-divorce". This is a normal marriage. She says they love each other, they are really really good friends, they trust each other, and their disagreement about the children (which ended in a compromise) is not that severe of a case for divorce. Then, duh? To quote Carly Simon; "well that's the way I've always heard it should be".

Possibly the article is published under Money becase it's poorly written where the interpesonal is concerned. Or possibly the twentysomethings of today have a much different opinion on how their marriages should be. But I think every twentysomethings of every age had different ideas. I can't tell you how many times I've heard and read that 'it's not always hearts and flowers', and 'staying married takes work'. Personally, whatever lies ahead of me is going to take some very active maintenance on my part. This I know. It, in fact, is what makes me the most nervous about wanting to get married. But not being married, or at least, not being in an intimate loving relationship is becoming more and more of a problem for my mental health.

This weekend I had an exercize in the 'work' of maintaining a relationship. The backstory is this; for the last few weeks I've been getting some resistance concerning my favorite project; the audio drama. It has revived my sense of self and restored my faith in my skills. It fulfills my dreams and brought me into a relationship with my hero. It also provided lots of happiness for at least a dozen other people. All good. So every time I get some resistance from other agents who are not as invested as I am, or do not share the same taste that I do, I just want to tell them, "Alright already. Just go away and let me have my fun. It isn't hurting you, is it? Or do you just like pissing on other people's dreams?" Once I formulate that thought, then I want to go for the jugular. I want to insult the critic's character, I want to condemn their motives, I want to defeat this foe.

Okay, with that in mind, I go to play D&D with my friends this weekend. Two of my friends, listed in my Hero posts, in fact, are quite argumentative. And foul-tempered. They were friends long before I ever met them and this is their history together. They fondly remember a time when they got in a fistfight with each other. That is so not like me. But these two guys would fight a buzzsaw.

I suppose they are heroes of mine because they have qualities that I wish I had more of, which are 1) raging masculinity and 2) aggressive, take-charge personalities. But I admire these things from afar. I do not admire them when they are used against me. Which they seemed almost constantly to do during the game. So I came to a point where I told one of them, "If you don't like it, you have other options." Which he completed by saying, "Oh you mean I don't have to play? Well, you're right!" He did keep playing, but I could tell that it hurt his feelings. Which made me feel bad. So by the end of the session I asked him if he was planning to play next session, and although we were back to smiles he said, "Give me some incentive." So I told him, "The incentive is that I really do want you to play, and that I'm sorry I said that." Well, that's when the buubble of tension broke, and the cloud he had hidden under was totally gone.

That's what I figure being married is going to be like. It will take work. And, gads, when I tell you work, I mean it was WORK. Up until I said what I said, he was driving me CRAZY. I literally wanted to throw everything down and just storm out of the room. I wanted to scream, "Shut up! What the hell!? Why the eff are you playing this game if all you want to do is argue with me?! TRUST me!! I'm not running this game to hurt or confuse or to defeat you personally!! I'm running the game so we can have a good time here?!! DaMN!!" But my friend is a fighter. He approaches life like one big battleground. Every thing he faces is a foe to conquer. It makes him seem hella cool, and hella macho, but it's exhausting. I wouldn't want to be like that all the time, but I could use concentrated doses of it every now and again. (although I think I'm much more of a fighter than I want to admit)
So after I did say my little bit, and hurt his feelings, then it was tense and still bad. For the next few hours I had to divide my brain into the 'running the game' section, the 'worry about my friend' section, and the 'don't run away from the game, keeping playing--be a man!' section, until I finally found a way to apologize.

Non-fighting takes WORK.

But being lonely is not a good alternative, so I guess this is what its all about.

So that's all right then.