I was driving with my daughter, Sophia, a forty-five minute ride of monotony. She was lost in the world of Instagram and YouTube, and I wanted to draw her out because she's thirteen, because she started using mascara over the weekend, because every day I'm afraid that I'm losing her to her future, separate life, one that is only spuriously connected to me via text or vague, sideways responses when I ask her how she is: fine, okay, good. So I try to model honest, respectful communication, but to be truthful about how I feel. While I used to keep a photo of Wonder Woman over my childhood bed, I am not a Super Mom--no lasso, no gold bracelets, no comic book immortality thanks to Bipolar Disorder, Anorexia, and Alcoholism. I am of the species Homo Sapiens. Lately, though, I'm sad.
So I turned down the radio (Taylor Swift) and said, "This is a hard weekend for me."
She looked up. "Why?"
"A year ago, this weekend, is when I moved out of your dad's house." (Your dad. Not dad. A way to create distance. Yours. Not mine, not any longer, anyway.) "The year has gone by really fast; it's surreal."
The pain of divvying up all of our shared "goods," down to the photos in the albums, is still on the surface. My ex-husband passed on the wedding album, as if eager to erase evidence of past intimate connection. Maybe it was too painful. If I tried to flip through it now, looking at those younger, buoyant, gussied-up selves who believed in forever and in shared dreams, I would dissolve in hopeless nostalgia. Like Dr. Who (the kids' latest obsession), I would long for time travel in order to ensure the aliens of anger, betrayal, and emotional dissociation didn't kill us off.
Dissociation. Dis: a Latin prefix meaning "apart," "away," "utterly," or having a privative, negative, or reversing force. So not restorative time travel, but a force that reverses love and affection, severs the ties that bind two people together and the marriage vows that enact that promise. Utterly without association. Except for our children, who still long for the circle. My son, turning ten in a few weeks, said that what he wanted most for his birthday was for his family to have dinner together. And by "family," he meant Mom + Dad + Sophia + Alexander; and by "family," he meant the four of us laughing over Five Guys burgers and leaving in one car; and by "family," he meant for the four of us to re-associate and repair what has been lost in our year apart.
Sophia looked back at me in the rearview mirror, her eyes steady (and smudged with brown pencil). "Are you okay?"
"No," I said. "It's been really hard, especially not being with you all the time."
"Even though you're sad, you seem happier," she said.
"What about you?" I said.
She put her hand on the back of my shoulder, in consolation and connection. "The separation is hard. Not living together."
"What have you learned about yourself, though, even in the hardness?" I asked.
She was silent, struggling, likely, to name the source of strength that has helped see her through all this.
"You know what I see?" I said. "I see how resilient you are. How much compassion you've shown to your Dad and me. A lot of kids would have been thrown by this, would be full of anger. Which is okay if you are, but I see how steady you've been. Not that you have to be, because wobbling is okay, but you've haven't let our difficulties shake up who you are and know yourself to be. You're pretty amazing."
She smiled, but that was all a sometimes-self-conscious teen could take. "Can we turn the music back up?" she said.
Equanimity. That's what my daughter has shown me this past year. How to roll with the punches, instead of being flattened by them. It's hard to be alone, without an adult who loves me best of all. Financial insecurity that comes with divorce is terrifying, and keeps me up most nights. Dating is uncomfortable and still feels like cheating (not to mention the fact that I can't exactly tell dates that I am Bipolar--definite romantic buzzkill). On the other hand, my family and friends have astonished me in their generosity and love. And I haven't wanted to drink or starve myself over this. Being numb is no longer an option for me. While the full weight of grief and anger and happiness and hope can be overwhelming (thank god for the healthy displacement of CrossFit, running, yoga, and Netflix), the ravaging is worth it because I am here to tell my daughter and son that they are holy and astonishing and loved, and born, yes, from love.
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