"MY children won't have anywhere to sleep!"

We’ve got two weeks to get out of the house.  Progress is dismal.  I have started taking half days off work to help pack.  But Wife’s focus is taken up with little things.

Last night she asked me, “Can I have the bunk beds?”  [She means the bunk beds that the boys used to sleep in, that I amd my brother slept in a generation ago, that we have had on long-term loan from my parents all this time.]

I told her, “No.”  She has invoked the sacred principle of heirloom-inheritance so many times to justify why she has to keep so much worthless antique crap that I’m a little surprised to hear her ask.  Surely she recognizes that by the same criteria she invokes so often, I would be breaking some kind of sacred bond to let her have them?  But of course this counts without her other sacred principle, viz., that she should always be allowed to have whatever she wants for free.

She tried quite a few variations to get me to change my mind, starting with “Well you’re not using them,” which is true enough but the only way to get them back again (assuming she didn’t trash them in the meantime) would be to wheedle her for them and I want as little to do with her after the separation as humanly possible.  (I haven’t mentioned that part yet.)  Then she moved on to, “I didn’t realize that you had already decided to be so mean to me!”  This was probably supposed to sting, because time was when she could get me to do backflips by saying that, as I would fall all over myself to prove that I didn’t want her to think me mean.  But that was long ago.  And finally she ended up with, “Well if you won’t give me the bunk beds then that just means that MY children won’t have any place to sleep when they come stay with me!”  I’ve come to be amused that she always uses the singular pronoun when talking about the boys.  They are never “our” children to her, but always “my” [i.e., Wife’s] children … all by herself, presumably, by parthenogenesis.  Well, I tried to point out, she could go buy them beds.  She bought herself a bed a few months ago.  There followed a long list of reasons why she couldn’t – why, in fact, she was completely helpless in this area and so anything that was less than perfect in the outcome was my fault.  I spent a few minutes discussing, but not many.

We sorted some more books.  I took another box of them; she took another … what was it?  Four?  Six?  Eight?  I lost count.  A lot.  And this was on top of the boxes and boxes she has already claimed.  Babe, I know you’re leasing a house but where you gonna put all them books?  When you gonna read ‘em?  One thing I have noticed is that an awful lot of the time we will uncover something she likes and she will immediately say it was an inheritance from some family member (meaning that it is her property separately and I have no claim on it).  Every time we have found any china or silver, for example, it came from Aunt Betty or Uncle Herman.  Well I haven’t recognized any of the china or silver, so she might even be right.  Also, I don’t a lot care about it one way or the other so long as I have dishes to eat off of.  But I had to smile when we opened one of the boxes of books that had been sequestered in our garage for years, and found a complete set of Sherlock Holmes: the stories, the novels … everything.  Immediately she said, “That was my father’s. I recognize it from his apartment.” 

Oh really?  I opened the flyleaf and pointed out that the publication date was sixteen years after her father died, and a good ten years after she and I were married. 

“Oh.  Well you don’t want them, do you?”

I don’t know.  I’d enjoy them.  And I haven’t taken that many books so far this evening ….

“Well if you really want them THAT MUCH then I suppose I won’t FIGHT over them …!”  [Here she heaved the deep sigh of the chronically oppressed.]

I took the books.

And so it goes.

Another from Ikkyu

See also http://thegreenleaf.co.uk/hp/Ikkyu/06ikkyubathing.htm

Progress, 3

Just a brief update.

Wife signed a 12-month lease on a house.  It’s the best one she has looked at so far: the size of the house we are leaving, all new everything, and within her price range.  She is very relieved that she’s got it: this has made her a lot calmer and more rational on other fronts.

Mind you, a couple days ago she met with her attorney to discuss my proposed support offer, and declared herself “very very depressed” with the outcome.  What was it that was so bad?  Just that her attorney told her that everything in my proposal was perfectly legal (surprise) and … implicitly, at any rate … reasonable too.  Wife wanted more, of course.

But right now she’s focused on getting the house packed so she can move.  One thing at a time.

Sister Failure in Japan

I just discovered this poem today.  It’s perfect ….

Wife, daughters, friends.
This is for you.
Enlightenment is
Mistake after mistake.

-- Ikkyu Sojun, 15th century Japanese Zen Master

Progress, 2

Last night, I learned that Wife has a lead on another place to rent – a house, actually, about the size of the one we are selling.  Son 2 was with her yesterday when she looked at it, and he reports back wonderful things.  It is large, spacious, airy, and light; the owners are completely re-doing it, putting in new appliances and a hardwood floor; and it comes with a gardener, to boot.  Also, to hear Wife tell it she seems to have made a good first impression – not normally her strong suit, these days.

Nothing has been signed yet, and of course it ain’t over till it’s over.  Anything can happen befor the ink dries on a contract.  But it sounds better for Wife than any of us had dared hope for.

I have to admit that it felt a little funny listening to Son 2 go on and on about this place, especially when he finally asked “Why couldn’t you have found a place like that too?”  All this as I was driving him back to my apartment for the night: the apartment I got back in May that has two rooms (i.e., “1 bedroom”) plus kitchen and bath; and no appliances besides stove, oven, and refrigerator.  Clean, but not fancy.  And enough for what I need, but nothing more.

Silently I spent the drive reminding myself that this apartment is what I wanted, almost exactly.  I don’t want to have to look after a big house.  That’s part of why I am so glad to be selling ours.  There is something exciting about big houses, to be sure; and they inspire the admiration of others.  But for me it is borrowed enthusiasm – the enthusiasm that comes from knowing that other people think this is desirable.  In my heart of hearts, I myself don’t desire it.

And there are practical reasons, too.  My apartment is cheaper.  It’s also an hour closer to where I work; adding the price of gas there and back each day would make the real price of a big house Out There even higher than it already is.  Wife should be able to afford it if she is frugal in other areas, and if we come to a reasonable agreement on spousal support.  But my apartment is in a perfect location, and in any event I was in a bit of a hurry to find some place because I had already left the house.  You remember all that.

The meditation class I went to a few months ago taught one kind of meditation (called “Mudita”) that focusses on rejoicing selflessly in the good fortune of others.  If Wife really does get this mansion she hopes for, I will have a lot of opportunity to practise Mudita meditation.  There are parts of me that have been predicting her downfall or come-uppance with this separation, that have been looking forward to sneering as her bad attitudes and execrable social skills land her with nowhere to live and nobody willing to help her.  It looks like that won’t happen, and I have to remember to be happy.  It even benefits me for her to be well-off, because it means she will be easier to deal with during other parts of the separation.  So it will be a good thing for her to get a place she loves, that she can afford.  And it’s a good thing for me to be in the little place where I am, which is exactly the kind of little place I have always dreamed of.

In the biggest picture, all these things are true, not just platitudes.  But I do have to remind myself not to be small.   

           

Progress

Two things, both of which I touch on briefly in the previous post.

Wife may have a place to live.  She has been accepted by someone renting a house, who did not bother to check her income.  So the fact that we have not reached a settlement yet, and she therefore can’t prove any support from me at all, doesn’t matter.  This has lifted her spirits considerably.

Also, Son 1 is back at Hogwarts.  We spent the weekend moving him in.  The down side is that more burden (of every sort) will fall on Son 2.  But at least Son 1 is out of the day-to-day maelstrom.  That has to be a good thing.

Aftermath

For what it’s worth, she was better the next day.  Maybe she had gotten it out of her system?  Or maybe all the attention satisfied some narcissistic urge inside her?  Or maybe all my theories are full of shit and I have no idea?  But she was brighter and more able to focus.

She also told Son 2, “Wow, I must really have been tired last night. I went to bed at something like 5:00 and I guess I slept all the way through the night.”  Was she trying to spin the event, so that he wouldn’t remember it?  Or did she genuinely black out and not remember it herself?  I have no idea which.

The next day I wrote to Counselor (whom she still sees weekly) as follows:

Hi Counselor,

Wife tried to commit suicide last night.  (Thursday evening, August 15.) 

She took some of her medications (don’t know what or how much) on top of one or more martinis and no food, and then lay down and went to sleep.  When she got up again, several hours later, she was stumbling and muttered that she “didn’t try hard enough.”  She tried to vomit and couldn’t, but was speaking in a disconnected way.  I called 9-1-1; but by the time they got there she was able to answer all their questions coherently enough that when she refused treatment they had to allow her to do so, and they left.  I sat with her until she went back to sleep and then I left too.  Son 1 stayed up most of the night on the computer but also watching her medications, to make sure she didn’t try it again the same night.  And apparently she didn’t.

I am concerned for her, naturally.  Her overall level of functioning has been getting worse and worse since I moved out, and the challenge of having to pack and move is taking a real toll.

I am also concerned for the boys: they are both competent and resilient, but they shouldn’t be in the position of having to conduct a de facto suicide watch on a parent.  Adolescence can be tough enough without adding that to the mix.  I’m not sure I know what to propose instead.  But at the very least I figure you should know about it.

If it also turns out that you have advice, so much the better.  :-)

It wasn’t until Monday that I got back to my e-mail and saw this reply:

I've tried to contact Wife on the home phone and her cell, Hosea, but have yet to speak with her.  Can you tell me how she is doing?   we should talk about the question of hospitalizing her, if that's the only way to keep her safe.   my cell is xxx-xxxx.

I know this may be traumatizing for you, and especially the kids... I'm sorry.  Depending on her emotional state, we should try to find a way to get the kids out of the situation where they are feeling responsible for her safety.

Call or email... Either way, can you let me know the situation?

And my answer, that I sent just about an hour ago:

Hi Counselor,

I only got this e-mail this morning.  Several things:

1. Wife’s mood was significantly – very much -- better the next day and over the weekend, partly because she may have found a place to live when she moves out of the house.

2. It’s also better when she doesn’t drink (and the boys have more and more urged her not to drink).

3. Son 1 is now back at school: we drove him to Hogwarts over the weekend, so he will now be occupied with school activities and not in the middle of it all.  He has a cell phone, which means she can still text him (and sometimes she does, sending him long screeds of panic).  But as far as day-to-day supervision or intervention goes, he is out of the picture.  He can still be splashed, but he can’t be called on to do much about it.

4. The downside of Son 1’s departure is that more will fall on Son 2. In the normal course of things that ought to mean just “More of the work of packing the house.”  But of course if she takes a downturn it could also mean “More caretaking.”

5. Traditionally Son 2 has taken on a significant amount of parenting Wife, starting as early as when he was three.  From time to time I have tried to suggest that she’s the grown-up and he’s the kid, so really he’s not responsible for her.  But he has spent a lot of years acting as if he felt responsible for her emotional well-being.  It may take the advice of someone besides his dad (i.e., a counselor) … and on a regular basis (not just once in a while) … before he really accepts that it’s not his job.  Or maybe I’m wrong and worrying too much.  I don’t know.  I guess someone who understands this stuff should evaluate him …?

6. For what it is worth, Son 1 several times urged me to take the next two weeks off work completely to help with the house, “because otherwise Son 2 will have to do it all by himself.”  Ostensibly his words were all about packing, but I wonder if he had in mind the emotional burden as much as (or more than) the physical burden?

7. Our custody schedule has Son 2 with me for two weeks now, starting last night and continuing until Friday night August 30.  However, while that addresses where he has dinner and breakfast and where he sleeps, I have not been able to articulate a plausible reason for forbidding him to help pack the house: so this morning, for example, I gave him bus fare and a map of the busses to take to get from my apartment to the house.  I plan to pick him up in the afternoon after work.  And unless something changes, other days are likely to be the same.  This puts him back there for most of the hours of the day.

8. I totally agree with you that the boys should not be in a situation where they feel responsible for her safety.  I’m not sure how to make that happen.

9. Son 2 goes back to school on Sunday, September 8: two days before escrow closes.  So one way or another, he would normally in the middle of things until the end unless some kind of deus ex machina removes him.

10. On the other hand, once he is gone he doesn’t have a cell phone (and his school forbids them).  So his only window into the home situation becomes his traditional once-a-week phone call home.  And if it were important or advisable, perhaps that could be cancelled or cut back.  It would need someone besides me to say so, though.  I could not appear to be disinterested, obviously.

11. The boys haven’t been acting traumatized, so far as I can tell what that looks like.  Maybe I can’t tell.  We can talk more about this if it is relevant.

12. My cell number is xxx-xxxx.

Wife tries to kill herself

This post is a little out of date, but it belongs here in sequence – just dated last Thursday night.

I went over to the house after work to help pack stuff.  Wife was drinking; this made her bitter, angry, and illogical.  I was helping the boys dismantle their bunk beds and she came into the room, screeching at me about my support offer and alleging that it would leave her in poverty.  (In case you wondered, the math doesn’t begin to support this.)  Her face was maybe six inches away from mine and she was screaming at the top of her voice.  I made myself just breathe, and then responded in a low voice, “Please get out of my face. Please get out of my space. I can’t answer you when you are like this because I can’t think.”  I said this a few times while she stormed threats at me, and then she said, “I’ll get out of your space all right! Just give me forty-five minutes!”  She ran back into the bedroom and slammed the door.

The boys and I wondered if this meant she was calling a friend to leave, or something worse.  But in a while she seemed to be asleep and both of them sighed, “Good. Maybe if she sleeps off the martinis she’ll be better.”  We went back to work, disassembled their bed, and moved it to storage.

They asked me to stay to dinner.  I was going to meet Debbie, but she had been out of town and wasn’t back yet; also the boys really wanted me to stay for company.  Wife was still silent.  So I stayed for dinner.  Son 1 grilled some chicken breasts on the barbecue, I boiled up some rice, and we had quite a pleasant meal.  A good bit later I took off.  Debbie was back in town by then so I drove by her place on my way home.  (She is moving too … I think I’ve mentioned this. Busy summer.)

While I was at Debbie’s, Son 1 texted me that Wife was awake.  She had gotten up, stumbled to the bathroom to try to throw up, and mumbled semi-coherently “Didn’t try hard enough.”  Son 1 was adamant that I should stay away and not let her know that I knew; he insisted that he and Son 2 had the situation under control and could manage her, but my presence would reignite her fury.  But when I told Debbie – who is a nurse – I heard a very different story.  Debbie urged (quite rightly) that teenage boys should not have to conduct a suicide watch on their mother, and that I should call 911.  She added that even just hearing about it second-hand, she was walking a fine line by not interfering; but if she saw it directly she would be legally obligated to call.  I thought for a few minutes and then decided that she was right.  I texted Son 1 that I was on my way and left.

Son 1 texted me frantically telling me to stay away.  When I got to the house he came out to stop me.  But I insisted I had to go in.  I checked that she was still keeled over in the bathroom (Son 2 was attending her), and called 911.

In the end it was a huge waste, I guess.  Her pupils were pinpricks but she answered their questions flawlessly and so they legally could not take her against her will.  They spent a lot of time getting my story and Son 1’s story.  They also explained that the way she looked fit what we were telling them, and that if she had slipped up on even one question they could have taken her.  But she didn’t.  And so after an hour or more they left.  They boys and I privately expressed amazement to each other that she could pass this test, although I admitted that she had always said she would do anything to prevent being hospitalized for mental problems against her will.  Son 1 joked that maybe she practices the answers in front of a mirror, for just such an event.

It was late by now, after 11:00.  I sat with Wife until she went back to bed and fell asleep.  I also moved all her medications out of the bedroom and into the study, where Son 1 was playing computer games.  He said he’d be up until late (in fact he stayed up till 5:00 in the morning) so he could keep her from getting into more drugs.  Son 2 went to bed.  Once Wife was asleep, I left to go back to my apartment.

What a night.

How not to help the drowning

I drove past the house after work again last night.  Wife had taken Son 1 to the doctor for his annual check-up, and there were some forms that the Hogwarts Health Center needed.  The doctor had filled them out and so I was going to pick them up and turn them in.  Other than that, the boys had spent the whole day at the house helping Wife pack.  Meanwhile, Debbie is moving to the Big City a couple hours away from here, to enroll in a graduate program.  Her movers arrived today, so she was out of town.  Still, she’ll be back tomorrow to pick up some odds and ends, and we were in touch by text message.

Shortly before I got to the house, Son 1 texted me as follows:

Just thought you should be aware mom is making death threats at you and suicide threats. Admittedly alcohol influenced but made all the same. Don’t do anything but be aware all the same. Repeat, do not do anything.

Yes, well Wife always gets a lot less rational after a couple of martinis.  And she loves martinis.  So I texted back that I was on my way.  I also forwarded his text to Debbie, with the same caution not to take any action … but just so she should know.

When I got there ….  Well, hell, I already texted this whole story to Debbie after it was over.  Let me just recopy to you what I wrote to her.

At the laundromat. The visit didn’t go so well, though it could’ve been even worse. I came over nominally to get some medical forms for hogwarts filled out this morn by s1’s doctor….

… So as soon as I got there (they were all in the driveway packing boxes) S1 said “let me show you where the forms are” and took me inside. There he urged me to take time off work and help her [Wife] because she’s becoming ever less functional. He also said he and S2 may be the [only] reason she is still alive, and if I don’t come help S2’ll have to do it all. [Because Son 1 goes back to school this weekend.]

I explained that there ARE houses in her price range (she fears homelessness) … even ones as big as our house. Just in [a small town about 35 minutes from here]. We went online and found one right then, which S1 thought would ease her mind a lot.

Then he told me to leave before W saw me, but no dice. She came in as I left, so S1 and I tried to buoy her mood with the news that she could afford a place plenty big enough, that welcomed cats.

“Come look!” It answered every fear she had been expressing.

But no. It’s in [that small town] and she reacted as if we had said it’s in the slums of Calcutta. Or the north pole.

There followed a long tirade about how her life sucks. (I’m abbreviating.) I kept my voice calm and quiet. S1 left in disgust or frustration. Finally I left. But I had printed out all the emails I’ve sent her lately, including my support offer, because her email hasn’t been working so she hasn’t seen any of them. I handed them to her before I left. In retrospect this was not a skillful move.

I should have given them to a boy to give her when she was sober, but oh well. Followed many texts as I drove home about how my proposal left her “below the poverty level.” (This is the same plan I described to you.)

[As a brief memo to my readers, my proposal would more or less match the disability check she gets every month from Social Security. My attorney said she thought it was fair. Debbie said, “That gives her as much per month to live on as I have, and I live very well.” Opinions obviously differ, but I think it’s safe to assume that Wife has not looked up where exactly the poverty line is really set these days.]

I will go to the house tomorrow morn to discuss it a bit, and be late to work. Really I think she should ask her attorney’s opinion.

Debbie asked: Is she still drinking?

She had one or more martinis tonight. S1 said the reason Monday went so well is that she didn’t drink at all. He clearly sees a correlation.

As for moving to any other town besides here, what she says tonight is that the distance from here makes it a nonstarter. Also there’s “nothing to do” anywhere else. Over the weekend she told S2 and me that she has to have a big place with all her stuff because she “never” goes out of the house. So does it matter that there’s “nothing to do”? No it only matters that she has a reason why anything anybody says is wrong. Wrong and hateful.

She also claims she has a romantic relationship going, the “only” one who is loyal or cares for her, and moving away means the end of it. She worked herself into tears at this. I just said that if he won’t drive to see her, she deserves better. I absolutely did not explain that my girlfriend is moving to Big City.

Debbie said: I feel concerned but don’t know what to say.

Don’t worry at not knowing what to say. There’s nothing to say. Her level of suffering just overwhelms anybody who tries to help.

It’s like the rule that you don’t swim up to help a drowning man because he’ll just pull you under and drown you too.

Her suffering and grief are THAT extreme and have been so for years. Maybe decades. Maybe all her life.

Either you learn to detach from the suffering around you and give up clinging to outcomes or she destroys you. In that way she’s a kind of dharma teacher.

Debbie added: Yes. You hear the same teaching in Al-Anon. But as long as the boys are there and trying to save her, it’s very difficult to detach.

So there you have it.  Wife is either a drowning, neurotic basket-case, or a skillful and subtle Dharma teacher … or both at once, I guess.  I am either learning how to preserve my own life and sanity inside a maelstrom of madness, or I’m an uncaring asshole who is callously leaving her to fall flat on her face over and over without even noticing.  Or both at once, I guess.  And the situation at the house is either steeply escalating drama, … or else it is steeply escalating drama.  Not so many options on that one.

Moving, packing, drama, trauma

Have I told you yet that we succeeded in selling the house?  Hallelujah!  Now all we have to do is get out of it before the 60-day escrow expires (in maybe four weeks from today).  That part’s not so easy.

Wife has been looking for a place to live, with no success.  She has also been trying to pack the house, with help from the boys (and occasionally from me) … again, with limited success.  She is weighed down by twenty years of hoarding, and by having no idea where she will go next.  And her ability to cope seems to be shrinking.

She no longer cleans any of her own dishes.  If the boys are there, she makes them do it.  Or she leaves them undone.  She has not fixed a meal all summer: Son 1 has done all the cooking, and is getting to be good at it.  That’s good for him, but worrying in what it says about her.  She no longer even makes coffee in the morning, and that was an inflexible ritual for the year when both boys were away at school and I was still living in the house.  When I got there Saturday to help out I went to make a pot of coffee and found the pot had to be scoured first.  The filter still held the used grounds from the previous pot, but they were crusty and moldy.  And I’d probably better not talk about the catbox.

What follows are some notes that I texted to Debbie along about the middle of Sunday [edited for readability]:

What a day.  I got here a bit before 11:00. Son 2 was up (since 7) packing his room. Son 1 & Wife got up by noon. W spent the next 30 minutes making breakfast then at least an hour on the phone. Sons 1&2 sorted clothes in their room. I looked through files to find paperwork needed by escrow company; then organized some more.

Finally W off phone, going to look at 2 apartments right now. Oh wait – no, not going. Spent a little time boxing a few more books & a lot of time complaining. Son 2 announced his allergies are bad & just now left on his bike. (Good for him!)

She tried to give him money to buy her milk; he insisted on using his own money instead. Then she went into a rant about how she’ll have to pack the whole house by herself because Son 1’ll be at school, Son 2’s allergic & I’ll be at work. And lay down with medicine and a migraine.

Except now after another 20-30 minutes she really is leaving to see a couple places … though I had to tell her that if her appointment is near [such-and-such an intersection] at 2:45 she has to leave now. (sigh)

Son 2 really does get a bad allergic reaction whenever he spends too much time packing things at the house – probably dust, though he thinks it might be the cats.  And Son 1 really is going back to school next weekend.  And Wife can’t find a place to live.

She came back from her outing Sunday afternoon saying that she was ready to slit her wrists (yes, she used exactly those words) because finding a place seems so hopeless to her.  I can’t see why: when I go to Craigslist and put in the parameters I think she should be using, I find a bunch of places.  Yes, she has applied to a few and been turned down because she can’t prove her income.  But the answer to that is to get a legally-binding agreement from me about spousal support, which in turn would mean logging onto her e-mail and reading the proposal I sent her a few days ago … and then agreeing to it.  And partly she has a list of mandatory criteria that is just too long.  It has to cost no more than this; and it has to have that much space; and it can’t be located over there.  I want to tell her, “Look, you are imposing restrictions on price, size, and location, but the reality is you can pick any two of those and not the third.”  But I also don’t really want to spend a lot of time talking to her, nor (I think) she to me.

It’s not pretty, and it’s not getting any prettier.  We’ve got a month longer before we have to get out of there, and I expect it to get worse steadily.

Wise and good

NOTE: I am writing this post some nine years after the fact, on May 21, 2022. But I have back-dated it to where it belongs in the narrative. My hope is that it will give you a little more information about Debbie.

I've mentioned that Debbie is a Buddhist, and that we have gone on a meditation retreat together. I think I have neglected to mention that she specifically follows the Plum Village tradition of Thích Nhất Hạnh, and that she has formally received the Five Mindfulness Trainings. This put her on the path towards ordination as a lay member of the Order of Interbeing, a goal she is hoping to reach soon.

Part of the process is that she has to provide letters of recommendation from people who know her, to describe how her practice of the Five Mindfulness Trainings has informed her life. I'm not sure how many letters she is supposed to provide, but I'm pretty sure it's more than one. Anyway, she asked me to write one of them. I wrote four paragraphs, explaining that we are dating and giving some other background. But then came the core of my letter, as follows:

Early in our relationship, I asked myself quite explicitly what I saw in her, what it was about her that attracted me.  This was (and is) a practical question: I have had other romantic relationships (including a marriage, now ended) that have not gone so well; and I have no intention of repeating past mistakes.  Once burned, twice shy.  The answer that came to me, and it has become only clearer with time, is that Debbie is wise and good.  These are heavy words, but they are exactly what I mean and I use them very specifically.  When I say that Debbie is wise, I don’t mean that she knows everything, nor that her opinions are necessarily always right; what I mean is that she knows how to frame questions in the right way.  Whatever we discuss, no matter how difficult, she sees what parts of it are important, and therefore what the foundation of any decision has to be.  Likewise when I say that she is good, I don’t mean that she is somehow miraculously free of those moments of distraction or irritation that beset all the rest of us; what I mean is that, once she collects herself, she knows those moments for what they are, and she knows that she knows better.  In other words, she can understand that she has been distracted or irritated or whatever, and so can disengage whatever rankled feelings she might still have from the rest of what is going on; this then frees her to understand the people involved from a perspective of basic kindness.  This is easy to say; but I have to admit that it can be surprisingly hard to do, and Debbie succeeds in doing it.  Perhaps this fundamental wisdom and goodness address the very first criterion [that you list for candidates], that an aspirant have learned to transform suffering and that she embody mindfulness in her own life.

When I first settled on the words wise and good, they frightened me, because they sound so heavy, so meaningful, so portentous. But the more I thought about them, the more I realized that they were exactly what I wanted to say. In the sense that I explain them above, they are exactly true. 

Of course you are free to tell me that I'm in love, so of course I'm going to use high-flown adjectives to describe her. And you're not wrong. But I think there's more to it than that.

      

"Wait, what?"

A couple of evenings ago, the boys and I were having dinner at my apartment.  My phone happened to be sitting on the table because I had picked up a text from Debbie a few minutes before (and then carefully clicked back to the home screen).  Son 1 wanted to know what time it was, so he casually reached out and picked up my phone.  I was worried there might be another text from Debbie at any time, so I plucked it out of his hand.

Son 1: Hey, what’s the problem?

Son 2 [in a sarcastic deadpan]: He doesn’t want you to see all his girlfriends.

Hosea: [splutters inarticulately]

Son 1: What? You mean there’s more than one?

Son 2: Wait, what? You mean there’s even one??

Both: That can’t be! You’re fifty … and you have grey hair … and you’re flabby!  You’re not allowed to have a life!