Poets, authors and song writers have referred to love as a
fire or a flame. That’s a time honored
and well put analogy. It’s especially
apparent when a love dies out and the flame gets smaller and smaller. Just like a campfire that has been deprived
of new wood to keep it going, the flame dies down but just when you think it’s
completely out, a spark ignites and the flame comes back for a moment or two
just to tease you into thinking it’s going to get stronger and keep going.
Yeah, love can certainly be like that.
Recently, something happened that sparked the dying embers
of the fire that was the fuel for my marriage. I won’t go into detail on what
it was, but the event was strong enough to reignite something I thought had
been extinguished or was at least nothing more than smoldering remains. The situation made me think that there was a
chance the MMC and I could get back together again and those thoughts stopped
me down for a night.
For a while I stoked the small flame and wondered if I could
make it bigger. I thought about where I
was with my new house, her in her new house and the house we had up for
sale. For a moment, I considered those
to be obstacles too big to overcome but then I realized those were just
things. I could rent out the house I
just bought and she, since she was only leasing, could probably get out of that
and we could all move back into our old house.
The fire got bigger.
The notion of having my family back fanned the flames more
and I thought maybe…just maybe there was a chance. This hope for a chance caused the fire to
become a bit hotter and I warmed myself in it.
But then I thought if this spark really was an opportunity
to reconcile, is it something I wanted to do?
The first, gut reaction was yes.
I would do anything to have my family back the way it was a few years
ago and that’s when the fire started to falter.
A few years ago.
Back then, things were great. My wife and I were in love and our youngest
was just starting to develop into the wonderful little girl she is now (my
oldest was already there and still is). We
did things a family did and there was never any thought it would ever end. We would raise our girls in our house and
then retire together in it, passing the time either in the rocking chairs on our front
porch or on a cruise ship going to places we hadn't been before.
While those thoughts were great, I also thought about how
things had been for the last year or so.
The fire died down a little more.
We both felt distant. This was
when I was traveling a lot and sensing things were different when I returned
home. I thought it was just me but as we
all know now, it wasn’t. I thought about
how when presented with the idea of divorce, the MMC took to it like…well, if I
can just beat this analogy further into the ground…a moth to a flame. No chance for marriage counseling or trial
separation; just straight to divorce.
Never any discussion on why she was unhappy or exactly what happened to
drive her away. Just end the marriage
without any real reason why. Is this the
woman I want to go back to? It’s almost
a cliché but she’s not the woman I married and more than likely, I’m not the
man she married either. How could I
be? If I was, wouldn’t we still be
together?
The flame reduced to a flicker and eventually turned to
smoke and dispersed into the night air.
I think that everyone who goes through a divorce, especially
if they are the ones who are the “victims” of it, have these momentary sparks
and they hope they can fan it into something more. The truth is they are only that: sparks. Not a raging inferno that could burn brightly
for any length of time. Just a spark
that lights up the mind with thoughts of what could happen and possible futures
of what could be and all the while we are blowing on it and shoving crumbled
newspaper and twigs on it to get the flames to grow. The
truth is the fire is really a burning memory of the past and a hope to go back
to the way it once was. Unfortunately,
we can’t go back to the past any more than we can burn a piece of wood twice.
I don’t care for these sparks. I would prefer to mentally produce a bucket
of water and pour it over the slowly cooling embers and put them out
permanently. It would make things easier.
I am trying to face forward in all of this.
To take steps away from where the fire once burned and find a place to
build a new fire but that’s a long hike on a path that hasn’t even been made
yet. It’s a daunting task to blaze that trail and it’s hard not to look back to
where things were once warm and cozy; to want to go back, sit there and see if
I could get just a little more warmth out of it. The problem is, there is no warmth
there. The sparks are just flickers of false
hope and ideas that get into your head.
The situation that started all this came and went and I got
on with clearing away the brush and debris that lay before me on my new
path. I’m sure I’ll hear another pop or
crackle and see a flicker from that fire again.
Next time, however, I will try to leave that spark behind me and
continue my search for a place to build a new fire.
P.S. - I hope all my fire references in this post didn't burn you out. ::chuckle::
