As always with being home, I noticed more: the windows in the kids' dressing room need to be replaced; the yard needs work; my husband is on his phone a lot; the new chairs in the living room are fabulous; the little kids have so much love for me; my husband's phone dings a lot; the big kids work hard at school; our Italian friend responds to my husband's messages more promptly than to mine; our fourteen-year-old cares a lot about how he does in school; our twelve-year-old gets happier when she talks to her friends over zoom; the little kids can actually write decently; I like the break from school life; I don't need as much sleep because I'm not commuting and spending all day at school; my husband is doing Italian and texting with our Italian friend before I am even up in the morning.
My awareness of these things was not entirely new. On some level, I had already noticed all of these at some point or points and had put them aside. Raking one afternoon, I listened to the podcast Modern Love. The topic was relationships during quarantine: some couples were beginning their relationships; some had just ended their relationship but were still living together, trying to endure; some were in the middle of a break-up when quarantine began. I raked and listened, mesmerized. I thought, I'm lucky that I've had more time during quarantine to talk with Daniel, to walk him to work when he goes, to hang out. It was easy to find the positive.
And I ignored the things I was noticing, things I had noticed for months, but had convinced myself out of. Cristina and Daniel text much more than Cristina and I do; he's putting more time into learning and improving his Italian. Cristina and Daniel leave each other many voice messages. Daniel's enthusiasm for Cristina and hers for him seem more than I'm comfortable with; I can work on not being jealous -- we're all friends.
Cristina and Marco and their son Emanuele had planned to come to visit us -- and stay with us for three weeks -- in June. Daniel had mapped out a schedule, including a camping trip to Lake Umbagagog. I hadn't committed to going, thinking that, with a three-week-stay, I might like a break from all the company at home. I vacillated though, because being out camping sounded pretty great, too. I like camping (provided that our kids or Daniel sets up all the tent gear). Back in January or February, I had thought, I don't think I can go camping with them. It will be too much to be around Daniel and Cristina and their flirty energy. I'll need a break. I didn't think that anything physical was going to happen between them; it was more their excessive admiration of each other, an admiration that seemed to have grown since our return to the states, that now, I sensed and saw on some texts, was more than I was comfortable with. I told myself, They're friends. We're friends. It will fade. He needs attention, and eventually this will run out. I'd seen it before -- twice with an ex-girlfriend and once with a woman who lived in our city. Not full-out romantic relationships, but emotionally-charged-building-in-intensity-time-consuming relationships that gave him energy and made him feel happy and purposeful. Until I said, You can't be in touch with ex-girlfriend because you told her that you dream that, if something happens to me, you'll grow old with her. Or until I emailed same woman years later and said, No more contact between the two of you, and does your husband know about these emails reliving the past? Or until I said, You lied to me about Gabby. You lied. You said that you were by yourself one night, but she was here, too. You need to move out of the house. (It was a brief three week exile of which our kids never learned since he left after bed and arrived by breakfast. They were small.)
So I told myself, Don't be jealous. Check in with him. Put more time into your friendship with Cristina. Work on your Italian and your communication with Cristina to get rid of your jealousy. Give Daniel more attention. He needs attention.
I did all of these.
Ding, ding, ding.
The texts came in during the day. I heard his speaking in Italian leaving voice messages before I even got out of bed. When he'd been up for a couple of hours before me, and I asked, Oh, did you meditate? He'd sometimes say, Not yet. I was working on my Italian flashcards. Flashcards that had not only Italian words but entire phrases and sentences in quotes with dates from Cristina's WhatsApp messages. I asked him one day, "Don't the flashcards with Cristina's sentences on them make you then think about her and her messages or the conversation you had? They would for me." "No," he said.
I said, "These are pretty effusive, this message about how you send messages with enthusiasm, passion, with the heart, with happiness."
"Yes," he said.
In response to her list of emotions with which she sent him messages (con entusiasmo, con allegria, con cuore, con passione, con amore), he wrote: "Tutto per me?" (All for me?) and she answered, "Tutto per te, Daniel William Keleher. 😊" And I thought, But that's a line from one of our favorite movies, Love Actually. The secretary says to her married boss, when he compliments her on her planning of the holiday party, "It's for you. It's all for you." So we have used that line, too. I tried not to think too much more about it. Even if he wasn't aware of the movie reference here the way I was, it was still a line that goes over a line.
Having conversations about his friendships with women in the past haven't gone well. Even now, years after I insisted that he not have relationships with the ex-girlfriend and the woman in our city, he told me that he didn't like that he couldn't have these relationships; that he didn't think it was fair and didn't really get it. I thought, I can try harder, try to accommodate his need for attention and Italian learning. But it wasn't enough.
I started checking his phone when he was outside or in the shower. Him in Italian: I love you. This friendship isn't just fun for me; it's integral to who I am and how I live and brings me so much happiness. Her: I love you, too. Last night I went to sleep smiling thinking about this message of yours. You're my favorite/best friend.
And the mundane: I'm at the grocery store that you used to shop at here in Italy! Here's how you say "than" in Italian, depending on the context. You are amazing, wonderful, incredible, talented. I am full of admiration for you. I woke up so happy today and with a hundred smiles and I am sending them all to you today!
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I was becoming more unhappy. My attentions, no matter how much, were not slowing down Daniel's outreach and messages to Cristina or hers to him.
I started asking for reassurance in ways I never had before: Am I your number one? Will I always be your number one? Will we stay married forever? Questions I never could have imagined asking. He said, "Yes," and moved on.
I noticed that I needed to speak up. Okay, with the help of two girlfriends who said that I wasn't just being jealous.
I noticed that even then, his focus was more on how Cristina felt after I sent her an email than on how I felt.
I noticed that again, I was told that I had misunderstood, that it was only friendship, that this friendship was important.
I noticed that he couldn't stop being in touch with her even after I asked for their not being in touch. He still texted her son on Cristina's phone, facetimed her and her family on his birthday, called her by accident one Saturday morning.
When I thought that the worst was over, after we had read Olive, Again aloud in bed and made love one midnight, I lay there afterwards and asked, "What do you understand now?" I was curious, hopeful, eager. I wanted to know that he understood what hadn't been okay, how hurt I was; I wanted reassurance.
He said, "I understand that you were hurt by my relationship with Cristina. Cristina has been a huge part of my life. She plays an integral role in my life. She lives out what I'm learning in meditation. She has given me more support than anyone else in my passion to engage citizens." There was more. Ten minutes more of Cristina's enthusiasm and love of life and engagement and insight and generosity.
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I was miserable.
Finally I had to change something -- and this time it wasn't myself.
I noticed that the rules I was living by -- that you stay married, that you compromise and find depths of flexibility for your marriage and your family, that you speak up but you don't fight in front of the kids, that you try to understand the other person's needs, that you use only "I feel" language to talk about your hurt, that you support your spouse, that you accept your spouse -- were not good enough. Finally not good enough.
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I noticed that I wanted more. That this was not enough.
I noticed that I didn't have to follow these rules any more.
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