the briar patch

BC came and went. He was here long enough to spend time alone with each child. He shopped reloading the cupboards and the fridge and picked up a certified envelope containing more of his ex wives rantings against me. Her bullying campaign rolling thoughtless along.    

BC laughed and laughed at how ridiculous he found her. Bringing the letter to my desk at the gym to share with me. Smirking at me, grateful I was the woman beside him. 

Of course I didn't find it quite as funny as he does. But I don't begrudge him his enjoyment. See, what she fines most offensive about me isn't my parenting- it is that I love BC. 

It is written right into our history. Back in the Sugar House days when she was my-married-to-BC-up-the-street-neighbor.  For her own reasons, she stole a piece of writing of mine right out of my book bag. It was short story titled Seeking Shelter. 

To this day it remains one of the best pieces of writing I have ever done. It was the true story of how during my marriage I had fallen in love with another man. But more importantly than falling in love with him & never being able to tell him how I felt, was how it had helped me see something bigger in myself I had never even thought to seek.    

This was the proof she brought to BC to show him that I, not-beautiful-but-intriguingly-smart-girl-down-the-street, was not as wonderful as he thought me to be. And after reading it he completely agreed with her: I was not as wonder as he had thought- I was much, much more than that.  

He told me later, long after his marriage fell the rest of the way apart, and they divorced, that my story had helped to end them. 

He said he saw the way I loved. It was shameless but somehow graceful and quiet. I didn't set limits. I didn't bargain for power or control. I loved simply and honestly the best I could. He said he remembered reading it and wanting so much to be accepted and loved like that. And slowly he came to realize that he wanted to loved like that by me. 

Eventually, that was just what happened. And his ex said to me that was not what she wanted for him. Not what she intended. She had left to punish him for not being what she wanted him to be, not for him to turn up with "the perfect woman". 

I have thought about this strange compliment in a stranger still conversation many times over the past 12 years. I believe it is the key to her motivation. She feels she never got justice. What ex wife feels she does? 

I don't have an easy job here, unarmed and out in the open, on the front lines of their 13 + year divorce war.


And BC isn't always easy to love but I find him rather hard to un-love.

In his short visit he dropped Fisher off at the airport for hopefully a better weekend visit with his mom than the last one was. 

He picked Beach up from gym and left me with a hot cup of coffee to end my shift with. 

Together he and Beach made pizzas rolling the dough out by hand on the thick oak counter top he crafted for me, built over a shelf he had built for her. 

He popped by the Beer Store and picked up a six pack of what he believes to be my favorite beer. It's not, but the fact that he believes it to be is enough for me.

I don't often have the mental patients for movies but something in me is very still right now. We watched School of Rock, ate pizza dripping with pesto and cheese, & drank good beer. 

The 3 of us cuddled together. Beach laughed and laughed and the dogs laying at our feet rolled over.

He left in the morning early. Before he went he made a pot of dark coffee. Killed a young rooster (ah-yes). Signed checks.  Watered the greenhouse. Showed Beach on a map the exact spot he would meet up with us on the way to her State competition down in Southern Utah next weekend. He kissed us good-bye. I gave him a hard time about going back so soon and then suggested he consider a haircut but not to trim the beard.

After he pulled away I walked around the yard to survey our life here, smiling to myself. His ex is pointing the finger at the space in my life that BC fills. The parts of he and I that work together so well the other one hardly knows anything about what goes into it until one of us isn't there.

I am sure she doesn't even realize what she sees or why it is so offensive to her sensibilities. Why would she? I have been here the whole time and I am just now seeing it clearly. 

He and I are far from perfect but I hold a hundred thousand rays of sunlight that fall around him, moments together perched on dusty rocks, laughter inside a tent with frozen breath, breaking through the surface of blue water, and miles and miles of dirt roads.

What she hates about me is what I am willing to do for him and what I am wiling to do for her own son in the shadow of the love I have for his father.

Or maybe I don't love BC as much as I think I do. Maybe part of what it is, is how much I love who I am when I am with him. For that feeling there has to be a bigger word than love.      

He once told me he never would pretend to be a big enough man to hold onto me but he could find a way to be content knowing he was the man who opened the door for me.
      
I love the way the greenhouse stones smell like smokey water on a warm morning. Especial when I know it means he was here.