second hand love

If you know me only from the last 10 years then you will have a hard time wrapping your mind around the next few lines.  All I had were dress clothes.  To go out into the woods with him I had to slip into a pair of his thick winter pants over my slacks. And borrow boots and a hat from his grandmother.

The place was Etna, New Hampshire.  The Him was BC.  The Me who was there 15 years ago is a bit more complicated to explain.

BC had flown me out to the East coast to meet his family.  It was over winter break.  I had stayed behind to be with my kids for Christmas and to take an undergraduate shadow shift with the Trauma Team where I saw my first on the table operating room death.

Two days after Christmas I flew alone across the country to be with him.

He was late at the airport picking me up.  I almost turned around to collect on the invite for drinks with the young lawyer seated beside me on the plane from Chicago to Islip, New York.  But BC showed up in the nick of time.  Running and waving.  Apologizing. Maybe stoned- defiantly stone.

Wearing an old wool sweater the kind without generational boundaries, LL Bean leather boots, and baggy jeans.  He grabbed my wrist; my Anne Taylor blouse, JJill Cashmere wrap, $200 Sundance leather bracelet. 

"I left the car running, double-parked in traffic. Hurry airport security is coming!" 

On that trip, we drove twisting New England roads where trees kissed over our heads and snow hugged all the edges. We stayed in at least 4 different houses in 3 states over a week's time.  We walked the sidewalks of New York City. Spent New Year's Eve on the rooftop watching fireworks and drinking wine. We skated on a frozen Connecticut pond.  And we snowshoed on a sliver of the Appalachian Trail.

Me, far from home, underweight- and on my own losing ground. Harboring an undiagnosed medical issue I was like a sick bird BC had been trying to nurse back to health.  He fed me home-baked bread smeared with butter and honey on plates beside slices of apples and extra sharp, salty white cheese.  He cooked eggs loaded with zucchini dripping spicy pepper jack and hidden tofu.  

If you are thinking, oh Misty forgot to pack casual clothing for her trip is what she meant to say.... then you would be thinking the same thing I was rolling over in my mind as BC's grandmother sent me upstairs to find something more appropriate to stomp around the woods in.    

I dumped the contents of my bag onto the bed only to realize I hadn't forgotten them, I really didn't have or own those sort of things anymore.  

I had business attire and a set of running clothes and my soccer stuff but no levis, no t-shirts, none of that sort of thing.  As I had lost weight and my old clothes didn't fit anymore I had replaced only what I needed at the time; hospital clothes, work clothes. 

Up until that minute I hadn't needed anything that was exclusively for ME, for my comfort and self.  I had been building a bridge from one life to another but it was unfinished.  A whole part of myself had been left out.  

That was 15 years ago.  In my minimalist wardrobe of today, I have something for each part of ME.  From a black cocktail dress all the way across the spectrum to my farming Carhartt overalls.  Mom-me, wife-me, gym-me, subcategory meet-season-mom-me, employee-me, writer, runner, hiker, homeschool educator, even grandma me.  Mostly they blend together, there are a few outliers of course (explains the cocktail dress).  

BC taught me to snowshoe in the woods behind his grandmother's house.  He showed me the sugar shed where his family made maple syrup. He taught me to love and to trust.  He taught me to listen to the words deep inside my mind. 

Under a chairlift at Alta, he smiled, "You're not a bad skier but you might have more fun if you point your skis downhill."

He's brave.  He's maddening.  He's always late.  He's almost always right.  

He has taught me a lot in our life together.  We don't have an anniversary.  We have a series of stories.  Each one leading us closer to the life we have together today.  

Buried deep in our past are these words, "I can't expect a woman like you to stay with a man like me.  I know you can do better.  I want you to stay but I could be content knowing I am the man who opened the door for you...."

We left that door open. I have peeked but I have never walked out it. We had a child.  We raised two and a half families as one.  We bought an old house down on the valley floor. We were never married. 

I have my own boots now, 2 pairs (one for snow the other for mud), and yet I still like to be standing in his when he's not here to stand beside me.