I sat under the sprawling arms of an age-old tree and let the sun warm my skin. The tree stood at the edge of a quiet rural cemetery. And I sat under it because my bike had developed a flat rear tire. I had no spare tube nor any way to inflate one if I'd remembered to pack one in the small seat bag. But I'd put my cell phone in my jersey pocket so I called my oldest son to come get me (his car has a bike rack on the roof). Then I just waited.
In many ways, I thought, I am waiting on the outside edge of a cemetery. Literally and figuratively. I was waiting for him to drive by so I could flag him down and get a ride home. And I am waiting, spiritually and figuratively, for my life to end and so enter into a cemetery. Not this particular cemetery, mind you, but that place we all go at death.
I could have nursed the flat tire back home -- some 15 miles or more -- but that would destroy the tire and possibly damage the wheel. I know because I have done this before. I opted for the more economical, but easily also more embarrassing phone call and wait for a ride.
I could rage against the passage of time, dress like today's teens, grow my hair long again, buy a sports car, find a 20-something "girlfriend" and burn the physical, mental and spiritual candle at both ends, day and night. But that would destroy a lifetime of learning as well as take a terrible toll on the very health on which I rely. I know this because I lived through that when I was in my teens and 20s. I know this because I periodically stepped back into that way of life when work demanded 24-hour-plus shifts or the rare gathering lasted until the wee hours of the lightening morning. I prefer to act my age, for the most part, and accept that I am old and growing older with increasing speed, even if that means I no longer am attractive to women because of thinning, graying hair, the lines age sculpts onto a face and a body unable to fight gravity as it did when young and supple.
So I sit under a tree, on the "living" side of the fence surrounding a cemetery, and wait. Either someone will come along and save me, offering me a love to last me until my dying day, or I may just open those gates and head inside.
After all, given enough time, the grass eventually does look a lot greener on the other side.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
SAME OR DIFFERENT?
What, I often wonder, brings couples together? What, I think as I look at two people in love, did he see in her, or her in him? I don't mean those questions as mean or malicious, but as a statement of curiosity. I truly want to know what brings any two people together into a relationship. When he first looked at her, what did he see that drew him in her direction? When she first looked at him, what attracted, or repelled, her?
If, as the saying goes, opposites attract, then shouldn't we be drawn to people who've endured a completely opposite childhood? If I grew up with an alcoholic, abusive parent then I should be attracted to someone who comes from an Ozzie-and-Harriet background, right?
Well, not so fast.
See, I don't think we truly are drawn to our complete opposite, except that men are drawn to women and women to men, for the most part. And while comedians and even some writers want to point out the ways in which men and women are different -- and if you haven't noticed that we are then we need to sign you up for both a refresher biology course and far more interpersonal relationships with the opposite (see!) sex -- we are and probably should be drawn more to our similarities than our differences.
Study after study has shown, for instance, that the male who was the eldest in his family often weds a female who was eldest in her family, and youngest child marries youngest child. And people who grew up in big families are drawn to someone who grew up in a big family. People who grew up in wealth tend to wed others who shared a similar background.
Of course, no two people are ever completely alike and so there are always going to be differences, no matter what our backgrounds are. And it is those subtle and smaller differences, I think, that we tend to focus on too often while ignoring the commonalities and similarities.
That said, we sometimes -- and I speak here from hard-won experience -- dismiss the glaring, large, ominous differences with someone because we bought into that whole "opposites attract" line. I think too often people connect, wed or just pour themselves into relationships with people so fundamentally different from themselves simply because they believe that is what they are supposed to want. Just like society has and continues to hammer into our minds that women and men must look some idealized, stylized way (men with layer upon layer of muscles, perfect teeth and hair and chiseled jaws; women with Barbie-like bodies, too much makeup, perfect teeth and skin and long, polished nails and hair), so, too, have we swallowed -- hook, line and sinker -- this idea that we should be attracted to someone opposite to us.
I don't think so.
Even when I was younger I think that "opposites attract" thing sounded a little lame to me, but back then I was stunned if any woman/girl gave me so much as a glance, let alone a second look. She might have really been from Venus as far as I knew or cared, the slightest interest was all I wanted. As I've aged, though, I realize and cherish the value of a woman with whom I share interests, passions, ideas, faith, romance, friendship, companionship and many other commonalities, traits I find important to what I seek in a relationship. I don't want someone different from me. And I can't fathom why anyone would.
If, as the saying goes, opposites attract, then shouldn't we be drawn to people who've endured a completely opposite childhood? If I grew up with an alcoholic, abusive parent then I should be attracted to someone who comes from an Ozzie-and-Harriet background, right?
Well, not so fast.
See, I don't think we truly are drawn to our complete opposite, except that men are drawn to women and women to men, for the most part. And while comedians and even some writers want to point out the ways in which men and women are different -- and if you haven't noticed that we are then we need to sign you up for both a refresher biology course and far more interpersonal relationships with the opposite (see!) sex -- we are and probably should be drawn more to our similarities than our differences.
Study after study has shown, for instance, that the male who was the eldest in his family often weds a female who was eldest in her family, and youngest child marries youngest child. And people who grew up in big families are drawn to someone who grew up in a big family. People who grew up in wealth tend to wed others who shared a similar background.
Of course, no two people are ever completely alike and so there are always going to be differences, no matter what our backgrounds are. And it is those subtle and smaller differences, I think, that we tend to focus on too often while ignoring the commonalities and similarities.
That said, we sometimes -- and I speak here from hard-won experience -- dismiss the glaring, large, ominous differences with someone because we bought into that whole "opposites attract" line. I think too often people connect, wed or just pour themselves into relationships with people so fundamentally different from themselves simply because they believe that is what they are supposed to want. Just like society has and continues to hammer into our minds that women and men must look some idealized, stylized way (men with layer upon layer of muscles, perfect teeth and hair and chiseled jaws; women with Barbie-like bodies, too much makeup, perfect teeth and skin and long, polished nails and hair), so, too, have we swallowed -- hook, line and sinker -- this idea that we should be attracted to someone opposite to us.
I don't think so.
Even when I was younger I think that "opposites attract" thing sounded a little lame to me, but back then I was stunned if any woman/girl gave me so much as a glance, let alone a second look. She might have really been from Venus as far as I knew or cared, the slightest interest was all I wanted. As I've aged, though, I realize and cherish the value of a woman with whom I share interests, passions, ideas, faith, romance, friendship, companionship and many other commonalities, traits I find important to what I seek in a relationship. I don't want someone different from me. And I can't fathom why anyone would.
Friday, October 7, 2011
BE READY TO ENDURE
As a runner, I endured heat that baked the soles of my shoes and feet, cold that caused ice to form on the hairs of my nostrils and darkness that often put my life at risk. As a cyclist, I have battled winds that attempt to push my bike out from underneath me, rain and hail that pelted me with stinging indifference and traffic that often puts me and others on the road in immediate danger.
In any distance sport, the participant must endure. Not just the distance involved, but everything along the way. In a race, there also are the other competitors to watch for, to pick one to chase down, to hear another's labored breath in your ear as they slowly pass you. Or, at least in cycling, to feel the "whoosh" of a peleton go flying past as if you were standing still and only this mass of wheels and bikes were moving.
Each tests your resolve, your strength of will, your ability to endure. That is what endurance sports are all about. They are far less about time and distance, about winning or not winning, as they are about the inner test of man(woman) vs. self, of mind vs. muscle, of will vs. weakness.
Sometimes love is an endurance test.
You may think it is a sprint, that you are in a hurry to get from the start to the finish and to finally be with the one you love for the rest of your life. But the race is not over when you finally are together. Instead, it has just begun. But where you once ran, rode, raced alone, now you do this together, with the one you love. And, like a team, you can only run, ride, race as fast as you are able to do together. For, much like a sack race, you stride with her, ride with her, race by her side, bound to her to the very finish.
Sometimes, though, the endurance test begins at the very start. Sometimes, what you must endure is waiting, the waiting for the time to come when she notices you, or realizes you are even alive. Sometimes you must endure and wait for the time when she finally will put love and your relationship first. At other times you may have to endure the test of time, and, like the mountain climber, seek that correct route to the summit that holds her love and her heart.
And sometimes, like the steeplechase runner, you have to not only endure the distance and the waiting, but obstacles life puts in both of your paths. Sometimes you have to be patient and wait for God to clear the way for the two of you to finally be together.
You can try to sprint to the finish, but you will tire and fall by the wayside if you do. Only with the mindset of the distance athlete, the endurance participant, can you find the will, the strength and the patience to wait for love, to endure for love, to be ready for love when it finally arrives.
To finally have love, a love worth waiting for, you must be ready to endure.
In any distance sport, the participant must endure. Not just the distance involved, but everything along the way. In a race, there also are the other competitors to watch for, to pick one to chase down, to hear another's labored breath in your ear as they slowly pass you. Or, at least in cycling, to feel the "whoosh" of a peleton go flying past as if you were standing still and only this mass of wheels and bikes were moving.
Each tests your resolve, your strength of will, your ability to endure. That is what endurance sports are all about. They are far less about time and distance, about winning or not winning, as they are about the inner test of man(woman) vs. self, of mind vs. muscle, of will vs. weakness.
Sometimes love is an endurance test.
You may think it is a sprint, that you are in a hurry to get from the start to the finish and to finally be with the one you love for the rest of your life. But the race is not over when you finally are together. Instead, it has just begun. But where you once ran, rode, raced alone, now you do this together, with the one you love. And, like a team, you can only run, ride, race as fast as you are able to do together. For, much like a sack race, you stride with her, ride with her, race by her side, bound to her to the very finish.
Sometimes, though, the endurance test begins at the very start. Sometimes, what you must endure is waiting, the waiting for the time to come when she notices you, or realizes you are even alive. Sometimes you must endure and wait for the time when she finally will put love and your relationship first. At other times you may have to endure the test of time, and, like the mountain climber, seek that correct route to the summit that holds her love and her heart.
And sometimes, like the steeplechase runner, you have to not only endure the distance and the waiting, but obstacles life puts in both of your paths. Sometimes you have to be patient and wait for God to clear the way for the two of you to finally be together.
You can try to sprint to the finish, but you will tire and fall by the wayside if you do. Only with the mindset of the distance athlete, the endurance participant, can you find the will, the strength and the patience to wait for love, to endure for love, to be ready for love when it finally arrives.
To finally have love, a love worth waiting for, you must be ready to endure.
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