For the love of books and boyfriends
Should we expect them to be easy and effortless? Or is trudging normal? And do we really have to finish just because we started?
I finished Demon Copperhead last night. The book was given to me in November. I picked it up sometime in December. During the last six months I’ve put this particular book down only to pick up other reads that I would blow through in a week. More; A Memoir of Open Marriage by Molly Roden Winter. All Fours by Miranda July. Countless columns. Books ‘for work’.
Let me preface
1) This is not a book review.
2) I absolutely loved it. Highly recommend!
And
me getting through the first three quarters of this book, was nothing short of a miracle. During the month of May I questioned if I should even be putting this much effort into finishing a book. It felt like a trudge compared to what we think of as ‘the beach read’ that you pick up and digest in a matter of days.
That’s what memoir’s read like, for, me. All consuming. Effortless to get into and out of. There is a sense of accomplishment, this deep personal satisfaction that I experience when I can’t put a book down until I’ve finished it.
David Sedaris once remarked that if you are not into a book within the first twenty pages, move on. There is not enough time in life to finish the books we love, let alone the ones that cause us pain. He didn’t say exactly that, and I might be blending some words that Hugh Jackman told Tim Ferris that Patrick Stewart told him on the set of X-Men.
Needless to say, all of this got me thinking about dating and relationships; should the beginnings be effortless joyrides that pull us in at the start? Or should we expect some trudging?
Which led to, do we really have to finish just because we started?
I mentioned this over pizza one night with some of my gal-pals. And my boyfriend.
I posed the question in my newsletter earlier that day and raised it with them. I can’t recall what they said. I only remember my boyfriend half laughing. Not because he thought I was being clever or cute. He looked at me, ‘trudging?’
I quickly defended myself. ‘Babe, it’s just for my column. It has nothing to do with us. It’s directly related to my relationship to reading and certain books.’
Which was mostly true. Okay, mostly half true.
Does it count as a lie if at the moment you honestly didn’t know it was about something else? Have you ever noticed how you are unable to see something clearly, the tension you are feeling and building on, until the drama unfolds and you’re walking back, how, you got there to begin with.
Meanwhile, those around you can read you like a book.
Nate and I met last year and I’ve written a couple of times about it. The rare feeling of being pulled towards him. The resistance I was feeling towards this pull. Not due to him. On the contrary.
I want to say that we have approached our relationship and one another at a tempered, but committed pace. At the same time, life approached us, at a much quicker pace.
I joke, even though it's not funny, that we were plunged into sickness and health- by the grace of God- when one Saturday morning we were told he had a cancerous mass on his kidney. (how we got there is another story)
They told us he would need to have it looked at at once.
Wait. What?
We had been seeing one another for approximately three and a half months.
No doubt an unexpected plot twist, it had the potential for high drama. We were anything but. Instead, I was level-headed and calm. (I’d say Nate was as well, but I didn’t have enough time with him to know how he might respond) There was never any doubt in my mind that I wouldn’t see him through it. That he would be okay. To be honest, I was surprised by this version of myself. This version being a woman who didn’t once think of leaving, who didn’t make it about herself, the inevitable cries of why me?! Because yes, I have been a person who would make your life experience all about me.
Obviously, I did have a few private, self-deprecating moments with God and my bestie praising my high caliber instinct to choose unavailable men. That this might be my all time high.
A few days after his cancer discovery, I told him I would be there for him as much as he felt comfortable with. I was a little shocked that he let me in the way he did. I thought for sure this would be a moment in his life that he might consider not being in a relationship. It never came up.
His diagnosis would be treatable with surgery. He is one of the lucky ones.
Following the months leading up to his surgery, we spent time getting to know each other in hospital waiting rooms, car rides to and from, and over conversations processing the information, in addition to our normal life activities.
I listened as he grappled with the options in front of him. I went to every appointment. I admired his ability to not fall into doom and despair. I cared for him. He is a man who can say he no longer has Cancer. If he were to even mention it at all.
I saw everything I needed to know about him.
I’d like to think that I also showed him who I was, too. No doubt a few exceptions. Like the night before one of his major appointments. We were going in to get clarity on the risks between a partial and full nephrectomy. I had a hair appointment following his doctor's appointment. I started lamenting and raising my concerns about what to do; I was worried I might regret cutting off all my hair into a pixie and maybe I should just cut it above my shoulders. To be safe. I didn’t want to have to live with feeling like I’d made a mistake.
He sat there listening to me and said, ‘Yah. I was thinking the same about my kidney…’
Not one of my proudest moments.
There is an urban myth among my family and close friends that nurturing doesn’t come naturally to me. That I need someone who can take care of me and not the other way around. I created this myth and have made myself a legend out of it. The truth is, I excel at care taking. It’s what I do for those I am close to and love. I will cook for you, send you supplements, bring you water with electrolytes, and listen at all hours. I will only rub your back when you’re vomiting if you ask. I will think about what I need to do next. I will give until I can’t or you tell me enough.
Towards the end of Demon Copperhead a character named Chartrain is introduced. His life advice? Save your juice.
“A person only has so much juice, and it’s ideally kept for your homeboys, not all pissed away on strangers before three o’clock in the day”
Which is why I poster as someone who doesn’t naturally nurture.
If you asked us, Nate and I would tell you that we were champs during the process. Heads down, steady we went. Until the last follow up appointment. The wheels came off. Someone said something. Then neither of us said anything as we sat in an icy room, waiting for the doctor.
Who was 45 minutes late. I wish I was kidding. It. Was. Chilling.
Later, we calmly talked it out, laughing at the irony of how well we had done up until his final appointment. Maybe it was all the stress of the last few months rearing its head. We talked about whether we - mainly Nate- had even processed what he went through in such a short amount of time. We repaired. It was all behind us.
Then a few weeks later, something else came up. Maybe a tone. A misunderstanding. And then another thing. Perhaps we had miscommunication. An assumption. Something was off. We felt off. Was it him? Me? There was an underlying tension that I couldn’t put my finger on.
Now that life was supposed to be ‘normal’, I felt like we were anything but.
Commence the mental plot twist: We are plateauing.
We don’t have any plans on the horizon. Up until now we’ve had movie dates scheduled months out. Concerts, comedy shows, doctor’s appointments. What if our story is coming to an end after almost nine months. What if I was only meant to see him through this part of his life?
The plot thickened: Maybe we aren’t meant to be more.
If two people were ready for the next level in their relationship, wouldn’t they naturally find themselves talking about what’s next? At least start sharing their feelings for one another? After all we had been through, the way we looked at one another, the way we showed up for one another, wouldn’t the words, ‘I love you’, be confessed?
It dawned on me that one of our songs was Silver Springs by Fleetwood Mac. Was it foreshadowing all along?!
So I'll begin not to love you
Turn around, see me runnin'
I'll say I loved you years ago
Tell myself you never loved me, no
Don't say that she's pretty
And did you say that she loved you?
Baby, I don't want to knowOh no
And can you tell me was it worth it?
Baby, I don't want to knowTime cast a spell on you, but you won't forget me
I know I could have loved you
But you would not let me
And there I was. Examining the difficulty I was having getting through Demon Copperhead, despite the writing and storytelling being all encompassing, and everyone’s raving reviews, thinking I should be reading this faster, I should want to read this non-stop… Why is it such a trudge… when I began questioning if I should finish it just for the sake of ‘I started it’. Or… Or! Should I put it down and move on to something else since life is short and we only have so much time to read and wait a minute… is this all analogous to dating and relationships?!
Are people only looking for quick and easy, ready to close on the ones that are taking too long or challenging? How could you know enough ‘to know’ in only 20 pages? But also trust you know when you know to close that chapter and move on?
I’ll never forget the summer I started reading, Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Talk about wanting to quit and give up only to find myself staying up at all hours of the night trying to finish while the kids were sleeping. In the beginning, I had many thoughts like, where is this going and why is it taking so long… and I don’t want to read about Swedish financial controversies. So many words. So much trudging!!!
A friend of mine saw that I was reading it and straight away said, don’t give up before the first 150 pages. It takes longer than most books to find the groove, but it’s worth it.
A week after I made my comment about reading and relationships, Nate and I had our biggest fight to date. Convinced we were juiced out, I went to close the book on us,
but thankfully
turned the page instead.
It started with Ash, you need to know something…
and it ended with, I love you, too, Nate.
I’ve wondered if someone had told me, ‘Ash, give it as many pages as it takes. Trust me, the trudge is worth it,’ I’d ever doubted that we would arrive at the next chapter:
A love worth seeing through.
I should have predicted this when, around four months in, unprompted, he started waking me each morning with a cup of coffee and forehead kisses.
Oh my god who’s your editor 🤩🤩🤩
Sweet and profound.