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By Root 832 0

lie my mother told to protect me, I felt galvanized. I knew all of these things, and I thought the knowledge of them, the recognition of them, had changed me. But just because I figured it out did not mean that I had fixed it. I am shocked that I know better and yet routinely fall back into my old patterns. I shut off. I shut down. I don’t feel. And I hold myself above everyone else as though I am better. I think my pain elevates me above everybody else. That weak people are destroyed by the bad things that happen to them. That weak people need sex to validate their egos. That weak people can’t follow the rules. I wasn’t weak! I was strong, so strong nothing could penetrate me. What a glorious prize you get for not needing people. You get to be safe and alone, even in your marriage! But all those people who live and let go and let life happen to them, good or bad, wild or serene, they aren’t weak—they’re human. Somewhere in my past, I learned that if you separate yourself, you don’t get hurt. Pain can be avoided. And if you stuff it down deep enough, you will forget it’s there. Do not acknowledge it, and it will not hurt you. Theodore is right. I do owe this man an apology. But what else do I owe him?

“When will Etta be home?”

“Iva Lou is picking her up and taking her over to her house after the slumber party. She said she’d keep her overnight.”

“Good.” I stand up. “I don’t want to go back to what we were.”

“We can’t.”

“I want to begin again. With what I know now.”

“I don’t know if you can change. Or if I can.”

“It’s bigger than change, Jack. It’s reinventing the whole thing.”

“Do you know how to do that?”

“We’ll figure it out.”

I lead my husband into the house. We go through the sun porch and the kitchen to our bedroom and the bed with no pillows. I will begin with how I make love to my husband. I will be present in his arms, every cell of my body in tune with his, I will listen and I will pay attention and I will treat him like the rare and precious treasure that he is. For this time and every time that will come hereafter, I choose him. My beautiful husband with the big shoulders (good thing, they carried two of us all this time) and the sweet hazel eyes. I won’t wait for him to kiss me; I kiss him.

“This is new,” he says, and smiles.

“Work with me,” I tell him, and he laughs.

I take off his clothes slowly. First his work boots. Then his socks. I take his bare feet and rub each one tenderly. He begins to pull his shirt off over his head; I won’t let him. I work the shirt off of him and, for the first time, look at his neck and the way his shoulders connect to his upper arms, and the way the muscle twists from the top of his arm around the back and down the elbow. Would I know my husband’s body from any other man’s in the world? I will now, as I kiss each freckle on his strong brown arm, down to his wrist. His hand, the long fingers, the tiny cuts on his thumb from stacking the wood, his square pink fingernails. How strong his chest is; as I lie on top of him, I feel his breath rise and fall underneath me, as our skin touches and then fits together in the way only longtime couples know. All of this I took for granted. How did I let so much time pass? Why did I ever think that this was expendable, that I could cut this man out of my life? What was I thinking? That I could walk out of here and find someone else? Someone better? As I run my hands down his back, I know there is no one better. In the very moment that love is mundane, it can become new. Why didn’t my mother tell me that? I am able to see new things simply because I’m looking for them. How sad I am that they were here all along and I gave them away as though they had no value. Simple things: my husband’s love, his faith in me, and his steadfastness. All of those things I pretended did not matter. Love is so fragile. I kiss his eyes. I really want him to see me now.

Monday brings a perfectly sunny, yet cool, first day of school. I am happy for Etta, who didn’t want to wear a rain slicker to her first day of fourth grade. She wanted to show off her