Answers Revealed

*Originally published on my Wordpress blog 10.12.2020

Back in May of this year I wrote a mostly whimsical  piece about curiosity. Actually it was simply a list of ten or twelve things about which I was curious. The last item on the list was that I was curious about my former spouse Dave. We had married in the 1970’s but I hadn’t spoken to him since our marriage dissolved over forty years ago. I was curious about what had happened to him. How did his life turn out?  My friend Harold responded to that list by telling me that my curiosity inspired his own curiosity.  It was a very supportive, positive Harold comment and it motivated me to tell the story of that early relationship. It’s not a story that I’ve talked about a lot, especially not in a public forum. It’s not even a story that I had ever committed to paper.  

I spent a couple of weeks reflecting on those days, composing and readjusting that piece. Certainly it was told from my perspective and out of my memory. It was the story of a girl who got married when she was barely 19. It was also the story of two very young people who were trying so hard to be grownups but who didn’t really have the tools to deal with marriage. 

I wrote about the how and the why of that marriage and about how it ended. In the conclusion to that piece, I talked about how much Dave had mattered to me. He was an important part of my life and, in the post, I wished that I could know what had happened to him. I wanted to know that he wasn’t still angry with me. I wanted to know he was okay and that the early divorce had been a step towards a rich and happy life for him. 

I posted the piece, sending it out and thinking, “Well, we’ll see what happens”.  A couple of months later,  I mentioned to my sister that I had written that post and that I had been thinking about Dave. I said I had tried to Google him but had no luck. My sister is much more tech savvy than I am and so she Googled him. Within five minutes she had located someone with his full name, same birthdate, who had once resided in the same town where Dave grew up. The address she found for him was from 2014 but it was an address. I decided to be uncharacteristically bold. I took a simple Mark Rothko note card and wrote a message to the person at that address. I said if their name, birthdate, and previous residence matched the ones I wrote in the card and if they recognized my last name and IF they were willing to connect with me, could they please contact me at my phone, email, or snail mail address.  I put it in the mailbox and shrugged.  It was an old address. Lots can happen. I doubted the address was still good.  And, besides, would he? Would he even be interested in communicating with me?

About ten days later I was stunned to get an email from Dave. I was so excited when I saw his name in the Subject. His email opened with his gratitude to me for reaching out to him. He said he had thought about me often over the years and had wondered about me and how my life had turned out too. He knew only one piece of information about me and that was the town in which I was living but he was glad to hear from me.  In his initial email he gave me a brief snapshot of what he had done with his life in terms of profession and avocation. He concluded that email by again appreciating that I had contacted him and by saying he hoped I had forgiven him for the last angry conversation we had had.  That made me cry. That he wanted to know if I had forgiven HIM? In fact, it was the opposite for me. I wanted to know if he had forgiven ME.  

I wrote him back that very same day and and over the next week we had an exchange  of emails in which we each poignantly and compassionately recognized that we were both children at the time of the marriage. We were doing the best we could do at that time. We really didn’t have the tools to navigate a marriage well but there was no blame, no intention on either part to hurt the other. It was such a tender conversation for me and it was the best outcome I could have hoped for. Neither of us harbored anger at the Other and both of us could see the Other with genuine compassion.

We spoke a bit about how much we had meant to each other. After the marriage folded, Dave left the engineering profession that he had trained for in college.  He stepped away the tech firm in Silicon Valley and became a park ranger. That made sense to me since I knew even when we were married that he was far more suited for work in nature than he was for work in an office. In the ensuing years he had also explored Buddhism and eventually became a Buddhist.  Again, that made sense to me as that was so much the man I had married. I was so grateful to hear how his life had unfolded.

I’ve been thinking about how things always seem to work out the way they are supposed to work out. Maybe the Universe gave Dave the early marriage to show him that he didn’t belong in the tech industry. He was immersed on the conventional path but our divorce launched him into a career in the outdoors and to further spiritual study. His life became deeper and richer than it might have otherwise been in a conventional marriage. The Universe put him where he belonged. And the Universe gave me the early marriage to help me emerge from the very small life that I had lived as a child in a devoutly Catholic household. The divorce launched me into a much bigger life, expanding my awareness and my choices. Maybe this story demonstrates that some unknown but Bigger Power is watching out for us. I think I need to remember that. 

I hope Dave and I stay at least minimally in touch. It’s good to stay in touch with people who knew you when you were young. There’s a reminder there of that more tender soul.  Outside my family, Dave would be the only person who knew me from such a young age. I live hundreds of miles from where I went to elementary/high school and I have no contact with anyone from those years. He has a window on me that nobody else has. I like the idea of the full circle with him. I like the idea of recognizing that we were children who loved in the way we knew how and that we grew into wiser adults who have compassionate eyes and open hearts. It provides one answer to a question I ask myself all the time:  What’s the point? Maybe the point is to grow in wisdom and compassion. IDK.