Being In The In Between
I knew things had seemed off between them. But when we sat at their kitchen table, my then husband and I, the news that our good friends were divorcing was still met with disbelief. I felt a tightening in my throat, a rush of heat to my sinuses, constriction of my jaw, the rapid blinking of my eyes in an attempt to redirect my tears. But why? But how? But you're sitting right here together. Can't you work it out?
While I was saddened by their news, I was more worried than anything. What if just knowing someone getting divorced contaminated my own future? What if, just by association, we were doomed too?
I watched them carry on with their evening like they were still a regular married couple, as if they were not about to step on a landmine that would dissolve their lives as they knew it, our friendship as I knew it. I watched as they prepped for dinner (will you chop the peppers please?), called each other by their nicknames (Beej, the grill's ready), tucked their son into bed (say good night). I watched with such intensity, stunned by the in between. No longer who they were and not yet who they would become. How does one exist within that space, suspended in time, trapped in an expired life that they couldn't yet throw out? A kid, a lease, a car, jobs. Life had to be sorted.
Two years later, I sat on my own couch as I watched John Oliver with my soon-to-be-ex-husband. Our Sunday night HBO ritual, the last Sunday of its kind. The familiar "Welcome, welcome, welcome to Last Week Tonight!" rang through the living room and the severity of the situation became real. Welcome, welcome, welcome to the last night with your husband, Jenna. My unsealed boxes sat scattered throughout the living room. One person moving, one person staying. My wedding dress hung in solitude on my side of the closet. Our wedding album sat like a hundred pounds of bricks on our end table. My dog sat between us on the couch, unaware of how his life would change too. My concern for us being contaminated by our divorcing friends years prior was my subconscious shining a flashlight at the writing that was already on the wall. I looked at my husband, blinking quickly to displace my tears, looking up at the ceiling to will them back inside my sockets. The fear of the unknown ballooned with each breath I took. "This is the last time we'll do this together," I said. He looked at me solemnly. "I know, Jen." A dog, a condo, a car, jobs. Life had to be sorted, disentangled, renegotiated, recycled.
I know what it felt like to leave unit 410 for the last time. I don't know what it felt like to go back inside, to see the ring of dust around books that no longer sat on the shelf, to feel the lingering presence of someone who was no longer there, to find your former partner's hair in the most peculiar of places, or to reach for your favorite coffee mug and see an empty shelf. I imagined him sitting at the kitchen bar, head in his hands, the sound of silence closing in on him. No longer who we were but not yet who we'd become. The magnitude of the in between. The transition. The pause. The grief that quickly switched from a simmer to a roiling boil, forcing us to swim in its heat.
Eight months later, I moved again, unexpectedly, 2,000 miles away from the me that I was starting to become. The unresolved grief from my divorce was then compounded with the grief of leaving my dog behind, of leaving Chicago behind. Grief that was so dirty, so vengeful, so unrelenting that it deserved a whole new word for it. Just calling it regular ol' grief felt too forgivable, too mendable. Grief that made me stash tissues in every jacket pocket, every purse, every crevice of my car for the inevitable emergency meltdowns that were as common as the rising sun. Grief that caused me to get in my car every Tuesday night for an hour-plus drive to Encinitas where a grief recovery group awaited my strife. Where I learned that grief isn't just assigned to death, but it can blossom with any form of change. Loss of a job, moving, retirement, holidays, an empty nest, having kids, getting divorced, even marriage can result in this misunderstood word. The authors of The Grief Recovery Handbook describe grief as "the conflicting feelings caused by the end of or change in a familiar pattern of behavior."
The end of or change in a familiar pattern or behavior? Couldn't that also be the definition of life? In nature, in our bodies, in yoga we bear witness to cycles of all kinds. To inevitable change. To beginnings, middles, ends, and the space between as we navigate transition. A calendar year, a moon cycle, menstruation, the seasons, relationships, careers, the simplicity of one breath cycle. They're all reminders that energy is constantly renewing, transforming, and transmuting. The entirety of 2020 has felt like the space between with countless opportunities to begin again. Reopen, close, reopen. Work from home. Look for a job. Practice online. Teach your kids. Find the silver linings. Marvel at the impermanence. The in between is itchy, uncomfortable, confronting, and loud. And it's necessary in order to begin again. It's necessary when you're standing at the precipice of life, when you're looking at its vastness, when you're deciding: Do I jump? Or do I stay in between?
