One chilly December morning seven years ago, I went for a walk with my mother. We casually discussed the morning news, Diane Sawyer’s new haircut, and my crazy uncle’s latest attempts to open his own winery. He had sent my parents a bottle of his port -- Pork's Port -- that had exploded in their kitchen, permanently staining their pickled wood cabinets. Then, after a long and thoughtful pause, Mom mentioned that she had met my husband’s new assistant. Turning sideways to face me, she grabbed my arm and said, “She’s cute, and she’s very thin.” She then proceeded to tell me I had better “watch it,” because she suspected he was having an affair.
At the conclusion of our walk, she asked me to come inside because she had a gift for me. And this is not a lie: the woman handed me a diet and exercise book titled Look Great Naked. The implication, of course, was that if my husband was having an affair, I could fix the problem by losing fifteen pounds.
I was devastated. My mom thought my husband was cheating, and she had also just called me fat.
Four months later, I found myself in a twelve by twelve room of a rehab facility and listened as my husband read aloud the following statement, written in his own hand:
“I have struggled quite a bit with alcohol the past year, but what you don’t know is my behaviors that led to my drinking. Last summer, I became involved in an affair with a coworker. This affair has been ongoing and very difficult for me to break off, even after repeated attempts. The magnitude of this addictive relationship is such that I have even had contact with this person while in rehab.”
I heard nothing in this statement after he admitted to an “ongoing affair with a co-worker."
“Ongoing affair with a co-worker.”
Ongoing affair with a co-worker.
Ongoing affair with a co-worker.
What does “ongoing” mean? Is it still going on?
I knew who the co-worker was. I’d known it when my mom handed me the book about looking great naked. Deep down, I’d known. And now, on top of everything else, I felt stupid for not “knowing” until he confessed. In that moment, I felt as if I would never, ever be able to breathe again.
I also felt incredibly fat. That day, I quit eating. I lost seventeen pounds in one month by illogically reasoning that if Mom was right, I could win him back by losing weight.
And I began playing mind games with myself, games that I had no hope of winning. For instance, the “Co-worker” drove a black Jeep. I’d never paid much attention to Jeeps, but suddenly every other car on the road was a damn black Jeep. Every time I spotted one, my heart began pounding, and I suffered a slight panic attack. Every black Jeep was her. She’s on her way to see my husband. No! She’s following me. And I’m half-crazy, so they’ll get my kids. That bitch is going to steal my kids!
That affair eventually ended, but it was followed by several more, the most ridiculous of which was with a twenty-seven-year-old shot girl he met in a strip club. The great irony is that I finally looked really, really great naked, what with all the weight loss, but he kept right on cheating.
I finally mustered the strength to stand up for myself, realizing it wasn’t anything about me – my appearance, my flaws, my imperfections, even my crazy ideas about what kind of cars his lovers drove – that caused him to cheat. After several excruciating years of thinking I could fix him by fixing myself, I realized his affairs weren’t about me. And that’s when I filed for divorce.
My insane aversion to Jeeps lasted for nearly four years, though, until the day it dawned on me that I’d always liked Jeeps; in fact, I’d liked the “Co-worker’s” Jeep before I’d discovered my husband was sleeping with her. So the Jeep wasn’t the problem. It was the meaning I attached to her Jeep – and eventually all other Jeeps – that caused my pain. Further, if I could attach new meaning to Jeeps, and then to his affair, and even to the Look Great Naked book, I could change how I felt about them and, perhaps, even grow from those experiences. Confirmation that I was on the right track came when I discovered the following poem by the Sufi poet Rumi:
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
Some momentary awareness comes
As an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
Who violently sweep your house
Empty of its furniture,
Still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out for some new delight.
Black Jeep was doing me a favor all along; I just hadn’t been able to see it. At that moment, I decided that, rather than cringing every time I saw a Jeep, I would say to myself, “It’s clearing me out for some new delight.” Over and over, Jeep after Jeep, I repeated the new mantra: “Clearing me out for some new delight.” Eventually, I even began to look for Jeeps, to search them out, like every Jeep I spotted was a clue that something good was just around the corner.
In fact, I’m secretly hoping that when my new delight shows up, he’ll be driving a Jeep.
