Rhode Island
For anyone in a partnered relationship for any length of time, you will understand just how much my husband and I needed this trip. I remember as a teenager my mother telling me "Your father and I are just two ships passing in the night." Through the busyness of life and the time you have had together it is really easy to start to exist together.
Our routines are almost innate in one another. So much of the earlier questioning gone. And most times, we can complete each other sentences - not to mention our brains seem to be on similar paths most of the time. It's the kind of companionship I believe most people long for. A settled acceptance of each other. A knowing...
But the adverse side of that is loss - loss of the sometimes extraordinary. In the knowing, there sometimes seems less to discover. There is no time for adventure and let's face it, you get older and tired. It's the "boring" in the settled knowing... it is the side I think we see when we are young and are afraid of.
20 years have passed and with the pandemic and my father's illness, trips for just us pretty much were off the table. But our time in Rhode Island, it reminded me why stealing away together is so important. It pealed off the scales of the mundane and opened my eyes again to all the things we have to be so grateful for in each other. I knew these things. I just took them for granted.
The quiet reading in the morning
Our ability to just exist together
Our serious conversation
Our love for food
Our love for the outdoors
Our love for the sea
Our love of adventure and travel
Our love of being together - while so opposite, enjoy so many of the same things. I think we help each other see things in life in different ways.
After 20 years, sometimes you need reminding... reminded that there is so much that exists between you. A whole world you have built together and a whole world you still have to live together.
Until next time, Rhode Island, you will remind me of the quiet, steady love and companionship that we hold and why it's so worth it to keep working towards this life and love that we share!