Early in my relationship with Jennie, I used a metaphor for our relationship. It was a "birdhouse," that we had constructed and was now complete, a project, assembled and painted.
This surprised and confused and disturbed Jennie, who didn't feel that way at all. The context was that Jennie desired to spend more quality time on our relationship.
One of the deep understandings that I've come to in the past two years is that relationships need continuous attention. It's not a done thing. The Gottman Institute (and their Marriage Minute emails) have been a constant reminder and teacher of that. And like Marilynne Robinson says about democracy... it's an achievement that we need to value and that it's a "made thing" that needs to be remade every day.
I went for a walk yesterday with Charlotte. She seems content with meeting once every couple weeks to walk and catching up on school, work, gardening. Of course that's not a real relationship. Yesterday I had the thought that it's not like I can just "tell" her that her idea of a relationship is distorted (after all, I was 49 when I thought that intimate relationships were "like a birdhouse"). I can't point to healthy relationships that we both know of (not her brother's, not her moms).
And so my challenge is how do I teacher her this? How do I encourage her to value it?
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