I have reached the what ifs....
I think back on the last twenty years and wonder at which point I should have gotten out had I known where these twenty years would ultimately lead. This is an incredibly difficult thought to ponder. Two decades is a long time to spend with a person. Ten of those years were completely by choice, maybe they could be defined as the pre-contract years. Then came marriage, or shall we say the post-contract years.
I make this division for a reason. When you are with a person by choice and not by obligation, it really defines the relationship in a different light. Fun and happiness are best friends in such a relationship. It is easier to work to keep both of them healthy. You do so out of choice and there is no fear of complacency. Then there is marriage. The post-contract years. Marriage today is quite different to what it was in the past. What is the reason for it, especially if you have got the fuck out of the way.
In my parent's generation, people married to fuck. I mean, not only, obviously, theoretically there should have been romance and of course there was also social, cultural, and religious motivation.
But for me, I am South African. What is my culture? Apartheid? Racism? Post Apartheid? Post Racism? My culture is mine by choice, not by force. Then there is religion. Again, by choice, I choose not too have one. I am not a person to believe in things purely because they have been believed in previously. That doesn't really work for me. In my view, belief is for children, knowledge for the dead, and if you are in any way between childhood and death, the best you can hope for is to think and try to understand.
So why get married?
To be brutal here, it was contractual. I have an Irish passport, my wife (ex? estranged? I have no clue how to define her!) did not. We wanted to work and live in Europe so marriage made sense. Romantic as fuck, I know. But, having been together for 10 years, it worked. I loved her in the least romantic way imaginable and in an entirely open eyed consciousness. Yes, I am not in any way metaphysical, I am certainly a brutal materialist in that sense. And she knew that. I am not a hand holdy, red rosy, shiny pink hearts on valentines day kinda person. I am a partner, a team mate, the sort of house dog there to tear intruders apart in 100% service to my team mate.
Honestly, I thought that was enough. I now know it was not, and just how much of a pompous self centered asshole I was / am. I can own that. That, however, in no way justifies infidelity to the team. Fuck that bullshit!
Let us now return to the main point. If I were to have been told in the early stages of team Us, that team Us had a fundamental flaw in it (my shittiness as a person) and this flaw would result in the complete dissolution of said partnership, would I have got out earlier?
Fuck me. I have no clue.
I really do wish I were younger than I am now, single in the city in which I live. But, were that the case, I would be an inexperienced dumbfuck, who probably would still be treating other humans like my playthings that merely exist as NPCs in my self contained subjective video game reality.
I know now that is a fairly shitty way to live, and I needed her to teach me that.
Fuck. I guess there it is. I needed the soul centered shattering heartache of betrayal to finally wake up. The final lesson of the many lessons she has taught me. I just wish I weren't the sort of asshole that always has to learn through burn. If only I could have learned through theory instead.
