(169) The Things We Take

When I love someone, when I fall for them hard and swift and complete like a book that was read before written, I take little pieces of them. These bits, in my daily shuffle, and my stressed face, and my laughing wink, and my hands holding his, are ours forever and simultaneously, and it will not be undone because the love that put it there is too real to suffer separation.

I took things from my ex, the abusive one. I forget what they were. His surprised smile, maybe. His near holy respect for practice time. His desperate cling to being seen as responsible. His meanness, eventually. I didn’t have a lot of choice with what I took. Abuse does that. But, the things I took left me after time and cleansing and more time; that love wasn’t meant to stay.

I take things from hubs all the time. Before we met, I was one of those that thought technology was here to ruin real relationships. (Hi. Please don’t block me. I’m not that person anymore.) I didn’t, uhm, ‘believe’ in email. I had played Nintendo a few times. (Duck hunt was ok. I’m old. Shut up.) He loved the tech world. If I’m borderline introverted, then he is Introvert Concentrate in a martini glass on a table of silence and observation. His entire being lit up when he told me about different TV screens and exactly how the internet works and why my nokia wasn’t as great as I thought it was. His face would relax into brimming creases and open smiles and I wanted to be there in his solace, with him.

So I took his love of tech.

He’s one of those musicians who pretends like he’s not sightreading because the fact that he is not missing a damn thing is just too alarming for regular splerps like me. I used to be awful at sightreading. I was embarrassed to participate in chamber music parties because I didn’t want people to know how awful I was at it. Hubs was staunch in his appraisal of himself and even more stubborn about his theory that I was better than I thought. I wanted to be able to read music with him and not hate myself. I wanted to believe what he believed about me.

So I took his grit, and his optimism.

He’s not a shell of a man, though. It’s not like I’m robbing him. The taking is by invite only. What is taken is still there. Those bits are both him and me, for each of us, for as long as we choose to keep them there.

I was remembering failed friendships and thinking about the things I took from those people, wondering if those things being alive and kept in me, meant I still loved them. I tried to remember if the shitty ex had taken things from me.

He hadn’t.

I thought of all the things I took from hubs, and realized how much he took from me. My love of dogs, for one. He used to be a cat person. We have three dogs. The second two are his fault. This turn of events is displeasing to no one.

He also yoinked my borderline creepy appreciation for good food, to the point where we don’t have to discuss how vacations pivot around fantastic meals and good hiking, or why no one is getting a cake from that bakery because of frosting-to-cake ratio and also it isn’t dessert if it tastes like splenda soaked gerbil turds. Also, fancy varieties of salt are real things that are important, also so are different peppercorns. Also.

When I am given a compliment or an apology, I reciprocate. It’s not out of obligation; it’s an automatic response I have because I want to bring clarity and dimension to the appreciation already in the exchange. I don’t want it to be one-sided. (It’s not always a great thing; sometimes I don’t need to apologize. Sometimes I should just shut up and take a compliment. But whatever/different post.) Hubs took that, too. I think he wanted me to know he was also in that exchange. That I wasn’t out there on my own, reaching out.

My point is that we take from each other. It is a two-way invite, and it is frequently accepted. If I look at these things that we take, these bits and pieces of our souls that now have both our names on them, that float in my heart and sit on his lips and slink coyly around our fingers in the dead of night when we’ve both let go the harness of communication and social expenditure, if I look at these things, that we take, I can tally our growth. I can sum our togetherness. It’s math I shouldn’t be able to do, but there it is, in the bits and pieces of me, smiling his name while we wait for the next thing we are invited to take.