278 Days to Go - Insight from the Outside

If I observe enough people, will I see my way? I have lofty goals and lack of .... something that I don't even know. The two have a hard time going together. 

I am a communicator by nature. I learned to talk early, and as my dad says, I've never shut up since. I have always been able to express my love for people through my words and my actions. I can talk long into the night with a troubled child or friend. I can speak to large congregations, both prepared talks and unprepared comments. I have sung at funerals. I have talked with those who have lost loved ones, once even being the bearer of the loss to the young children of a family I was close with. I have done customer service for years and loved it. I love talking with my family members, near and far. I have no problem speaking up in groups at meeting, etc. Pretty much, I could talk to any stranger, and often have. And, of course, I write.

So, why am I troubled today?

... it's that something I don't know. There is something missing! No matter how hard I try or how creative I get, I can't seem to communicate with my husband as easily as I can other people. That really bothers me. We will start to talk about something, and the conversation with turn to incoherent babble from my lips. At times, I don't even know what I am talking about. He says my defenses go up pretty fast. I have tried my to sit on my Defense cards. My Get Out of Jail cards seem pointless because I think I am in way too deep for those. My married communication is @#$%!

The funny thing is (or should I say the poignant thing is) that in my first marriage, which lasted for 21 years, we didn't communicate well at all. His solution was never tell me anything, and my solution was to never talk, not to him, not with him, not about him. He yelled at me, and I quivered. Those were the roles we played. Not very healthy. Now, in this second marriage, I married an attorney by trade. He is a talker and his words mean very specific things. They are very important to him because they mean the difference between winning a case and not. His work is mostly done on paper and he only has one chance to help his clients ~ and that requires the exact words. He is an Immigration Attorney.

From a marriage without talking to a marriage with talking, I was delighted four years ago. Now, I am completely famboozzled by it. I don't know his words and he doesn't know mine! Good Grief! We love each other. We are committed to each other. We care about each other. We just can't talk to each other. The irony is that when we first met, we talked long hours into the night. That went on through our first years of marriage as well. Now, what? We're seasoned married people? Really? Now after all this time, we don't have the stamina perhaps for each other's stories. Too bad we can't just rewind the tape a bit and go back to the beginning of our relationship when talking together was fun.

Now, you may (or may not) question why I would write something so incredibly personal. A) I have done it before. Check previous posts. B) This blog is a journey of discovery and challenge. It requires honesty or I won't get where I want to go. C) My relationship with my husband is very important to me, and today I am missing something. Something I can't see.