Week Eight - A Day in The Life - Warming Trend 

Paul broke the silence spell, finally. On Thursday, when I came home from work, he was in a good mood. He had prepared dinner and was quite excited about what he had cooked. Paul is a good cook, much better than I am, so his meals are always special treats for me. They are also reflections of his states of mind. When he cooks, Paul is in high spirits. So I was cautiously optimistic that something had happened to break the spell of the last few weeks. And I was right. Something had happened and he was excited about it. Someone he had known when he was working had contacted him with an offer to work for him! Clearly things had to be ironed out and discussed, he went on, so it was not a sure thing, but it had a lot of potential and Paul was ecstatic. He liked this man; had a lot of respect for him. Working for him would mean to go back doing what he loved best. And there was potential for growth, as this was a fairly new company with good chances of becoming very successful.

As I was listening to Paul telling me this good news, I was thinking that now we could talk about what had been going on in our heads for the last three weeks and recapture the closeness between us that I had been missing during this time. But Paul did not go there. Yes, he was much more open about not having a job, now that he was possibly going to get a new one, but he did not seem to want to revisit the last three weeks at all. “I have been very worried about all of this,” I started cautiously, hoping this would be a way to open up a conversation about how we felt. But he blew me off, “I told you not to worry. I knew I would get another job and there was nothing to be concerned about.” But I wasn’t concerned about whether or not he would find another job. I was interested in what had been going on in his mind for the last three weeks, and maybe even before that, who knows. And, wasn’t he interested in what was going on in my mind? Apparently not, because he went on talking about plans he had for the weekend and a new part he had to buy for his truck.

Don’t get me wrong. I am elated he has a new job prospect and that he is quite excited about it. Its just that I thought this could be an opportunity, now that things seemed to be less stressful, to talk about the last three weeks. It feels like there is a hole in our relationship, a gap that keeps things disconnected between us. I don’t like it. I want to get rid of it. I want to know how to avoid this in the future, but I guess Paul is so relieved he may have another job that he does not want to revisit bad times. He always tells me that I tend to live in the past too much. “It’s over now. Why dwell on it?” is his favorite thing to say. Why? Because I can’t let go just like that, just like he does.