Interdependence Day

On July 3rd (July 4th being Inderpendence Day in the USA), my friends Eric and Renee got married. I am at the stage in my life where many of my friends who married young are either going through some upheavel, working out some major issues or not being able to get through the issuses and are now either dating up a storm or have found their soulmates. Now I don't use the word soul mate lightly because it something that I do believe in, I also believe that there are many people fall into that category and that we donot have just one soul mate but people who capture parts of our soul at various stags of our lives. My kids have monopolized parts that will never be returned to me and belong to them forever. Past loves have a special place and while Josh is convinced we are soul mates I believe he is the only man I could ever be with. I could not imagine being with anyone else but he is only a part f my soul and all that completes me.

I look at my friends who are doing this marriage thing for the second time around and being a person who just loves to explore peoples minds, hearts and souls I have noticed that the stars are there but this time under the guidance of a telescope. Their thoughts are clearer, their outlooks bright and their bonds undying. Gone are the fairytale hopes of happily living after these are marriages built on so much more then love but a solid basis of what a good friend of mine would term standing in your own truth. And I believe they will live happily ever after because of it.

I am also fortunate in that having married later in life I think my expectations of marriage are so different. I spent a wonderful day with a friend in the city who got married in her 40's and we both agreed that we had a chance to explore every part of our beings by getting married older. There really is nothing on my to do list that I need to do alone. I have done all I want to do. Being a person who lives in the here and now I don't believe in having regrets and while obviously it has all not been a bed of roses or easy going always and there are things I would like to have said or done differently for the most part I have lived the best possible life that I can. And I am grateful for that. How lucky am I to live a colourful life, with ups and downs. Joys and sadness and a huge rainbow of hope and tenacity that throws me through all that life has to follow. I can't help but thank my folks for always giving me a safe place to return to, a warm heart to bask in and their undying love to push me through. I am who I am because of them, not as many people who I know who are who they are inspite of their upbringings.
Thank you mom and dad who have been married 40 years and still get each other (for the most part :)