side by side

Days like these, you really wish there was someone to talk to at the end of the day--on the phone, in person--to cheer you up, to let you vent a little and to remind you this too shall pass. Someone special, in your corner. Someone who thinks you rock, and tells you so. Someone who happens to rock himself. To stand or walk or crawl along the rock with you. To rock you to sleep sometimes.

When I was very young I wrote a song, a wistful little yearning thing addressed to the person I imagined I would be spending my life with. From the last stanza:

All of the things deep inside
that we usually manage to hide
could come out in the open
'cause i'm more than just hopin'
you're always someone on my side

That's what I'm talking about--someone on your side, looking in the same direction--not carrying you, or holding you up, but next to you. When you're a parent, this kind of partnership is especially sustaining. I think I had that for awhile, more than a decade, and then it stopped working that way, for a tangle of reasons. And then again, briefly, with someone new, for a few months last summer and fall...so much promise, unfulfilled.

So this is why we pray. One of the reasons, anyway. Holy Week is nearly upon us, and I will be in the city while the kids go on vacation with Bob. I'll be catching up on work, of course, but I've also been scheduling some fun time--both with friends, the ones I haven't seen in awhile, and on my own. More about that next week, as things progress.