When Knowing Isn't Enough

Whoopie shit!  So I write this blog and with Dave's great insights and help have written A Married Man's Survival Guide and now it's sequel, Thriving in the Jungle, and then something happens like this past week that causes me to question it all.  The occasion was when a close relative came to me because their marriage was about to fall apart. Real stuff that I have dealt with many times before with friends and buddies, but this one landed really close to home.

My first instinct was to think "What advice can I give that might make a difference?" But the pivotal phrase in that sentence is "make a difference" and all the advice in the world has never made any difference - to anybody.  That isn't what matters when the bomb goes off right next to you.  All that matters is that you are there.  All that matters is that you listen (without editorializing), just listen.

Oh to be certain, I have an opinion.  I have failed at marriage and have gotten divorced and I have lived through dealing with the monster that occupies the space between failure and the final decree.  And all I can really say is that it sucks - as in it sucks all of the life out of you, all of the oxygen out of your lungs - and you cannot think or breathe or move. And what is worse is that the way that felt for me is different than how it will feel for my brother or my kids or for you going through that same in-between space.

I (or you) can never know what it is like for another, no matter how well we know that person or the path they are walking.  We just have no insight into what they are experiencing, and even when they tell us of that unique brand of suckitude fron which they are presently suffering, we will only understand it in terms of what we have as words and history and feelings.  We won't understand theirs.  So all of that knowing is for shit - it has no relevance in the space in-between.

So we laid there and stared up at the ceiling and I listened into the confusion and pain. And as quietly as I could I let the tears of remembrance slide down into my hairline so I wouldn't interfere the telling and spewing that was happening beside me.  And eventually we laughed and went to sleep, so we could get up and talk and listen some more.

It's not over and I am not deluding myself into thinking that I made even an iota of difference.  But I did no harm by assuming that I knew more or different or better.  Sometimes the experiences and pains of life teach you that we all have those periods - those explosions - in our lives and what matters is that we aren't alone.  My pain has taught me compassion for the pain of others so that I can listen without opinion - and for a short while maybe it didn't hurt as much.