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Sunday, November 30, 2008

When love and hate collide...

I just had breakfast with an old classmate of mine. Strangely, we never did really keep in contact until 8am this morning when I answered his call. Lucky for him, I was up reading the papers... otherwise, I'd have given him my "do you know what time it is" speech.

Conversations with old friends are always the same.

"How are you?"
"What are you doing nowadays?"
"Married yet? Got kids?"

Then he started to tear and in his bravest front, "I think my marriage is over."

"So why you telling me this? We haven't kept in contact and I hardly know what's going on with you."

"I just needed someone to talk to..."

I'm not about to plaster the rest of the morning here. I think he deserves his privacy and neither am I keen to share any of my personal details on a public platform. However, in general, this is what we concluded :

A marriage is broken because either one party, or the other, or both, isn't fully satisfying and fully functioning. But can it be really fixed? One thing for sure, it's NEVER GOING TO BE THE SAME. Try putting back a broken mirror. Basically, that "perfect heaven" that you once knew, now bears the cracks of imperfection. And if you can live with that, then perhaps the marriage is worth salvaging. Otherwise, sometimes you just have to walk away from the trees to be able to see the forest. Other times you have to fail before you can figure out how to succeed.

I'm no counselor, and neither am I an expert in the field of human relationships. All I know is, although marriage is a sacred contract... but if it breaks down and it ain't fixable anymore, do yourself and everybody else involved a favour. Get over with the formalities and move on, hard as it may SEEM to be.

The biggest clue is when little peculiarities about your spouse start to get on your nerves. That's when you should really start looking at the bigger picture. Personally, what makes a relationship work? When two people can stand and endure each other's flaws and bad habits.

After a long 3-hour chat, I hope my friend finds the path that he ought to take, whichever it may be. As with everything in life, there are always options... and it's really not up to me, nor some professional marriage counselor, and most definitely not your relatives to dictate your next move. You make the choice and live with it.

So much for the Sunday sermon. It's raining and I'll like to catch a few winks... after I finish with this hot mug of green tea.