Day 43

My partner Bill and I celebrated Valentines Day by going to Walgreen's together and buying 2 boxes of candy, one for each of us. What can I say? We like candy and we're not terribly romantic. Actually I think that we both qualify as cynics and you know what they say about cynics, scratch the surface and you find a romantic.

Bill was the answer to a prayer. I share that reluctantly and immediately feel the need to qualify. First of all, I am not generally one to pray, let alone pray for a man. I'm not exactly sure what god is but I'm pretty sure she's not sitting in heaven answering the prayer hotline. I identified as a feminist for many years and was active in feminist activism. One day it hit me. I wanted to create a world in which men and women treat each other as equals yet I had never had an equal relationship with a man. I decided that I had to make the political personal. I was a single mother who wasn't afraid to use the f word (feminism or any other f word for that matter), clueless about how to find a man. I did what most people do when they feel helpless and hopeless. I cast my wish to the universe. "Universe, bring me a man," I said (well those probably were not my exact words).

Bill and I had a mutual friend and had met before. In fact, we worked at the same psychiatric hospital at one time. I saw him on the day I got connected to the internet. He was the only other person I knew who was also connected. We exchanged email addresses and agreed to write. I lived in a small town about 60 miles from Bill. Before long we were writing every day. A couple of years later when we moved in together we discovered that we had each saved every email we received from the other. OK, so maybe we are both romantics.

We have been together for about 15 years. I am amazed and grateful everyday for Bill's weird sense of humor and his willingness to listen. A few years ago we hit some really hard times. We went to a therapist who helped me learn to slow down and hear Bill's pain, even when it comes disguised as anger. Those are lessons that have helped me in every area of my life. I suppose that is what I am most grateful for. Bill has helped me to become a better person. Whispered prayers are sometimes answered in ways we can hardly imagine.