A Cup of Comfort for Couples (17 page)

“He was nice looking but seemed creepy.”

“He kept repeating everything I said.”

“I loved his thick, curly hair, but his teeth were bad and his clothes weren't clean.”

“He is so anxious. I couldn't relax.”

Or the very real, but painful for a mother to hear, “He has even more disabilities than I do, Mom.”

Or the even more painful, “He ditched me when I went to the bathroom, and I had to pay for both of our burgers and coffees.”

Sometimes the dates were more devious:

“It wasn't even his real phone number, Mom. It was a laundry. Why did he do that to me?”

There was a Tim, a Robert, a Paul, a Ben, a Kevin, a Ron, and someone with limited English skills named “Panji.” One suitor was as old as her father. The string of first dates kept getting longer. My heart was breaking for Dayna. Maybe she was right, maybe she would live alone all of her life.

Some twists in her dating scene were just plain odd, as in this post-date report:

“Mom, the man from Maine just dumped me from our date, saying I wasn't fat at all. He was really mad because I'm petite and skinny. He called me a liar.”

“I don't understand, honey. Did you make a posting saying you are overweight?”

“I don't think so.”

“Well, maybe he has some problems and came up with an idea that you are overweight, or maybe he was hoping you would be large. I don't know.”

Then, she said sweetly, “I know I'm a good person, and in my posting I said I am more to love.”

“More?”

“Yeah, Mom, you know how you always tell me I am more lovable than most people, that I have more love to give and give it largely. All I did was put my contact information in the ‘More to Love' section because you're right, I have more love to offer than most people.”

Her brother and I didn't know whether to laugh or cry, and we did a little of both. We imagined the man with a preference for large women finding himself face to face with four feet, eleven-inch, ninety-eight pound Dayna and roared.

Then, just over the New Hampshire border, in Peabody, Massachusetts, Brad, age fifty-one, was convinced that his disabilities ruled out his chance of ever forming a healthy relationship with a woman. His heart and spirit had been stomped on so many times. He decided Dayna, this new woman up north, would be his last try. They compared interests and their religious beliefs. They went on picnics and walked on the Maine and New Hampshire beaches.

Her enthusiasm spilled over into our nightly calls:

“Mom, he even told me that he is special education, too, and he can't read well. His spelling is terrible online. But you know what? He can drive.”

That was a big deal, because Dayna would never be able to drive, and getting around on buses and making transfers confused and stressed her.

“So, Mom, what do you think?”

“Don't get in his car. Ask him to park in front of the coffeehouse and then take down his license plate number. When you're in the bathroom, call and record it on my voice mail.”

“Okay.”

“And remember, say good-bye at the coffee house and don't walk home until you see him go down the one-way street out of the city. Then call me again when you get home at eleven.”

“I know, Mom. I have school-learning disabili-ties. I'm not stupid.”

My promotion of her self-advocacy was taking root. Still, she was vulnerable in the dating world.

Brad, as it turned out, would be a powerful force for me to reckon with. I had an uneasy feeling that I wouldn't be able to scare him away.

“Brad says it's time to meet you, Mom. He wants to be sure you like him. He thinks if you don't, you might ruin it for us.”

Now there's an “it” and an “us?” My heart skipped a beat, and I had to bite my tongue not to confront her. My mantra was, “Go easy, Mother, or she, they, will dig in their heels.” Dayna has made more than one disastrous move out of town, rebelling against me and trying to prove loyalty to a boyfriend. I needed to be very careful.

I faked it. “Why wouldn't I like him, honey? He must be nice if he is making you so happy. I just hope he likes me.”

That's right: put him on the defensive with the reverse-psychology approach. It's Dayna's poor old mother who needs to be handled gently, and he will have to prove that he is on my side. Take that, you tall, dark heartthrob. I was feeling smug, sure that this latest guy could not outsmart me. I wanted Dayna to be happy, but I also wanted to be sure the guy would be right for her. I held hope that someone with developmental disabilities could be as sweet as she is and that together, with resources and support, they could improve each other's lives. Still, I doubted Brad was the one. Fifty-one and still living with his sister? This guy will never make it.

Brad did drive and produced a license, registration, and proof of insurance with a safe driver price reduction. My preconceived idea of Brad was beginning to crumble. At dinner, he pulled Dayna's chair out, hung up her coat, and cut her steak, which I had always done because she couldn't navigate a knife.

“I'm so glad we got different dinners, sweetie. Now we can taste each other's and share,” Brad said happily as he clasped her hand.

They grinned at each other. He ordered her coffee very light, no sugar, iced. She reminded him not to put the salsa on his chicken because it would give him heartburn. He redid the last three bottom buttons on her blouse, which she has misaligned. She read the dessert menu out loud because he is a slow reader. They managed to split their check fairly and asked for my help to figure the tip. They sat close, exchanged know- ing, intimate glances at each other, and cuddled. It all seemed so . . . normal. What was happening? They were happy, and it was infectious. I floated to my car.

A few weeks after this dinner, I was visiting Dayna at her apartment when she ran into the kitchen waving her portable phone and asked me to show her how to put it on speaker.

“Mom, Brad wants to talk to you,” she said excitedly.

“Hello, Priscilla,” Brad's voice was very loud, and he sounded nervous. “Dayna and I have decided to move in together.” No icebreaker.

“Brad, there is no way she is giving up that beautiful apartment and moving out of state.”

“Oh, I know. She made that clear. I'll have to leave my sister's apartment. That's where I've lived since our mother died, two years ago. I'm not sure what to do because I never moved away from my family.”

His mother died? Dayna's father died a year ago. And I have worried more over her future since I became widowed.

“I'm sorry your mother died.”

“And I'm sorry your husband died. I help Dayna about her grief over her dad. My mother had cancer, too. We know we can't live with our families all of our lives, because our families die before we do. We have to be our own family, so we can take care of each other. We hope you understand.”

There was a strong, well-defined, and purpose-driven “we” now and it brought me more relief than concern. I had to say the right thing. It wasn't about me; it was about them. And I had to give them a fighting chance.

“Brad. Dayna. Of course I understand.” Each word had to be pushed out, like a birthing.

Dayna burst out with, “Oh, thank you, Mommy!”

Brad right behind her. “Thanks a lot, Priscilla! We appreciate it.”

It was a good start, but they deserved more. No more faking it or manipulation. Brad had grown on me, and I appreciated what he brought to my daughter's life. So I offered, “What can I do to help you two?”

They put in their wish list, and over several months, they moved in as a couple, each named on the HUD lease.

Yes, Brad and Dayna continue to hold their own. They're happier together than they were apart, and they improve each other's lives. That they are disabled is the lesser portion of their identities. Primarily, Brad and Dayna are defined as a happy couple.

To this day, every time I hear either of them say “we,” I smile. And my heart leaps when I watch them kiss each other hello or goodbye, always followed by their mantra, “I love you greatly.”

—
Priscilla Carr

Garlic Soup

I
stand at the doorway, hands in my pockets, rocking back and forth on my heels, watching him cook. I'm not allowed in the kitchen here, at his mother's house, where he lives. He does all the cooking for her and for me — long, elaborate meals with big pots and many dishes. Years of working as a cook in Spain taught him the value of fresh ingredients, small portions, finesse preparation. He doesn't start with a recipe, but with a feeling. Then he slices and mixes and stirs, sometimes allowing me to stand behind him and watch. But mostly I am banished.

I stand there, needing one last thing from him. Without talking about it, we have slowly made our separations. My books gradually made their way back on my shelves. His CDs had been returned to the rack, one by one. We have divided up the mementos from our two summers in Spain, me giving him most of the coins and postcards to share with his Spanish classes. I took all the maps. We each got a set of pictures. We are running out of property to divide and are inching perilously close to having to talk about our unmaking.

Two years dating, and still no commitment. No “I love you.” Not much physical contact. We move through the world like brother and sister. As humanities professors at the same university, we share the same geography, the same general worldview, the same politics. We both love good food, and he cooks garlic soup for me when I am sick, bringing it to me on a bed tray. We both love to travel, and we took two trips to Spain together, my first time outside the United States. We both love to ride bikes, and we have ridden everywhere we can on two continents.

Overall, we are easy together, so we continue on like sixth-grade kids who say they are “going together” but don't really know what that means. Yet, this is no longer working for me. Obviously, it has never truly worked for him either. We are ready to move on, and our most recent experiences in Spain made it all the more clear that we need to.

We're in a bar in Piles, a small pueblo south of Valencia. The friends at our table have a small boy sitting between them. For once, I can keep up with the conversation because everyone is speaking slowly enough so the boy can keep up. Finally, I can participate. I talk more than any other time since I've been in Spain. I start to feel confident.

“Where are you going next?”

“
Extremadura
,” I answer, the home of the conquistadors.

Then, as I struggle to find the Spanish words to explain that I am a woman with some American Indian blood, returning to the Old World to follow in the footsteps of the conquistadors, John interrupts me and explains my research in fast Castillano.

The friends look from him to me, pleased and surprised.

“Why are you so interested in the conquistadors?”

“Because . . .” I roll into my answer at a good pace.

John interrupts me to correct my verb tense. Twice. From then on, each time I speak in Spanish, he cuts me off, corrects me, or ignores me. Finally, I quit.

This scene is repeated as we backpack across the country to Extremadura, into Portugal, and back across the border. We visit museums, libraries, and research centers devoted to the conquistadors. We look at faded documents in sixteenth-century Spanish, as different from the Spanish I know as Shakespeare's English is from the language my West Virginian students speak. John becomes my voice, asking for the answers I need. He also makes meaning for me, translating what I hear, explaining what I see. He loves his role as leader.

At home, in the United States, he is in my territory. Spain is his turf, and he wants me to know it. I can do little without his approval, his help, his control. I had learned in my graduate studies that the language we use shapes our thinking. Now I learn how true that is. I develop such a complex about speaking Spanish that I can't breathe whenever any-one speaks to me. My thoughts become fragmented, and I feel hesitant and confused. I don't initiate conversations. I stop going out on solo adventures. I become fearful of what I can't even name — that something will go wrong, that I won't be able to find my way home. That I will lose him, my link to the world.

We've rented a car to drive back to Madrid, and I see, for the first time, a field of sunflowers stretching as far as I can see. I love sunflowers, with their preposterously large heads that follow the sun's movement across the sky. I love the small yellow petals, like rays from a black star. I also love sunflower seeds, crusted with salt and crisp. I want to walk in the field, to see that abundance stretched before me. I want to touch them.

“Can we stop?”

No answer.

“I'd like to take a picture.”

No answer.

“John, please.”

“No! No! No!” he finally yells. “Not now, not ever. We're not stopping like tourists along the road to take a stupid picture.”