LEAVING -By Travis Myers
One of my best friends called the other week, to invite me to the housewarming party he and his wife were having. Then he asked if I would be interested in doing a backpacking trip with "the guys" this spring.
This is the first time I have heard anyone mention backpacking with "the guys" in two years.
They've been busy getting engaged, married, starting careers, taking bigger trips with their wives—they've been busy with other things.
The last time it was mentioned was at a social gathering. The guys ended up in a corner and the girls were gathered around the couch. Something in the conversation sparked a reminder in me, "Hey, when are we going backpacking?"
Something happened across the room. Probably the girls had erupted in high pitched yells and laughter, leaving one of "the guys" rolling his eyes, one wincing at the noise and asking what the h--- just happened, and another with that bland smile approaching amusement at their joy.
I was watching them to see if they'd come back to the conversation. They'd heard me, but in that brief instant between my question and the girls' interruption there had been no acknowledgment of the question. The girls saved us that night, saved us from that awkwardness between friends when a kind of distance has fallen between them, when a four year tradition is broken. They saved us from having to verbalize it, from trying to cover it in humor which lands insufficient in such moments.
They didn't come back to the conversation, and I knew I couldn't be the one to mention backpacking. I wasn't the one who could close that distance.
I wasn't bitter about it, or at least it wasn't a deep bitterness, just enough to make me determined to take that solo trip I'd always thought I would like to do. I've taken two. They were great. And I found someone into boating, which the guys haven't gotten into, and took two trips with him.
Change doesn't' have to be a bad thing, and the guys are coming back around, getting settled into their new life, though certain conversations with them during this time had me a little worried. Actually I'm still a little worried.
I asked one of my friends, about nine months after his wedding, how marriage was treating him. He said it was good, hard sometimes, but good. He noted some ways in which they complimented each other, ways she made his life easier, as well as the frustrations they caused each other.
Then he said, with a weight in his voice, "I don't feel like I have the freedom I used to, I couldn't do a twenty-one day backpacking trip again." And he implied that I still had that freedom. I informed him that I can't take a twenty-one day trip because I can't afford that much time away from work, that losing some freedom is part of "settling in." I reminded him that he's a teacher with three months in which he could fit a three week trip if he wanted.
"True, but she doesn't like me to be away."
Other friends have confirmed the same thing, that going away for a few days can be a tense issue, creating potential for a fight. I've also been informed that there aren't any girls who would be interested in a three week honeymoon, the last two weeks spent touring with a pack.
As I write this, it occurs to me that this spring-time backpacking trip may not be a good idea. If I spend much more time with my friends I may swear off women altogether, move to the desert, and become a monk. When I'm trekking through Nepal and Mongolia, or evangelizing to the penguins in Antarctica, I'll pray for all the poor souls lost to the institution of marriage. O.K., so maybe that wouldn't be so bad.
I don't get it—women. I'm a man, so I probably won't, but I can try.
I saw a scene acted once, where a girl told a boy she couldn't be with him because the work he wished to pursue might sometimes require him to travel for several weeks at a time, sometimes on short notice, and the work would often be in places that were unstable, not the safest. She told him, "I don't think I could handle it when you just leave."
"Just leave." She didn't say, "go away," or "when you're away." She said "leave." And she didn't say merely leave, but "just leave." Her choice of words carry with them a sense of finality, they seem to suggest abandonment. Yet nothing in the scene suggested that the boy was the sort to fail in his commitments, but rather, that he was quite committed to that which he was passionate about, that which he loved.
Is it a fear of abandonment which would propel a woman to discourage her man from pursuing his passions? Is this fear justified? Or maybe it isn't abandonment she fears, maybe she simply feels lonely when he is gone? Does she understand this loneliness? Is it, in the end, a fear of abandonment which causes the loneliness?
I don't know. Maybe she doesn't know either. Maybe she finds the emotions propelling her actions as irrational as her man does, but she feels it none-the-less, and doesn't know how to resist it? Does his absence make her feel unloved?
I have heard that every woman needs to feel loved, every man needs to feel he is good enough. I've heard that most problems in relationships, if followed deep enough, will lead back to one of these needs and the failure for that need to be met…or the feeling or belief that it is not being met.
Does the presence of a man, or his lack of presence, affect the degree to which a woman feels loved? Does this stem from some ancient dependence of a woman upon a man to bring meat home?
The feminists are up in arms. I feel their verbal blows.
Probably a woman never needed man in order to eat. In most regions of the world, gathering would provide enough to eat, and typically it is the man who feels the greater need to find sustenance in meat over vegetables, probably to acquire sufficient protein to support his muscle mass. And it is frightening when a woman turns hunter—I have learned to run.
Maybe a woman only really needs a man in order to feel loved, and for that love to produce children. And it is hard to raise children alone.
Abandonment is real. A woman is justified to fear it. But distance does not equal abandonment. Abandonment occurs when commitment is lost—or never really existed. Distance does not equal lack of commitment. Going does not equal running. Going suddenly, does not equal leaving.
I went, with a friend, to an art museum the other Sunday, "The Washington County Museum of Fine Arts" in Hagerstown, Maryland. It is a rare and unexpected local gem. One of the exhibits presented propaganda posters from the World Wars. One showed two women and a child standing at a large window watching a group of soldiers marching out of view. The women's faces were strained with worry, they held hands, and leaned into one another. The little boy clutched his mother's skirt with one hand, but his body was straining toward the window and maintained a posture half looking at his mother and half at the soldiers, trying to understand it all, but with an air of excitement, already longing to be a man.
The poster read: "Women of Britain Say GO!"
The duty of those left behind isn't any easier than those who have to go.
I can't understand my friends' wives, but maybe I know just a little what they feel. That night, at the social gathering, in that moment when I decided I couldn't' mention backpacking again, I felt a bit abandoned, and it did produce a little bitterness, but I knew they were fulfilling their duties, different from mine, so I lived my live and waited for the day I'd get a phone call asking if I wanted to go backpacking.
I knew they'd call, that they'd be back, because "the guys" are the ones who will be there when the day gets ugly. When a sleeping bag is lost, they'll run two miles back the trail to find it, and when it isn't found, they'll share a cold night and their bag opened blanket style. When one has reached his limit, they'll sit and wait until has enough to go that last mile. When one pukes his guts out, they'll do what they can to ease his discomfort. When one makes a bad choice, one they've all made, and it causes a day's delay on beginning an extended trip, they help him clean up the mess and don't hold it against him. I knew they'd be back because they're "the guys." But, while I trust in the friendship of "the guys," I haven't much faith in their understanding of women.
Somewhere, there's a girl who will be delighted at the thought of a three week honeymoon.
Labels: Leaving, Travis Myers