Unpacking My Baggage, Part 1

I grew up in a family that was as nuclear as it gets. I had a mom, a dad, an older brother and a younger sister. We did everything together, as a family. We ate dinner together every night (each with our own assigned seats). We kids participated in the same activities (Like band. Don't laugh.), and our parents were involved in those activities too. (Mom was president of the Band Boosters Club. Again, don't laugh.) 

We had so much fun together. Our nightly dinners usually involved lots of laughter. My father, brother and sister are real comedians, so there was never a dull moment. On weekends, my mother would find fun, inexpensive things for us to do as a family. Twice a year, we took family road trips to the east coast. 

Good things always just happened to our family. We had some snafus every once in a while, of course, but for the most part, we were well-behaved kids with two parents who loved us and loved each other. People used to call us the Brady Bunch. Like we were too good to be true.

My parents appeared to have a good marriage. They were affectionate with each other, and as we kids grew older and more independent, they started to build their own little life apart from us. They went on dates and took swing-dance lessons. On Friday nights they'd hang out with one of their many couple friends. Life was good.

So that's why, when they divorced this past year, the world as I knew it was swept up from under my feet.

Now that I'm older and know more of the story, I can see where some of the pitfalls were, all those years. I can see how tiny little molehills eventually turned into mighty mountains. I know that my parents never fought in front of us—never gave us any warning—because they wanted to protect us. And I know that, even though they told us over and over again that "divorce is not an option," it became one, simply because it just got to the point where it needed to be.

When I think back to the memories I have of our family during "the good ol' days," there's one that sticks out in my mind the most. We were in the kitchen, teasing Dad because he had this habit of leaving the cabinet doors open. We were all laughing hysterically about it, and then Dad came up behind Mom, wrapped his arms around her and kissed her on the neck. My siblings and I were horrified by this gesture of course, throwing out trash talk like, "Gross!", "Eww!", "Get a room!"

What I would give now, for my parents to be hugging and kissing in a kitchen full of open cabinet doors.

When you grow up in a household that has such a solid foundation, and when that foundation starts to give way and eventually crumbles into a million pieces... well, it can be a mess. So you clean up and build a new foundation. But you may not trust that new foundation very much. After all, you thought the old one was sturdy but it wasn't, so what's going to happen with this new one?

I'll stop speaking in metaphors now, but surely you can understand why I'm so conflicted about this whole love-and-marriage thing. I want it more than anything, but am afraid that it will someday go away like my parents' did.