Sad but sad
The other night when having a discussion, my wife said that I may be
“missing some critical empathic quality” that she needs in a husband.
This makes me sad as I also fear it may be true.
I’ve always felt like an outsider in almost everything.
I remember back in college someone once asked one of my friends what he’d
do if aliens landed.
“I’d say ‘Frank, your mail is here!’” he replied.
And, it’s true, I’m not good with other people’s feelings.
I can figure them out. But, it is an intellectual experience for me.
I can sit there, examine the inputs, examine the outputs and derive the
process that led one to be the other.
But, that’s not the same as feeling what they feel.
I can see water go into one end of something, steam come out the other, I
can figure out things are getting heated in between. But, that doesn’t
make me feel hot.
It makes me very sad. I have known for a long time now that our problems
could be due to a lack in me. Something that I just can’t perceive and
therefore can’t do anything about. It’s like asking a blind person to sort
things by color. There is only so much you can fake by feeling the
texture, or how hot they get in the sun. There’s no amount of training
that will make you be able to see the color.
It doesn’t matter how much I cook for her, do the laundry, buy her flowers,
take her places, write her stories, hold her or say I love her.
It doesn’t matter how much I love her, how important she is to me, or how
much I need her.
If she needs something I can’t even detect, then I’m not going to be able
to give it.
12 years ago I was able to rationalize what she did by saying “she was 9000
miles away, surrounded by people who acted like assholes, for 6 weeks. It
wasn’t that I didn’t have what she need from me, but that she was too far
away to get it.”
This time, she was right next to me, and still didn’t get what she needed.
I can lament it has taken her 25 years to determine this.
I can hope it’s wrong and while I might not have all she would want, I do
have all she needs.
But, I don’t see anything I can do to change it if I don’t.