10 years & counting, up or down

Reflections on marriage, and how the Barbie movie can still be great without changing anything

My husband David and I went to see the Barbie movie for our 10-year anniversary — a week and a day late, because that’s how life is right now, too busy for celebrating milestones, definitely too busy for the kind of reflection necessary for executing the most optimally poignant, meaningful, and heartfelt celebration. We chose the 11:15am showtime, which of course meant sharing the theater with a few other couples who, like us, had decided to blow off work and hang out with Barbie while the kids were in school. I don’t remember when was the last time we’d gone to see a movie together, but I’m sure it was in the time before reclining theater seats.

Barbie was every bit as good as I’d heard. It didn’t blow my mind — no new revelations, but a therapeutic dose of solidarity. The laugh of recognition, the tears of being seen and felt and understood…and hopeless, without answers, nevertheless. A friend complained to me that the movie didn’t offer any solutions; she saw it as a shortcoming of the film, not clearing a workable path forward, as if the only justification for making a film about patriarchy is to entirely solve the problem of patriarchy. Well, I’m not looking for any work of art to prescribe certain behaviors or point me in a direction, but I do place high value on a creative work that points to a precise spot on a (literal or figurative) map and says YOU ARE HERE. When we humans are clear-headed about where we are, we are capable of making wise, informed decisions about which direction to walk in. And I think Barbie did an excellent job of showing us where we are.

When the movie was over, David and I went to a local coffee shop and discussed it for 20 minutes or so, then went home and resumed our separate workdays. He enjoyed the movie, and his biggest criticism was “it’s not going to age well.” I wasn’t sure I agreed with that, but didn’t have any real points with which to argue against it. I was mostly relieved that he didn’t hate it, because I wasn’t going to have the stomach or the will to try to explain that it’s not his movie to love or hate, it’s there for him to listen. Or not listen. David is a good man, believes in equality for all races and genders, and has no interest in the subjugation of anyone…but when it comes to all the nuances of gender dynamics, believing the right things only gets you so far. I am still at times haunted by my memory of waking up on the morning of November 9, 2016, unable to move out of bed, eyes baggy from sobbing at the results of the election, and the sharpest pang of loneliness I had experienced in our relationship up to that point, when he kept trying to comfort me with phrases like, “The presidency doesn’t even matter that much,” and “It’s not going to be that bad.” He was trying to be sweet but all I heard was, I don’t have to feel this or care the way you do. I don’t have to be afraid, so I can’t process your fear as something real. This is an intellectual issue, not an emotional one. I felt like I couldn’t breathe, like the wind had been knocked right out of me, and like I couldn’t trust someone who was trying to fix the situation instead of just listening and absorbing my pain.

Now, a few more kicks in the gut later, for better or worse, we’ve moved into a different phase of our relationship. I wasn’t craving a deep conversation after the movie, was perfectly content to sip on my coffee, engage in some pretty surface-level musings about Barbie, and leave it at that. We didn’t talk about the kids, or our careers, didn’t do any planning for the future, not even a hint of reflection on ourselves or our relationship; we might have gone down a couple of pop culture rabbit holes on Google (i.e. What else has Margot Robbie acted in? Is U2’s residency at The Sphere really going to be all that? What kind of enterprising shenanigans is Taylor Swift up to this week?). We don’t need as much from each other these days…or we’re doing a better job of accepting what is and isn’t available, and getting the rest of what we need from other sources. To me, this feels so much more like a balanced partnership than the alternative: the constant power struggle of mutually exclusive needs set up in opposition to each other.

This is the spot where David and I got married 10 years ago, along the Sun River in Western Montana. I love this picture because there is so much nuance in the way that we're walking, the subtle differences in our posture and demeanor. I also love it because we're walking as two free-standing people, each with our own shape, direction, and desire, surrounded by a vast amount of space. If these two people keep walking in a straight line for ten years, where do they end up? How close or how far from each other?

I've been thinking a lot about long-term partnership lately, what it means and doesn't mean, what it can be, what it should(n't) be. As usual, I have more questions than answers, but questions have always been the gas in my engine. I love them more than almost anything. I think as long as there is still a constructive question to be asked, then there is still a life — or a relationship, or an idea — worth fighting for.

No marriage, no relationship has to follow a prescribed path. We are in charge of our own destinies. We can change our lives, we can light them on fire, we can hold them tightly or loosely or let them softly go. We can wait them out for as long it takes to understand what's next. We can make the best use of the love that's there or decide it's not enough and walk away. We can walk together quietly or in constant conversation. We can hold hands sometimes, or never. We can let our shadows mingle, or not.

I am grateful for this journey and all the challenges it brings. And this year I am particularly proud of us for letting that vast amount of space move between us and nurture the parts of us as individuals that can't connect to each other or that wish to remain autonomous. You have to be brave to love in this way, but I believe in us.

.