It came apart. Some pieces were big chunks, others fragmented splinters. I was in my kitchen drinking coffee with my friend Tom as we listened to the sound of a circular saw slicing through wood and the groaning crunch of a crowbar yanking planks that had been nailed into joists decades ago. An era was about to pass.

I met Julie at the hospital.  I thought she was the unit secretary, not the program director of the eating disorder program.  I had been asked to do a consultation on that unit, and she caught my eye.  Weeks later, I was told to attend a hospital-wide marketing meeting.  The request seemed odd as I had never been asked to attend one in the many years I served as the medical director of the hospital’s substance abuse program.  However, I complied.

Julie walked in. She, too, had never been asked to this meeting. She was late, and only two open seats were available. One was next to the director of nursing, whom she couldn’t stand. The other one was next to me. She picked the lesser of two evils, and we struck up a conversation. It was then that it dawned on me that she was directing the eating disorder program and not the unit secretary. 

After the meeting, I returned to my unit and ran into my assistant medical director, Dr. Mary.  I asked her if she knew Julie, and she said she did.  She thought that she was dating a rich guy.  She also felt that she wouldn’t want to date a divorced man, especially one with a child.That would be me.  I’m not a person who quickly gives up on hearsay.  I summoned up junior high Mike and came up with a plan and sent Mary over to the eating disorder unit to do some reconnaissance work.  A short time later, Mary returned with the news that the rich boyfriend was on the way out.  In her hand was Julie’s phone number.

Our first date was to a Vietnamese restaurant, followed by a drive down Lake Shore Drive in my Mustang GT convertible. I was cooler then than I am now.  Our second date was to a movie. Our third date was at my house.  I invited her over for dinner.  She said she would bring dessert.

Dear Reader, I have been a reasonably competent cook for most of my life. However, I did not cook much at that time. I was working endless hours, and most of my meals were consumed in hospital cafeterias or purchased at fast-food joints. 

I wanted to serve a nice dinner, but at the same time, it had to be simple.  That was a psychological move; something too elaborate could have been intimidating, so I decided on a “guy” meal, steak.  I bought most of the ingredients days before, but I realized that I needed a starch shortly before Julie arrived.  I ran to the corner and bought two huge potatoes from the convenience store.  I’m sure I paid triple what I would have at a regular market, but I was running out of time and needed those spuds. The menu was set: steak, baked potatoes, tossed salad, green beans, and warm dinner rolls.

I bought my house several years earlier, mainly to have a stable place for my daughter, who was then on an every-other-week schedule.  It was a standard two story suburban Georgian style popular in the 1980s.  Over the years, I was slowly improving it, and I was currently in the process of a project where I was adding French doors to the dining room and two decks joined by a little bridge at the back of the house.  I had contracted with one of the counselors at my unit who was doing side work with an experienced general contractor.

I debated on how to set the table.  Too casual would look like I didn’t care, but I didn’t want to appear to be too Martha Stewart, either.  I settled on using my favorite Fiestaware on top of placemats instead of a tablecloth. I fancied up the setup with some candles and flowers to set a tone. The sound of hammers accompanied my efforts as the crew continued to work on my deck project.  Jerry, addictions counselor turned temporary construction worker, soon noticed my efforts.  “Doc, are you having a lady friend over for dinner tonight?”  “Yep,” I replied.  Just as I had to think of Jerry in a different role, the look on his face suggested that he had to adjust to the idea that I had a life outside my medical role at the hospital.  After a brief pause, he smiled and said, “Great, have a nice time.”  I nodded and continued my preparations.

My next task was to pick some dinner music.  This was in the era of CDs, and I had one of those fancy CD changes that could hold 5 discs in a cassette allowing for hours of continuous play. I picked some of my favorite straight ahead jazz. 

Back in Wheaton, Julie was dealing with her food decisions.  One of her nurses gave her a recipe for a raspberry cheesecake.  Julie was in the throes of making it when she realized she needed a springform pan.  She made a quick dash to her local hardware store and bought one at double the price of what she would have paid at Target.  However, time was of the essence. 

Back at home, I was doing a final scan and realized that the towel in the powder room needed a change.  I’m usually obvious, but I caught it in time.  The stage was set. This was about the best that I could do.

The dinner went without a hitch.  The steak was done to perfection, the rolls were warm, and the green beans weren’t overcooked.  Julie’s cheesecake was enormous and could easily serve 10, but I wasn’t complaining as I love cheesecake.  We ate, and talked, and ate some more. I think both of us knew that this was no ordinary dinner and this was no ordinary date.

Many dates later, I proposed to Julie under the soft glow of the Christmas tree we had just decorated in my living room.

We married, and our lives continued. I eventually left my medical director job to direct other programs, and  Julie left her program director job to earn a PhD. After we were married, she decided to move into my house. Kids followed, adventures followed, and life followed.

My beautiful deck became aged, old, and decayed. It had been used less since we built a sunroom on the back of the house;its importance had faded. Now, my friend Tom’s construction crew was dismantling it. Tom and I talked and drank coffee as he barked out commands to his crew, ensuring that the job was done correctly. 

The process only took about 4 hours to complete. The boards were neatly stacked in Tom’s dumpster trailer. Eventually, the scarred earth under the former deck will be updated with a stone patio. I pondered how important the deck felt when I contracted to have it built and how unimportant it had become over the years.

When I’m camping in Violet, the camper van, my entire world is contained in a 75 square  feet.  Yet, I have everything that I need.  At home, I have duplicates and triplicates of everything.  Does that make me happy?  No, it may make me feel secure, but not happy.  Stuff is just stuff. The deck is gone, but the connection with Julie has lasted.  It has lasted through other remodels, three more children, good times and rough times, and health and sickness.

Dear reader, relationships require work, compromise, empathy, and more work.  It is important to be able to look in a mirror, laugh at yourself and not take yourself too seriously.  A relationship is not about who is right or in control; it is about working together.  How to support each other. How to find common goals while retaining individuality. How to continue to help each other despite unforeseen roadblocks. 

In many ways, these expectations are the same for any significant relationship, including those with children and friends. Yet, some of the criteria are a bit different. Expectations need to be adjusted with parents and small children vs. parents and adult children vs. a marriage relationship, vs a friendship. However, the above guidelines still apply. 

We are told that romantic relationships should be magical.  The infusion of the pleasure chemical, dopamine, fuels many new relationships.  That honeymoon period is there for a reason.  It is biologically built in for the sole purpose of passing on genetic material to a new generation.  This is an essential process, but it is short lived.  Like anything else that is worth having, relationships require work.  Sadly, how many approach such connections with a “What have you done for me lately” position?  How many look to others to fulfill them instead of looking inward to what they need to do to feel more complete? How many are sold the bill of goods that they can substitute stuff for connections with others? 

My deck is now gone and almost forgotten.  It was just “stuff.”  I don’t miss it; I have more important things to do with the people I care about in my life.

Peace

Mike