Bread and Salt – Love in Time

            I was going to spend my time with you today shredding the Department of Motor Vehicles, since I just expended 5 hours total getting my Blah Blah. I was gonna mention how, if I ran a store with a line of fifty customers – but kept only 2 staff people at the counter – the business would shut down. If I wanted to talk about all the state funds that are wasted, yet I sat for 5 hours waiting for the single computer to open up Blah Blah…

            But let’s talk about LOVE…I once DeeJay’d (in a younger time) a beautiful wedding in Stratford. The young couple had Polish roots, and one ceremony I was privileged to emcee at the reception was the Bread and Wine ceremony; the young couple invited their parents to a table at the center of the floor and shares wine with them as a sign of love and appreciation. Then the parents pick up the bread, in hopes that the young couple will always have food on their table, and then sprinkle the bread with salt, symbolizing that there will be hard times ahead, but if the couple can somehow look into the future and realize this as a part of marriage, their love will bear out.

            And what young newlywed can possibly realize the pressure life puts on a married couple. “Can we live together, will he drive me crazy, should we have kids now, what school, how much religion, did the teacher really yell at my kid, sex, money, house…” on and on. Lots of salt. I’m sure the young couple saw the salt as salt last Saturday, and nothing more.

            How can you explain married life to anyone who hasn’t been there? I feel like an idiot most of the time preaching to my own kids about how rough life can get. But I wouldn’t have listened at 21 either. A river, over time, will destroy a mountain and carve a canyon. Life, like the river, is unyielding, and bashes our spirits until we sometimes seem to become different people. I wonder how I look at my wife now, how we have both changed as a result of all that “life-bashing”.

            And I thought that if you just look at the battered facade – just see the change – you’ll grow to hate her, because she’s not what you married, she may hate the world now when at one time she was an eternal optimist. And she may hate what you’ve become – a man irritated with those that get everything for nothing, a complainer, a former idealist now given up on everything. A former dreamer who realizes that life can crush those dreams.

            But I don’t look at her that way – I still see only the glow that entranced me 22 years ago. I know that if given the chance by the world she’d be the girl I fell in love with when she opened the dormitory door. And I’m still here – inside. Maybe we’re both just sick of the world by now – tired of the mundane, tired of the bills, tired of responsibility. It’s almost like we used to share the world – wanted to LIVE it – and now that has us really down, and we don’t like the misery we share often. Yet I still see her, in brief glimpses, as the smiling, optimistic naive 18 year old who promised to vote for me for freshman class President. So I know it is still there – her True Self – and I’ll always love her for it.

            That’s the lesson of the Salt. Once the salt hits many couples bail out on each other  -lose sight; the grass always looks greener…

            If I were to make a speech to the young couple newly married…”Remember what you love about each other, and help each other to foster THAT, despite the Salt. Never lose sight of what you love, and if you do – look deeper. It’s always there. There will be horrible times when you grow sick of each other and sick of the world. Remember that this girl sacrificed her life for you because she loves you, even to this day. And you did the same for her. Step back and find each other again. You’ll never have a deeper love. Always remember.”

            Oh, and stay the hell out of the DMV, if you could avoid it. It’s leaves a nasty taste.