famous mistakes
who hasn’t made a misstep (or several) in pursuit of love?
a lot of life seems to be about making mistakes. we might as well learn from them…maybe even learn to smile a bit, or even laugh about them as time goes on…forgive ourselves and others a little…
since it’s valentine’s day…
who hasn’t made a misstep (or several) in pursuit of love?
a curious story…
one afternoon I was roaming around some backroads in Georgia. I did a double-take when I saw a small sign set off to the side of the road.
nudist resort, it proclaimed. now I am decidedly not the sort, but something drew me and I took the turn down the gravel road out of curiosity.
after half a mile, I saw the gated entrance and stopped to chat with the pleasant middle-aged woman at the booth. she was not what I expected a nudist to be like.
it was a family-friendly club, she assured me and offered me a tour on her golf cart. thankfully, as her guest, I was welcome to keep my attire.
she answered my many questions and tried to allay my fears. after we toured the campground, she introduced me around to a handful of ‘safe’ people who would put me at ease. I sat poolside and chatted and observed this new world.
after awhile, I saw a man smiling at me from across the way, hoping to get my attention. he came over and took a chair nearby. turns out it was his 1st time there, as well. he had also come on a whim when he saw the sign. we compared impressions.
he asked if I’d like to have dinner sometime…in clothed society. I said yes and took his number.
we became friends over the next few months, having dinner when he was in town.
an unexpected story emerged from those conversations…
he had been going through a very rough patch. his wife of 13 years had filed for divorce. she had 3 children when they met and he had helped raise them. but once they were of age, she discarded him. not only that, but she had squandered their savings and she had failed to pay their taxes for the last 5 years. the IRS was closing in and he was breaking under the pressure and the shocks.
the day that we met was going to be his last day of life, in fact.
(we were set up to meet…but not for the reasons one would think)
his plan was to go off into the woods and shoot himself, when he saw the same sign and thought ‘what the heck!’ and turned in. somehow our conversation pushed his plan to the side.
then he told me the whole story of their relationship…
he had met a psychic who told him that he was going to meet a dark-haired woman with 3 children. she went into some detail. six months later, he met the woman she described!
wonder of wonders! the psychic was right!
a whirlwind courtship followed, they married and he devoted his life to them.
I listened intently...and then it struck me.
I asked him again to recount all that the psychic had told him.
the missing piece?
the psychic had said that they would meet…
I asked, ‘but did the psychic say that you should marry the woman?’
the light bulb moment came when he confessed that she hadn’t.
he had supplied the rest.
he assumed…and so did she. blinded by what they thought and hoped was guidance from above. (as often happens in churches, as well!)
a very painful misstep.
our friendship was enough to help him through. he worked things out with the IRS and got through the divorce. he picked up where he had left off when he accidentally took the exit ramp and got back onto the highway of his life.
most of us have some variation of that story. a mistake no worse or better than any other mistake, but society makes it so.
forgive yourself, learn all you can and keep moving forward. nothing is wasted in life ultimately…
“Love easily confuses us because it is always in flux between illusion and substance, between memory and wish, between contentment and need.”
“When two people meet and fall in love, there’s a sudden rush of magic. Magic is just naturally present then. We tend to feed on that gratuitous magic without striving to make any more. One day we wake up and find that the magic is gone. We hustle to get it back, but by then it’s usually too late, we’ve used it up. “ tom robbins
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