Tonight I went to Jesse's house for dinner, and it was nice.
Aaannnd. Let's back up.
Remember diagramming sentences in grammar class? You can take the sentence at face value, but why, when you can over-analyze and read between the lines? (Which was, oh, such a thing of beauty for good little Type-A, word-nerd students like me!)
Time expression - subject - verb - preposition - direct object, etc.
Let's revisit my opener, shall we, with a little emotional dissecting:
Tonight (wow, so soon?), I (me?) went to Jesse's house (he has a house, and it's not our house?) for dinner (a civilized meal?), and it was nice (how can Jesse's house, dinner, and nice all be in one sentence?).
I know. But it was. And I'm here to tell the tale.
The dinner invitation came at me kind of sideways. Jesse was picking up Jonah this afternoon and he asked if I wanted to pick Jonah up from his house later on. A simple question, but to new exes, it's not so simple. I've only been to Jesse's house twice before, very briefly, and never for a social visit. I'm surprised with how easily I said, sure, that would work.
And so, very benignly, on a damp and dreary Monday night, with no fanfare, I went to my ex's for dinner.
It's weird, going to your ex's new place, where they are building a life without you. Things look familiar, now with new identities. The wool rug I found at a garage sale at a steal for our home, now lays invitingly in his entryway, looking brilliant against the Brazilian teak floor. The carved wooden Buddha that once had a home in our hallway sits in an alcove that seems custom made for it. The woven wall hanging that once hung in our kitchen now complements the dining room perfectly. A CD of one of my favorite groups wafting through this warm and cozy bungalow, greets me as I arrive. Traitors, all of them.
And, who doesn't casually -- yet as covertly as possible -- study the surroundings for clues to your ex's new life? The yoga flier on the refrigerator door (he's starting yoga again? who's he meeting there?), a dark chocolate gourmet candy bar (was this a gift from someone I know? did he buy it for himself?), the new towels in the bathroom (I wonder who else will use these one day?).
Suspicious much? I like to refer to it as inquisitive.
I also noticed what's not there -- all of my touches, a woman's touch. There are no plants, the magazines aren't fanned out on the coffee table like they would be if I were living there. The hand towel in the bathroom isn't smoothed and even. There are still unpacked boxes in the corner of the living room, all of Jesse's cookbooks stacked on the bar. And, there's still no highchair for Jonah, though I've reminded Jesse several times to stop by the kids' consignment store around the corner from his house to get one. With Jesse, Josh and David, Jesse's cousin, living there, it's a true bachelor pad. It's a little weird to see Jonah slip so smoothly into this environment, this men's den, and just hang like one of the guys -- pushing the broom around or playing ball with Josh on the stairs. Traitor. (What? I'm kidding! Sort of.)
We enjoyed a simple dinner of nachos, sort of a potluck affair, with my bringing the salsa and avocados. There we sat at our old kitchen table, a family of four, Jonah perched on my knee eating his fake nachos, saltines that he'd gingerly dip in ketchup (and, yes, he got something more nutritious than this for dinner). An outside observer would see two parents, two boys, enjoying a weeknight meal. Instead, I see two fragmented families: Jesse and Josh, Jonah and me.
After dinner, Jesse and I visited while the boys played. We exchanged news about the new nanny, Jesse's plans to see my mom tomorrow morning to return a table, my story about how some dear friends passed through town yesterday and how Jonah and I met them briefly at a Starbucks so that they could meet Jonah for the first time. Which. Is a story that I wouldn't have to have told if he had been there. If he had been home.
After about twenty minutes, I could sense it was time to go. No need to help with dishes, I was told. I'm a guest in his home, and he doesn't put guests to work that way. Instead, Jesse helped me gather my things and get Jonah buckled into the car, placing the half-used salsa jar in Jonah's diaper bag ("Don't forget this for your house!," he says cheerfully.). Emphasis on your.
It was so cold outside that there was no time for hugs. As I gingerly backed up and drove away, navigating the icy snow ruts in the road, I noticed Jesse in my rearview mirror, standing on his porch, waving goodbye, finally darting inside when he saw I was on my way. And when I refocused my eyes on the road ahead, I realized that, in a way, I was glad I came tonight. And, I was also glad to be headed to our home, just Jonah and me. Our home.
And I decided that this -- this little olive-branch dinner, this slowly growing okay-ness with living apart (albeit, a whopping five minutes away) -- is progress, no matter how it's dissected.
Just Jonah and me, in our home.
Listening to: So Are You To Me by Eastmountainsouth.
