The signs were always there, but I ignored them. It wasn’t what I wanted to see.
In October 1974, after Sara and I had moved in together in the cabin at AWR, I took a picture of her sitting on the steps. Her short blonde hair was curly and unkempt and she was wearing blue jeans and a faded mauve sweatshirt. She wasn’t looking at the camera, rather resting her chin on her hand looking off to the right, keeping an eye on her active toddler. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone looked so bored, but I ignored it.
In January, she and I went, along with her toddler Kyla, to visit Louise and Pat, two women we’d met at the retreat earlier. Theirs was an amazing love story. Both had been married with children, and Louise was teaching women’s studies night classes at a college in their hometown. Pat said she’d been restless and unhappy and thought the class might be just what she needed. She signed up, showed up, and stayed afterwards to ask Louise some questions. They ended up going for coffee and stayed out in the wee hours of the morning talking. They immediately knew they’d found their soul mates, and Pat quickly left her husband. Louise, afraid she’d lose her kids, didn’t leave her husband for a few months, but they ended up together.
On a visit to the retreat in November, Louise and Pat were in the main house talking when Sara and Kyla arrived. I hadn’t seen them for at least a month. The first thing I did was kneel down and scoop Kyla up in my arms. Later when I visited Louise and Pat in their cabin, they expressed surprise that I hadn’t grabbed Sara and kissed her. I explained that I wasn’t ever sure what her reaction would be and knew that Kyla was glad to see me, so hugged her.
Louise and Pat decided we needed to get away together, so we scheduled a weekend away that January. Romantics that they were, they took Kyla so Sara and I could be alone. Together. Of course, I was feeling quite romantic, having not seen her for a month. She pushed me away and asked if that was all I thought about. Honestly, I thought about it a lot.
What I didn’t think about was that while I had left my husband, she had not left hers. She’d gone back to care for her husband’s dying mother, giving her the opportunity to die in a home instead of a hospital. Sara and her mother-in-law had not had a good relationship in the best of times, and that was not the best of times. It was very stressful and, looking back, I didn’t put myself in her shoes, didn’t appreciate what her day-to-day life was like. I was her lover, but not her friend.
Eventually Louise and Pat left Pennsylvania for a small town in the far north of New York State, near the Canadian border. I think of them often and hope they are still in love and together.
Ironically, my divorce was finalized on February 14th. That was also the day Sara’s mother-in-law died. I called Sara the next day to see how she was doing and to see if she planned on returning to the retreat. She told me she was coming back around the first of March, but that she wanted to see other people. She didn’t want to be married and felt like that was what I wanted. I didn’t, I said, but I did.
As I’ve said before, my parents lived a great love story, and everyone in the family wanted something like that for themselves, me included. I kept trying to make people fit that ideal for me, romanticizing them, fussing over them until I suffocated each one. Almost every woman I got involved with eventually had enough and left me. Of course the fact that I pushed until they left meant I was able to view myself as the hero of my own story.
Sara moved back to the retreat and into our cabin. I believed she would come to her senses and realize how wonderful I was. Yeah, that didn’t happen. One Friday night she stayed at a party in the barn until almost 2am. I had gone to bed early so I could watch Kyla who was sleeping in her baby bed in the cabin. Sara had planned on going to the doctor with me Saturday morning, but she was in no condition to go. I woke her up before I left so that she could take care of the baby.
My best friend at the retreat was Malia’s girlfriend Diane. Straight women often think lesbians are attracted to every woman. My goodness, how exhausting that would be! I was never attracted to Diane. She was my buddy. We shot pool together, drank together.
I was devastated when I learned that Sara and Diane were attracted to each other and wanted to sleep together. Their “date” was set for a Sunday night, after our weekend guests had left. Sunday afternoon, Diana and I took several guests over to the ice races at a nearby lake. Every Sunday locals raced VWs around a track in the middle of a frozen lake, and this particular day one of our friends was racing. We were having a great time, when one of the women visiting the retreat talked about what a good relationship Diane and I had. It was good, she said, to see two women involved with each other who were so comfortable together.
We told her we weren’t a couple, and she asked who we were involved with. I told her I’d been involved with Sara, but Diane and she were getting together that night. The visitors were astonished that we could remain friends with that hanging over our heads. I still loved Sara as a girlfriend, but I loved Diane as a buddy, I told them. Then they asked Diane how she could do that to me. I let her handle that question. I don’t recall her answer, just that she was embarrassed.
After the races, Diane and I went to Northwoods where I was entered in a pool tournament. I was up against some pretty tough looking women, but ended up winning the tournament on an impossible shot. Diane was right there with me, cheering me on as best friends do.
Pool aficionados will appreciate this. We were playing eight ball, and I was down to my last shot. I had to at least hit the eight ball or I’d lose. The other woman managed to place the cue ball so it had one of her balls between it and the eight ball. She and her friends were already celebrating when I pulled off a shot I could never repeat and don’t understand to this day. I managed to pop the cue over her ball so it hit the eight ball which dribbled into the corner pocket. Needless to say, I retired from tournament pool immediately, realizing it was a once in a lifetime shot. I wasn’t that good.
Elizabeth had gone to Colorado to visit her family, so I said I would stay in her room so Diane and Sara could have their date in my cabin. Diane lived with Malia and didn’t have a separate room of her own. That was one of the worst nights of my life. I couldn’t go to sleep, but kept getting up to look at the cabin. They left the porch light on all night. I kept thinking “what are they doing that they don’t see that the porch light is on?” but I didn’t really want to know. The next day Diane couldn’t look me in the eye. I changed the sheets and turned off the porch light.
Sara and I made love one time after that. For me it was definitely angry sex. She moved into her own room which was larger and had a separate room for Kyla. I didn’t unclench my stomach for the next three months.
I am glad that I can look back on those times thirty plus years ago and not feel that anguish still. I believe I got it mostly right – Sara and Diane are still my friends. I was not the hero or the victim and neither of them was a villain. We were all trying to find ourselves, to learn to hear our own voices in our head. I am a better person for knowing them and loving them. They are part of the mosaic that makes up my life’s story.
©2010 jgschenck
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